Your mother had retreated into the shadows, gripping her gown with anxious hands. The monster she served followed your anxious gaze.
“She stays here,” he rasped, sounding nothing like the smooth and self-satisfied “King” of the demons he’d introduced himself before … before when?
How long had you been here? A day? A month? It felt endless and you wrapped an arm around John’s neck. “Please. She’s my mother,” you begged, “please, she has to come with us, she can’t stay here with him.”
“No,” your mother said suddenly, hurrying across the room, “no, my dear one you have to leave. Go now.” She nodded firmly, cupping your face. “You have to. We’ll see each other soon, but for now, you can’t-” her voice broke, but she carried on, “you can’t stay here. Go, let him heal. He has to be able to protect you.”
“Mama…” you were weeping and her jeweled fingers tried to wipe the tears from your cheeks. “I just found you.”
“Go now,” she moved into you, the odd pairing of your battered protector holding you and her pretty silk dress stained with his gore as she hugged you. “We’ll find each other again” she whispered in your ear, “I never gave up hope.”
“Neither did I,” you sobbed, “but you can’t stay here, not now.”
She kissed your forehead one last time, eyes wet. “Please keep her safe,” she said to John. You saw her first flash of fury when her mouth tightened. “Remember what I told you about this child.”
Your last glimpse of your Mama’s anguished face is tainted by the one of the furious monstrosity behind her.
John didn’t take you back to his desecrated mansion, to the Birdcage.
The smaller stone house he brought you to was set well back into the woods, the blackened birch trees and brittle pines struggling to shelter it. You’d cried silently during the ride there; your mother, your disgusting sire, John nearly losing to his son?Oh, dear lord, I am carrying this blood-drinker’s child!You thought,just like Mama.
Your shoulders were shaking as he helped you from the carriage, but for the first time when you wept, he said nothing, taking you inside. After seating you in a leather chair, he secured the thick oak door, pressing the iron bolts home.
You stared blankly out the window at the blackened trees until he knelt before you again.
“Oh…” you looked down to see the thing you’d been twisting mindlessly in your grief. “Here’s your hat. I’m sorry, it’s … uh…”
The Black Heart you’d known in the Birdcage would have punished you severely for this. You would not have left the tiny closet for a week. But John took it from you, examining the twisted brim before tossing it on the table.
The enormity of what you carried hit you again. You remembered the tales he’d told you about the vicious little fiends who tore loose from their human mother’s womb. But … youwereone. Nearly choking on your self-disgust, you found him leaning against the table arms folded and watching you closely.
“Tell me,” he said.
It was impossible to pretend.
“You made me pregnant. So, your child would rip free from me? But … Mama told me that I was different, even though that thing,” you hissed, the disgust and horror rising in your throat again, “that monster sired me? Stephen bragged that he was going to marry me. Get me with child. But he’s my-”
This time, you gagged and John was across the room in a moment, holding your shoulders as you heaved. You hadn’t eaten in … how long had you been in the grip of the Night Brethren? Enough that there was nothing to expel from your stomach.
“Little Bird.” He sounded almost sad, and he brought over a basin with a cloth, wetting it and running it over your face and hands. It felt good, real in a way the monster’s castle was not. He had taken care of you - and sometimes punished you - in many ways in the last decade. But here, his hands were gentle and John crooned a bit as you relaxed back into the chair.
“He said I wasn’t, that I was tainted.” Your laugh was bitter but his perfect features remained calm watching you carefully. “He said Mama was his father’s wh-”
“Shh….” He took your hands kissing one and then the other. “He lies. Even as a human, your mother’s status is elevated as the only one who gave birth to a halfling. A true heir.”
Recoiling, you shook your head, over and over. “No! I’m not like-” Even in the middle of your disgust, you knew the words you’d been about to say were as deeply offensive to John as they would be to the court of the Night Brethren. “How can I be? I eat food, I don’t drink blood, I was just like my friends … I’m normal,” you finished, “human?”
Pulling you onto his lap, he settled back into the adjoining chair. “You are human, Little Bird in all the most human of ways. Soft…” his index finger crooked, stroking over your cheek, “sweet, ruled by emotions and fears. Brave. Stubborn. That part of you that comes from my kind has been dormant, I think.”
You thought of all the terrifying punishments Black Heart had visited upon you all those years. Your loneliness. How you depended on him completely. And now he was being so oddly kind.
“You kept me in the Birdcage all that time … you did it to bond me to you, didn’t you?” Now, John would surely punish you again. You’d never spoken this way.
He leaned closer, rubbing one big hand gently up and down your thigh. “Yes. You’re made to love, Little Bird. If I am all that you have, you will love me.”
Kicking violently, you writhed away from him, trying to get free from this heartless blood-drinker. “You think we’re in accord? You think I willloveyou? I won’t! I- Just-” His arms enveloped you, just as they always had. Completely. Utterly. A place where there was no fight. Only John.
“Poor Little Bird,” he soothed, “you have lost so much today. But you have gained just as much. You’ll see.” He carried you into the bedroom, past the sumptuous bed, so different than your prim, narrow bed and your white comforter at home- at the Birdcage, you meant.
