Sorana led Aurelia to the palace Valetudinarium.
The air inside was cool and still, smelling of dried herbs, stale incense, and something metallic underneath. It felt less like a place of healing and more like a chamber of quiet judgment. Shelves lined the walls, cluttered with clay jars, bronze tools, and bundles of withered plants arranged with a careless, almost brutal practicality. The sight was unnerving.
"Oh, my ladies." One of the healers, a thin woman with watchful eyes, bowed as they entered. "Why are you here?"
"My lady has a fever," Sorana said smoothly. "She only needs something for it. Herbs, perhaps."
The healer's gaze drifted from Sorana's tense face to Aurelia's pale, withdrawn one. Sorana's eyes pleaded silently, shouting what her lips dared not: That is a lie.
"Sit," the healer said, her voice devoid of warmth. She gestured to a plain wooden stool.
Aurelia sat, her posture stiff.
"How do you feel?"
"Just a slight headache," Aurelia murmured, avoiding the woman's eyes.
"And more," Sorana cut in, her voice low but urgent. "I think… you should run a test."
The healer's eyebrows lifted slowly. The air in the valetudinarium seemed to grow colder. She understood. They always understood.
"Huh, it's just a fever," Aurelia insisted, forcing her lips into a wide, unconvincing smile. The effort made her look more shocked than reassured.
"I will need to take a blood sample."
"No." Aurelia's voice was sharp. Her blood ran cold as her eyes darted toward the array of sinister-looking bronze lancets and glass vials on a nearby tray. "Not with those."
"My lady, please," the healer said, her tone softening into something dangerously patient. "Today is the valetudinarium's clean-out day. Everything is being sterilized or replaced. That is why things appear… scattered." She gestured vaguely at the disorganized shelves and the tools laid out on clean linen. "It is the safest possible time."
Before Aurelia could protest further, the healer selected a slender silver needle, its tip gleaming spotless in the dim light. In one swift, practiced motion, she took Aurelia's hand and pressed the needle into the pad of her thumb.
"Ouch!" Aurelia hitched, a sharp gasp escaping her as a single, perfect droplet of blood welled up and fell onto the pristine white cloth draped over the healer's palm.
Silence filled the room. The healer cupped her hand, staring intently at the crimson bead. Her eyes seemed to lose focus for a moment, a faint, silvery glimmer passing through her irises. Slowly, as if reacting to an unseen force, the blood on the cloth began to change. It darkened, then shimmered, shifting from red to a deep, unnatural mossy green.
"It's green," the healer whispered, her voice hollow with certainty.
"And what the hell does that mean?" Aurelia's voice trembled, caught between defiance and dread.
The healer looked up, her expression unreadable. "It means you are with child. And from the vitality in the blood… the conception was two, perhaps three days ago."
The world did not shatter. It simply stopped. The air vanished from Aurelia's lungs. The scattered tools, the smell of herbs, Sorana's stifled gasp—all of it faded into a distant, muffled roar.
"You don't know what you're saying," Aurelia whispered, the words scraping her throat. She clutched the edge of the stool. "No signs show that clearly at two or three days. I've read books. I know."
"Oh, you do?" The healer's voice was flat, devoid of argument. "But my lady… this is the result. If you wish, we may try again. On the other hand."
"Yes," Aurelia said, her voice steadier than she felt. "Prove it."
She offered her other thumb, her hand trembling only slightly. The healer took it, wiped the skin clean with a damp cloth, and repeated the motion. The silver needle flashed. Another sharp sting. Another bead of blood bloomed and fell onto a fresh square of linen.
They watched. Again, the healer's gaze grew distant, that same faint silver shimmer passing through her eyes. And again, the crimson droplet darkened, shifted, and bloomed into the same unmistakable, mossy green.
The proof was now in duplicate. A truth written in blood, twice over—first by the healer's silver-shimmered gaze, then by the second vial of crushed moonwort Sorana had procured. The damning crimson dust settled at the bottom of the glass. A life. A chain. A catastrophe.
Aurelia stared at it, the world narrowing to that tiny point of finality.
"No." The word was a breath, stolen. "I can't have this baby."
Her plans shattered.
How on earth can I have Tenebrarum's child?
Her head snapped up. Her violet eyes, wide with a terror that was rapidly cooling into something else, locked onto the healer who still stood before her, holding the second, green-stained cloth.
The healer took a cautious step back, sensing the shift in the air.
"Do not say a word to anyone," Aurelia said, her voice not trembling, but low and flat. "Am I clear?"
The healer's throat moved in a silent swallow. "My lady, I am bound by oath—"
"You are bound by your life," Aurelia cut in, rising from the stool. She closed the distance between them, her movement deliberate. The chill of the valetudinarium seemed to seep from her skin. "You have performed a service. For that, you will be compensated. Handsomely."
She let the promise hang, laced with poison.
"But the moment we leave this room, the service, the test, and its result—they never happened. If a whisper leaves your lips. If a rumor reaches the wrong ears. If Tenebrarum learns of this from any source but my own voice…" She leaned in, her gaze holding the woman's captive. "…your life will end in this very valetudinarium. Not by his hand. By mine. Do you believe me?"
The healer's professional mask crumbled into raw, mortal fear. She nodded, a sharp, jerky motion. "I believe you."
Without another glance, Aurelia turned and walked out of the chamber of quiet judgment, leaving the smell of herbs and fear behind her. The war inside her was no longer just about escape.
It was about leaving with his child???
Aurelia turned to Sorana, whose face was pale but set. "You will see to her payment. And her silence."
She then caught Sorana's wrist, not with gentleness, but with a desperate, grounding force. "And you. Swear that you will not speak of this."
"I swear," Sorana breathed.
"Nothing is going to stop me from leaving this palace," Aurelia declared, the words a mantra against the new, living wall inside her.
"But my lady…" Sorana's voice was thick. "You can't carry his child. Not if you run. The journey… the stress… and if he finds you—"
"I'll be a great mother." The statement cut through the warning, fierce and sudden. It wasn't a plea. It was a declaration to the fates, to the child, to herself.
Can she actually raise his child on her own?
-------------------------------
To be continued...