Page 112 of A Kingdom of Wild and Power
It struck without warning, sharp and violent. Mal gasped and doubled over, her hands flying to her stomach as though she could cradle the agony itself.
‘What’s wrong?’ Ash demanded, fear flashing across his face.
‘I don’t know…’ She tried to breathe, but it came in ragged bursts. ‘It hurts.’
Ash barked something at Morthos—orders, frantic and urgent—and together they half-carried her to her chamber. The bed loomed before her, and the moment her back touched the sheets she thought, foolishly, that the pain might ease.
It did not.
It deepened.
‘I think…’ Mal gritted her teeth as another wave tore through her. ‘I think the baby is coming.’
‘Your wa-water hasn’t broken,’ Ash said, his brow creasing as panic threatened to overtake him. ‘It’s too soon. I didn’t see—’
Mal’s gaze drifted to the far corner of the room.
The creature stood there, half-shadow, half-mockery, laughing softly to itself. Its eyes gleamed with wicked delight.
‘It seems,’ it purred, ‘your husband is not able to seeeverything.’
Mal wanted to scream at it, to command it to vanish, but another contraction ripped through her, stealing the air from her lungs. She cried out instead.
Morthos hurried about the room, fetching towels and basins of water with shaking hands. Ash knelt at her side and took her hand, gripping it tightly, as though by sheer will he might anchor her to this world.
Moments later, her water broke.
And the pain only grew.
‘Something is wrong,’ she whispered, her eyes blown wide with terror. Her mother’s broken body flashed again and again behind her eyelids, a cruel refrain she could not silence. What if the same fate awaited her child? Her chest constricted; air would not come.
‘Mal, you n-need to breathe,’ Ash urged, fear etched into every line of his face.
She wanted to obey. Truly she did. But the pain was merciless, and grief was devouring her from the inside out. They paraded before her mind like spectres summoned to torment her.
Haven; crumpled upon the ground, neck twisted, black eyes emptied of life.
Kage; lost within the Underworld, frightened and alone.
And now their mother; sprawled upon the cold earth, blood trailing from her mouth into the sand as though the world itself had rejected her.
‘Don’t worry,’ the creature crooned from the corner, its voice silk and venom entwined. ‘As soon as the baby is born, I will keep it safe. You won’t have to trouble yourself.’
Another contraction tore through Mal and she cried out, the sound raw and animal.
‘Stay away from my baby,’ she gasped between fractured breaths.
‘What?’ Ash frowned, brushing damp strands of black hair from her burning forehead. ‘Mal, what’s wrong?’
Morthos hurried back into the chamber, and between the two of them they laid towels beneath her, wiping the sweat from her skin with trembling hands. Their touch was careful, desperate to help.
But none of it touched the true terror.
She wanted to scream at them to stop—that the towels, the water, the gentle hands were useless. That the true danger stood watching in the shadows, smiling with her own face.
She needed that creature gone.
She needed it torn from existence.
