by Sarina Dorie
I knew what she wanted. I wouldn’t give it to her. This body was mine. This baby was mine.
The aching inside me grew to a cramping, but I forced myself back from the queen.
Thatch stretched past me. His skin brushed against mine, the smooth sensation of human flesh transforming. He kept on stretching past me, his body lengthening, his skin turning to midnight scales. Lightning crackled and flashed, red and then violet, a strange combination of Celestor magic and the Red affinity.
We both had brought back something from that celestial realm. The Ruby of Divine Wisdom gave me the power of creation. It gave Felix Thatch the power of destruction.
In his form as a dragon, he snapped at the Raven Queen. She dove aside, shoving someone else into his path.
The giant jaws of my protector tore a man made of tree limbs in half. Thatch’s dragon tail whipped around and flattened harpies descending toward us. He roared and exhaled red flames. Bolts of lightning shot out along with the fire. He kept twisting, coiling around me, his body infinitely lengthening to create enough loops to protect me while sliding from side to side to fend off attackers.
This had to be using a tremendous amount of energy to transform and project so much lightning. He wouldn’t be able to keep this up. I didn’t know how to help him. I felt weak and depleted, not recharged like I usually did after using sex magic. It had to be the pain doing this to me. The spasms inside me were getting worse. All I could manage to do was hug my arms around my belly.
Queen Morgaine floated in the sky above, raven wings flapping to keep her afloat. She gazed down at me with satisfaction.
She spoke, though her lips didn’t move. Her words hissed inside my skull. “Join me and serve me,” she said. “In exchange for your oath of fealty, I will allow you to live.”
To live? The same way she allowed Odette and Felix Thatch to live? To treat her family and supposed loved ones as slaves? That wasn’t living.
Her whisper echoed louder than the screams and chaos around us. “If you join me now, I will allow you to remain with your husband and child.” She masked her fear with a veneer of calm, but I sensed it there all the same, hiding just below the surface of her skin.
The Raven Queen feared me.
I raised my hand, gathering up my magic to shoot lightning at her. She faded into black smoke before I could strike her down. In truth, I didn’t feel as if I could strike her down, but she didn’t know that.
“It’s my right as Felix Thatch’s fairy godmother to grant a gift.” Her voice came from just behind me. “I bless you with the gift of a swift childbirth.”
I whirled. She wasn’t there.
“I don’t want your gifts.” It might have been considered rude to refuse a gift from a Fae, but there was no way I was accepting a curse disguised as a blessing.
Coils tightened around me, squeezing the breath out of me. I couldn’t breathe. Thatch was crushing me in his attempt to protect me. I patted his scales to signal he needed to loosen his grip, and when that didn’t work, I punched him. He relaxed the coils and released me.
I could see the dead on the ground and charred remains of trees toppled over. More trees were on fire, the dry boughs caught in a blaze of golden light that lit the forest like torches. I scanned the forest for the oak tree that my fairy godmother had transformed into, but I couldn’t tell which one was her. There were several oak trees. It had been dark when she’d transformed. Now everything flickered and danced with light. Clutching my belly, I hobbled to a tree I thought might be her, to warn Thatch not to burn her, but then I saw another with the trunk smoldering and thought I should check on that one first.
A maelstrom of sudden wind pushed against me. It flattened me to the ground. Harpies and courtly subjects trying to flee fell down. The fires in the trees blew out. It was hard to see Thatch against the gloom of the sky. He was a silhouette against flares of light around us. I couldn’t tell whether his body was more like a dragon or serpent. It kept shifting. Perhaps he couldn’t make up his mind about what he looked like either. All I was certain of was that he was flapping his wings.
Relief and gratitude filled my heart. I thought he had read my mind and meant to ensure no harm befell Abigail Lawrence in her tree form.
My husband, my dragon, raised himself into the air and snatched me up in a claw. I realized what he was doing now. He was readying himself to fly. His tail lashed back and forth, striking harpies down before he launched himself upward.
He cradled me to his chest. The gray light of dawn crested over the mountains at the horizon. Thatch launched himself toward it. I clung to his claws, my stomach feeling as though it dropped out of my body with the speed of his flight.
I told myself not to look down.
I shouted over the wind, trying to tell Thatch we needed to go to the Silver Court. I didn’t want us to bring the Raven Court’s wrath upon the school. But him being the responsible and respectable teacher, he would probably want us to get back before dawn. At least the Raven Court wasn’t following. Maybe dragons and electricity were all it took to scare them off.
I felt lightheaded and dizzy. At any moment I thought I was going to vomit. I blamed it on being a first-time flyer on Dragon Airlines.
I would have been cold if it hadn’t been for the heat radiating off Thatch’s dragon body like my own personal space heater. I’d lost my shoes and one of my socks in the night’s melee. My toes were cold even with Thatch’s warmth. The ache inside me had subsided, but it felt as though a hard lump of lead was weighing down my belly.
As we neared the craggy cliffs of mountains, I noticed the way Thatch’s wings slowed. He groaned with each flap, his muscles bunching with the effort to keep aloft. This much exertion was taking its toll on him. He needed pain magic to fuel him. I punched him in the belly. It felt like punching an overstuffed beachball. He didn’t react. I wasn’t sure he’d felt it.
I tried again and again, my fists hurting from the effort.
At last we landed on a basalt cliff, his body barely fitting on the ledge next to mine. He dropped his head next to my body, warm puffs of air bathing me with humid heat that left me cold the moment he inhaled. I shivered in the lacy slip.
“Can you change back?” I asked.
He didn’t move. For a moment I feared he would be like Priscilla, stuck in an animal form. At least with Priscilla, she could disguise herself as a bird and blend in with a flock or pretend to be a Witchkin’s familiar. A dragon wasn’t the best at incognito.
