A Creed Country Christmas by Linda Lael Miller

at once placid and stalwart. “But this could take a while. You’ll have to be as brave as you can.”
    Rose-of-Sharon bit down hard on her lower lip, nodded, her skin glistening with perspiration, her eyes catching Juliana’s, begging. Hold on tight , they seemed to say. Don’t let me go .
    “I’m here,” Juliana said, in the same tone she’d used when one of the children was sick or frightened in the night. She squeezed Rose-of-Sharon’s small hand. “I’m right here, Rose-of-Sharon, and I’m not going anywhere.”
    The words, spoken so quietly, were at complete odds with her every instinct. Given her druthers, Juliana would have jumped up and run out into the snow, turning in blind, frantic circles, gasping at air and screaming until her throat was raw.
    What was calming her?
    Surely, it was necessity, at least in part. Tom’s quiet confidence helped, too. In the main, though, it was knowing Lincoln was there, feeling his presence through the skin of her back, as surely as she felt the heat from the stove.
    He seemed as strong and immovable as any of the mountains rising skyward in the distance.
    Tom asked for a basin, once the water had been heated, and instructed Lincoln to prepare more. Juliana bathed Rose-of-Sharon, helped her into her spare nightgown, while Tom removed the soiled sheets, replacing them with a blanket.
    And Rose-of-Sharon’s travails continued.
    Between keening screeches of pain, her body straining mightily, she rested, eyes closed, pale lips moving constantly in wordless prayer or protest.
    The light shifted, dimmed, became shadow-laced.
    Lincoln lit lanterns. Left the cabin again to make sure the children were all right and the barn chores got done.
    Juliana, as preoccupied with tending to Rose-of-Sharon as she was, barely breathed until he came back.
    It was well into the night when the crisis finallycame; too exhausted to scream, Rose-of-Sharon convulsed instead, her eyes rolling back into her head, her back curved high off the mattress in an impossible arch.
    The baby slipped from her then, a tiny, bluish creature, soundless and still.
    Tom caught the little form in his cupped hands.
    Was the child dead? Juliana waited to know, felt Lincoln waiting, too.
    And then Tom smiled, grabbed up one of the discarded blankets and wrapped the baby in a clean corner of the cloth. “Welcome, little man,” he said. “Welcome.”
    The infant boy squalled, such a small sound. So full of life and power.
    Tears slipped down Juliana’s cheeks.
    Rose-of-Sharon, spent as she was, seemed lit from within, like a Madonna. She reached out for the baby, and Tom laid him gently in her arms.
    “Get Ben,” Rose-of-Sharon murmured. “Please get my Ben.”
    Juliana heard the door open as Lincoln rushed to do the girl’s bidding, felt a rush of cold air, and shielded mother and child from the draft as best she could. Only minutes later, Lincoln returned with the new father.
    Ben approached the bed slowly, a man enthralled, hardly daring to believe his own eyes.
    “Come see,” Rose-of-Sharon said, the last shreds of her strength going into her wobbly smile. “Come and see your son, Ben Gainer.”
    The room seemed to tilt all of the sudden, and the world went dark. Juliana was barely aware of being lifted out of her chair next to the bed, bundled tightly into her cloak, lifted into strong arms.
    Lincoln’s arms.
    She felt his coat enfold her, too, the way it had in the wagon, on the way out from town. “I’ve got to stay,” she managed to say, blinking against the blinding fatigue that had risen up around her between one moment and the next. “They’ll need—”
    “Hush,” Lincoln said.
    Even in the bitter cold, she felt only the warmth of him as he carried her through the snow and into the main house. A single lantern burned in the middle of the kitchen table, but the room was empty. What time was it?
    “The children…?”
    “Theresa put them to bed hours ago,” Lincoln said, making no move to