Chapter 37 Alina #2
Then, a shaft of sunlight broke through from a narrow crevice high above, piercing the gloom and striking the pool ahead. It shimmered with a brilliance so intense that it looked like a reservoir of ethereal magic—alive, glowing, otherworldly.
I stepped closer.
My foot caught on a jagged rock.
I crashed hard, slamming into the cave wall with a sickening crack. Pain exploded in my skull as I crumpled to the ground. A cry tore from my lips just as the edges of my vision blurred and the cave seemed to ripple around me like heat over stone.
“Alina!” Jack’s voice rang out.
He dropped beside me, his panic unmistakable. “Are you okay?”
I blinked, trying to make sense of the shadows swirling around me. My hand trembled as I reached the back of my head and felt warmth. Wet, sticky warmth.
When I pulled my fingers away, they were coated in blood. Thick. Hot. Crimson.
“I’m… not sure,” I whispered.
Jack yanked off his backpack and unzipped it in one swift motion. “I’ve got it. Don’t move.” He tore open the medical kit, slipping on latex gloves before grabbing gauze and a bottle of saline. Working quickly and with surprising steadiness, he cleaned the wound, his brow furrowed in concentration.
“It doesn’t look too bad,” he murmured. “But we should head back. Omar’s a trained paramedic—he’ll get you stitched up properly and we’ll return after—”
“No.” I cut him off. “We can’t stop now.”
I screamed as he cinched the bandage tight around my head.
He gritted his teeth and reached for my arm to lift me. “Alina, you’re bleeding. Please. Let’s go, get you checked, and then—”
A sliver of sunlight shifted across his face, painting him in a ghostly pallor. The shadows danced behind him, wild and unrelenting, twisting his features into something almost unrecognizable—like a warning.
Then I felt it.
A sudden rush of warmth.
I looked down.
My khakis were soaked—warm liquid spreading too quickly, too fast.
Jack’s eyes widened in horror.
“No. No, no, no… what the—?” he stammered, his face draining of color.
My heart seized.
“My water broke!” I screamed, the words ripping out of me. “I’m going to have the baby—right now! It can’t be happening! It just can’t!”
I collapsed against the cave wall, my breaths coming in shallow, panicked gasps. Pain shot through me like fire, every nerve on edge, every muscle tensed with terror.
“This is all your fault!” I shrieked at Jack, spitting the words like venom. “You insisted I keep this baby!”
Grief, fury, and desperation boiled inside me, and without thinking, I grabbed at my belly, eyes wild. My hand closed around a jagged rock on the cave floor.
If I ended it now… if I stopped this…
I raised the rock, intent on ending the life inside me.
Jack lunged, seizing my wrist just in time.
“No, Alina!” he shouted. “Don’t do this! You’re stronger than this—you can get through it!”
I thrashed in his grip, knocking the lantern across the cave. It crashed against the wall and went out in an instant.
The light vanished.
We were plunged into darkness.
A guttural cry tore from my throat as another contraction ripped through me. I clutched my belly, breath ragged, trying to remember what the birthing coach had taught me—to breathe, to focus—but everything was chaos.
Jack tried to soothe me, but his words were hollow echoes in the dark. He felt oppressive. Useless.
I wasn’t ready. I had never been prepared.
“I can’t do this,” I muttered, my voice shaking, almost lost beneath my shallow breathing.
But even as I said it, I knew the truth.
There was no way out.
The baby was coming—whether I wanted it or not.
Then, the cave shifted.
The temperature dropped.
A sudden, suffocating stillness fell around us.
And just like that, the last sliver of sunlight vanished from the crevice above. The eclipse had begun. The Eclipsarum Obscura swallowed the world in unnatural night.
The cave pulsed with energy—chaotic, ancient, alive.
I clutched my stomach as another wave of agony tore through me, my body rebelling, my soul trembling.
“No!” My screams ricocheted off the cave walls as I fought against the contractions tearing through me—an unforgiving clash between my will and the forces of nature. I cursed God, fate, and every soul who had led me here, while the shadows of the eclipse pressed down like a suffocating veil.
At the peak of the eclipse, a final, primal cry tore from my throat as the child burst from my body. Darkness swallowed the cave whole. Every droplet that fell into the stone basin echoed like a funeral drumbeat. A chill swept through the chamber—one that whispered of death.
The baby wailed as Jack fumbled to hold her. “She’s here, Alina. She’s here. Keep pushing. The placenta—you need to deliver it now.”
The lantern suddenly flared, casting a jarring light.
And there, at my side, lay a black dagger etched with arcane symbols, its blade slick with shadow.
A dark mist bled from its edge, coiling into a formless entity before vanishing, sucked away by an invisible force.
My heart raced in terror as I understood what I had unknowingly unleashed—a force of evil, just like me.