Chapter 39 Bronwen
Bronwen
The child grew heavy inside me, stretching skin and space until there was almost nothing left for me to call my own. The days blurred together—meals and parties, eyes tracking my every movement, Carrow whispering soft threats against my belly like bedtime stories.
But the visions never stopped.
They came without warning—sometimes in sleep, sometimes in the middle of a sentence, leaving me gasping like I’d been pulled through time itself.
In one, I saw Aros, regal and radiant, standing tall as fae warriors knelt before him.
One by one, he called them forward—not to reward them, but to sacrifice them.
Each soul fed into the blade like kindling.
And each time, the magic darkened. I could see it in the steel.
In the stone. In the sky above, which turned redder with every offering.
Another vision came in firelight—Carrow, still young, still a servant, watching from the shadows with wide, hungry eyes. Not at the magic or the blade, but at the way they looked at Aros.
Carrow soaked in every moment of it.
I saw him older—maybe only a decade had passed, or maybe hundreds of years.
The buildings, the language, and the fashion changed around them, but he had stopped aging.
Still in servant’s clothes, but no longer watching.
He was acting. I watched his hands steal into Aros’s tent under cover of night. I saw the blade in his hands.
He didn’t hesitate as he drove it into Aros’s chest.
And for the first time, he looked alive. But a witch stood in the shadows. She stepped forward as if summoned by the act, her eyes glowing gold. “You will die within a year.”
That was the price.
He had traded immortality for power.
In the most recent vision, I saw him in Joveryn still clinging to the last threads of mortality. He moved through the town like a shadow, but he watched her.
She practiced magic in the woods, always alone. She screamed into the night, into the wind, at a family that didn’t understand her. Her disdain festered like a wound. He waited. Stalked. Learned her schedule, her weaknesses, her loneliness.
And then he offered her something in return.
Power.
Her name was lost to time now, but I saw her clearly—emerald eyes, ivory skin, thick curls as black as night, hands that shook when she touched the blade for the first time.
My ancestor.
She helped him create the spell. She poured her magic into it. She believed him, and together, they created the vampires and shifted the world.
Now, I sat curled in the corner of my cell, my arms wrapped protectively around the weight of my belly. My back pressed to the cold stone wall, and I let my eyes slip shut, trying to block out the ache that throbbed low in my spine.
“Your grandparents would have loved you,” I whispered.
“Your grandmother would have cooked you the best food, and your grandfather would have let you pet the horses. And your father… he would have spoiled you so much.” A tear fell down my cheek.
“We would have argued about it nonstop, I’m sure.
But I wish I could have seen the two of you together.
He deserves to be here. To see how much you’d love him. How much I love him.”
I had to get us out of here. Mama said I used to speak to Adar in my mind. August believed it was true. So I breathed slowly and tried to find Adar.
I pictured his face. Not just his features, but the feel of him.
The way he always smelled like old paper and pine.
The steadiness in his eyes when the world around us cracked.
I remembered the sound of his laugh, the quiet cadence of his voice when he corrected me as we sparred.
I pulled all of it close, like string I could wind through my fingers.
Please.
My breath hitched. Please, Adar. If you can hear me—
The first pain came like lightning, a white-hot spear ripping through my core.
It tore through me, sharp and brutal, yanking the air from my lungs and cutting off the thought with a scream I couldn’t hold back. I doubled over, clutching my belly as a second wave followed, even more vicious than the first, leaving my vision spotted and my breath ragged.
No. No, not now.
I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t strong enough. I needed more time—just a little more time. But the baby had made its choice, indifferent to my pleading.
My time was up.
The cell door crashed open with a sound that rattled the walls.
Servants rushed in as if they’d been told I would break tonight.
Maybe they had. Maybe he’d known before I did.
I tried to resist, to brace myself against the pain long enough to fight back, but my legs had given out hours ago.
They lifted me from the floor like I weighed nothing, my limbs dangling uselessly as they carried me down the narrow corridor.
One of them murmured, “Careful, careful—she’s too far along. ”
I barely registered where we went. Just the change in air.
The cold stone gave way to soft lantern light and the faint scent of lavender and something iron-rich.
The room they brought me was one I had never seen before.
It felt too clean. Too prepared. A basin steamed in the corner.
Herbs smoldered in a clay dish. The air was too warm.
They laid me on a bed that creaked under my weight, and another wave of pain struck so hard I thought my vision had fractured. A woman stepped forward through the haze—older, lined with time, but her hands didn’t shake.
