"They'll answer," I state flatly. "Because the alternative is watching dark elves carve up their territory piece by piece."
Korrath rolls up his maps. "I'll take a team to scout the eastern approaches at dawn. If they're massing forces, we need to know numbers and timing."
"Take Bloodfang company," I order. "And stay mobile. Don't engage unless you have no choice."
The conversation continues, flowing around tactical details and supply requirements. For precious minutes, I can almost forget the complications waiting in the temple's quiet chambers. Here, surrounded by maps and steel, I'm simply a warleader preparing his forces for battle.
The heavy doors crash open with enough force to rattle the iron hinges. Maedra stumbles through, her usually measured gait replaced by something urgent and wild. Ash streaks her robes, and the scent of burning herbs clings to her like prophecy made manifest.
Every head in the chamber turns. Maps forgotten, tactical discussions die mid-sentence.
"The flames," she gasps, clutching the doorframe with gnarled fingers. "Sacred flames burn outside the temple. Blue-white, reaching toward the heavens."
Thokmar straightens slowly. "Old woman, what are you?—"
"The Plentiful God has spoken," Maedra cuts him off, her voice gaining strength with each word. "Divine fire marks a blessed union. A child touched by the gods themselves grows in that human's womb."
The silence stretches taut as a bowstring. I feel every eye in the room shift toward me, measuring, calculating.
Korrath's weathered face darkens. "You speak of prophecy over a bastard child?"
"I speak of signs that would blind you if you had eyes to see them," Maedra snaps back. "The flames appeared the momentshe entered our walls. They burn without fuel, without tending. The gods have not abandoned us—they've sent us salvation."
Zharra's laugh cuts through the tension like a blade. "Salvation? From a human whore carrying some warrior's mistake?" She rises from her seat, ceremonial tattoos seeming to writhe in the firelight. "The old crone has finally lost what little sense she had left."
"Watch your tongue," Maedra warns, but Zharra's momentum builds.
"No, I think we've all watched our tongues long enough while you mutter about gods who've been silent for decades. This is madness dressed up as mysticism."
The chamber erupts. Voices clash—some supporting Zharra's dismissal, others murmuring uncertainty about divine signs. Thokmar pounds his fist on the table, demanding order.
Through it all, I remain silent. Something cold and heavy settles in my gut, recognition I refuse to name. The way the torches flickered when I first carried her inside. The warmth that seemed to follow her presence through the temple corridors.
"Coincidence," I hear myself say, cutting through the chaos. My voice carries the authority of command, silencing the room. "Old braziers, dry wood. Nothing more."
But even as the words leave my mouth, they taste like lies.
Gargan's eyes find mine across the table, sharp and knowing. His scarred jaw works silently, processing what I've said against what I haven't.
Maedra straightens, meeting my denial with disappointment that cuts deeper than anger. "So be it, Warleader. But the flames burn still. And they will burn until you acknowledge what stands before you."
Korrath gestures dismissively. "Enough of this nonsense. We have real threats to discuss."
Two guards step forward, flanking Maedra. She doesn't resist as they escort her from the chamber, but her parting words echo off stone walls: "The gods are patient. But they are not fools."
The door closes behind her with finality. Conversations resume gradually, forced and artificial. Maps are repositioned, throats cleared, the business of war reassembled around the edges of what just happened.
I stare at the tactical drawings without seeing them, that cold weight in my stomach growing heavier with each breath.
13
SERIS
Iwake to a sharp ache radiating from my lower back down through my hips, the kind that makes breathing feel like work. My hand finds my belly instinctively—still round, still moving with the baby's restless kicks, but something feels different. Heavier. More urgent.
The stone walls of my chamber seem closer today, pressing in with their cold weight. I push myself upright, fighting a wave of dizziness that makes the torchlight blur at the edges. Each breath comes shorter than the last, as if the air itself has thickened.
"This is ridiculous," I mutter, gripping the bedframe until my knuckles go white. "I'm suffocating in here."
