"Everyone has duties. That's not why you left."
His expression shifts with something new. Guilt, maybe. Or recognition of a truth he doesn't want to face.
The accusation hangs between us like a fog. But before he can respond—before I can say anything else I might regret—a sharp, twisting pain tears through my belly.
I gasp, doubling over, my hands flying to my stomach. The pain is unlike anything I've felt before—not the gentle movements of the baby, but something violent and wrong. Like claws raking through my insides.
My knees hit the blood-slicked stones with a crack that echoes through the chamber.
"Seris!"
18
VARGATH
Idrop to my knees beside her before conscious thought takes hold. My hands hover over her doubled form, unsure where to touch, how to help. She's curled around her belly like she's trying to shield the baby from some invisible attack.
"What's happening?" My voice breaks with genuine fear. "Seris, what's wrong?"
Her face is chalk-white, tears streaming down her cheeks as she rocks back and forth on the bloodstained stones. Her breath comes in sharp, desperate gasps.
"Please..." she whispers, the word barely audible. "Please not the baby."
Ice floods my veins. I've seen warriors gutted on battlefields, watched men die screaming with their entrails spilling into the mud. But this—this terror clawing at her features, the way she cradles her stomach like it might shatter—cuts deeper than any blade.
"I won't let anything happen to you." My hands find hers, cover them where they press against her belly. "To either of you."
She cries out, a sound that rips through the temple like breaking glass. Something warm and wet drips onto the stones between her knees. Blood. Dark red against the ancient granite.
My mind races, scrambling for solutions. Maedra would have known what to do—would have had herbs, prayers, some ancient wisdom passed down through generations of midwives. But Maedra lies still beneath Seris's robe, her knowledge bled out with her life.
Who else? The other shamans fled years ago when the council stopped paying them. The younger orcs know nothing of childbirth beyond the basics of battlefield medicine.
"Vargath..." Seris's voice breaks on my name, raw with pain I can't begin to fathom.
"I'm here." I squeeze her hands, feeling how small they are beneath mine. How fragile. "I'm not going anywhere."
Another spasm wracks her body. She doubles over further, her forehead nearly touching the floor. The blood spreads in a dark pool beneath her, too much blood, and panic claws up my throat like a living thing.
"What's wrong? Tell me, please, Seris, tell me what's wrong." The words tumble out, desperate and pleading. I sound like a child begging for mercy, not a warleader who's commanded thousands.
She can't answer. Can only sob and clutch at her belly while her body betrays her in ways I'll never understand.
I've stared down charging cavalry. Faced dark elf assassins with nothing but a broken sword. Led suicide charges against impossible odds without my pulse jumping.
But watching her bleed on these stones, seeing the terror in her eyes as she fights for our child's life—this is the first time I've truly known fear.
I scoop her into my arms without thinking, blood soaking into my leather vest. She's lighter than I expect—too light—and the way she goes limp against my chest sends fresh terror spiking through me.
"Hold on." My boots thunder against stone as I sprint through the temple corridors, past crumbling murals and guttering torches. "Just hold on."
The healer's hall squats in the fortress's eastern wing, a squat building that reeks of boiled herbs and old death. I kick the door open so hard it crashes against the wall, wood splintering.
Three orc medics look up from their work—grinding powders, stitching a warrior's gashed arm. Their eyes widen when they see what I'm carrying.
"Help her," I bark, moving toward the nearest table. "Now."
The lead healer, a grizzled veteran named Kormath with scars crisscrossing his forearms, takes one look at Seris and steps back.