But it was Carrow who drew the eye.
He stood just beyond the ring of light, unmoving.
I could feel his presence more than I could see it—something heavy pressing into the air.
He hadn’t blinked once. I felt his gaze through every contraction, cold and exacting, more invasive than the hands pressing against my skin.
He watched my stomach like it was a vessel of gold being pried open.
Not for me. Not for life. For what was inside.
Hands clasped behind his back as if in reverence. But it wasn’t reverence. It was restraint. Barely.
His eyes burned into my belly.
“Do not let my son die,” he said simply.
The son.
The healer didn’t look at him. Just gave a small, cold nod before pressing a hand to my stomach. Her fingers were warm and firm. “Breathe,” she said.
I tried, but the pain came. And it didn’t stop.
Time dissolved. I didn’t know if hours passed or minutes. I couldn’t see. I couldn’t think. I could barely remember who I was. There was only pain, and the memory of August’s touch in the moments before we’d created this life. That was what I held on to.
I pushed with what strength I could find, each contraction wrenching a groan from deep in my chest. Sweat soaked my hairline, my hands gripping the sheets until my knuckles ached.
The healer’s voice cut through the haze, sharp but steady, urging me on.
I wanted to stop, to curl away from the pain, but her tone left no room for disobedience.
I faded in and out—sweat-soaked and trembling. The healer barked commands I couldn’t understand. Someone dabbed my forehead with a cloth. My heart stuttered more than once. But I didn’t beg. Not even when I thought I was going to die.
And then—
A sound.
For a second, I thought I was hallucinating, that my own voice was echoing back at me—broken, reshaped, and unrecognizable. But then it came again, cutting through the haze.
A cry. A baby’s cry.
My baby’s cry.
My chest felt as if it cracked wide open. The tidal wave of sound washed away the pain, and none of it mattered anymore. The only thing that existed in that moment was that sound.
“It’s a girl, Your Grace,” someone said, the words seeming to float through the air.
A girl. A beautiful, perfect girl.
Mine.
I tried to lift my head. Everything ached. My chest felt like it was caved in. But I had to see her.
“No!” Carrow’s scream tore through the room like a curse.
I forced my head up from the pillow, blinking through tears and blood and light. “Let me hold her.”
The healer turned to me, but Carrow was already moving.
He crossed the room in seconds and snatched the baby from the healer’s arms. Not with care. Not with awe.
With fury.
“Give her to me,” I gasped, one arm lifting despite the fire in my side.
I tried to push myself up, but my arms shook and gave out. My body wouldn’t move the way I needed it to—not fast enough. Tears spilled freely now, hot and blinding.
She was mine. She was mine, and he was taking her away.
“Please.” My voice cracked. “She’s mine.”
He stepped back, holding her as if she were a spoiled meal. His face was twisted in something worse than rage—disgust.
“Give her to me.”
He turned fully to face me. “I have no use for a girl.”
* * *
Days passed.
I didn’t know how many. No one came other than a servant to give me food, but I refused to eat.
I curled around the emptiness in my body and stared at the wall, my arms wrapped tight around myself as if that could replace what had been taken. My daughter. My child. Ripped from me before I even held her.
I didn’t cry anymore. I couldn’t. My tears had dried. My throat had cracked. My heart had shattered and left nothing in its place.
He hadn’t come back.
I thought maybe he’d left me to rot. That maybe this was the end after all.
Then the door creaked open. Carrow stepped in, perfectly composed, as if he hadn’t stolen my baby.
“Where is she?” My voice sounded foreign. I hadn’t heard it in days.
His eyes swept over me, and he smiled.
“I’ve decided,” he said casually. “I want to try again.”
My blood went cold.
He stepped closer. “I can’t stop thinking about it. The idea of a half-witch, half-vampire vessel. It’s too… intriguing. Too perfect to waste.”
I stared up at him, hollow and shaking. “I would rather die.”
His smile faded.
He crouched in front of me, close enough that I could smell the copper on his breath. “Then I’ll force-feed you if I have to,” he whispered. “I’ve done worse for less.”
I tried to shove him away, but my arms barely lifted. My strength was gone. He grabbed me by the throat and shoved me back against the wall with a sudden violence that knocked the air from my lungs.
“You will rest,” he hissed, “and when you’re healed enough, I’ll be back to try again.”
He let go, and I crumpled. I couldn’t stay here. He couldn’t touch me again. I had to do something. Anything.
I closed my eyes and pictured my brother again.