I patted his snout. “Felix?”
His eye was glassy. It looked like he was about to start crying. I reached out with my awareness. His entire body ached, but it wasn’t a good kind of pain. It was a ravaging hollowness from the magic that consumed him.
“You need to turn back.” When he didn’t respond, I grabbed onto one of his giant nostrils and shook it. “Now.”
He snorted me off him, and I stumbled into the rock wall. I didn’t hit it very hard, but my belly churned, and I felt lightheaded. I propelled myself at him again anyway.
“Don’t do this to me. I need you as a human.” I pummeled his neck with my fists, trying to give him pain magic. “You gave me an oath. You need to change back and be here with me.”
He rolled over, and as he did so, the indigo scales shifted hue. Magic twisted around him and condensed. His tail whipped out, and I ducked, rocks biting into my knees as I fell. He bumped me into the wall as he writhed. Shifting back to human form must have been painful—and not the kind of pain he could digest, judging from the way he moaned pathetically.
He shrank and collapsed beside me, naked and panting. I flung my arms around him, relieved.
“You’re all right. Thank goodness.”
He didn’t answer. Each breath came out labored. It took me a moment to notice the white lines of his tattoos had disappeared.
“Is this a glamour? Or were your tattoos a glamour?” I asked.
He lifted
his head, inspecting the length of his body. “Merlin’s balls. My wards are gone.”
I thought about how Vega’s hair grew out every time she returned to her human form after she became a cat. Maybe there was some kind of regenerative property that came with shifting.
I still had my tattoo on my ankle, the one of the stars that I had decided was too painful to completely fill in. Then again, I hadn’t shifted my human body into another form. I had transcended my human body spiritually, even if only momentarily.
I wanted nothing more than to collapse onto the rocks beside him, but I knew we needed to leave. We needed a plan.
“I don’t suppose you have enough magic to transport us back to the school?” I asked.
“No.”
“Enough magic to spin rocks into a warm blanket?”
He snorted. “You should be a comedienne.” He snuggled me close, kissing my cheek and my neck. His warmth was welcome, but it wasn’t going to be enough. Full daylight would help—if it didn’t bake us. Maybe we just needed sleep. I usually felt fully charged after sexual activity and some rest. I might have enough magic to conjure giant eagles to get off Mount Doom later.
Or something. Brilliance would come to me after I rested. Assuming the Raven Court didn’t come after us.
I touched the amulet. I could call Elric. But it would come with a price.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered into my ear.
His hand came around to rest on my belly. It felt swollen and bloated, but I didn’t look that different. The pressure of his hand reassured me that everything was all right. We could face anything together.
“It’s fine. You didn’t hurt me,” I said. And more importantly, the Raven Queen hadn’t hurt me. Or him. Or our unborn child. “We’re both alive, and she doesn’t know where we are, right? We just have to get somewhere safe.”
“You don’t understand, Clarissa. The worst is yet to come.” He curled around me protectively, as if he thought he were still a dragon. “She blessed you.”
“Let’s ask my fairy godfather to unbless me.” I wasn’t exactly sure that was what Elric was, but if he could do it, he would.
“No more favors from Fae. Even if Elric can—which I doubt is the case—you will owe him a favor of equal value. The Raven Queen will still—”
“Shush. Just listen,” I said, inspiration coming to me. We needed to make the Fae Fertility Paradox open-source information. That would get those Fae kingdoms fighting each other. It would take all the Fae courts to fight the Raven Court. “What do you think about—” Pain stole my breath away.
A jolt in my core radiated through me. Nausea returned in full force. I covered my belly with my hands. Something stirred underneath my fingers.
Thatch propped himself up on an elbow, brows furrowed as he stared at me. “Keep breathing.”
I took in a few calming breaths. The agony pulsed again. It felt like my insides were being torn apart. Maybe they were.
The flutter in my belly shifted. My belly was no longer flat. There was a curve of flesh under my hand. My skin stretched, and my belly rounded more.
“What’s happening?” I asked. “This isn’t right.” I looked as if I were I was four months along.
Thatch’s brows furrowed. “Speedy childbirth. Your blessing.”
My curse.
The skin grew tight around the bulge. My core lanced with pain. Red zigzags of flesh widened across the stretching flesh before my eyes.
Stretch marks? F-ing Fae! Not fair. If I were going to be cursed/blessed, the least I could get was a consolation prize of no stretch marks.
“Clarissa, this isn’t going to be easy,” Thatch said.
“Really?” I asked. “I hadn’t guessed.”
“Do you remember why so many Witchkin mothers abandon their babies immediately after birth?”
“They’re underaged and not ready for motherhood.” I knew there was a better reason, but pain stole my thoughts.
“Witchkin babies are not born looking like human babies.”
Another lance of fire stole my breath. Thatch placed a hand over my belly and one on my spine, wicking away the pain. He massaged, his fingers sucking the energy away like straws. He continued talking, his voice a melodic monotone.
“It can take hours or several days for the baby to transition. An Amni Plandai baby might resemble a piglet or an imp made of sticks, an Elementia can look like a cherub made of rocks. After the delivery, don’t be alarmed by the appearance of the baby.”
“This isn’t the time for a Witchkin lesson,” I said. I could barely concentrate on his words.
“Push your pain into me,” he said.
Another rush of agony stole over me. I couldn’t push it out quickly enough. My belly kept swelling. My uterus had to be ripping. The human body wasn’t meant to change this quickly.
His face flushed, and sweat trickled down his forehead. Even surrendering the misery to him, it only decreased incrementally. It was too much for him to process it all.
My belly swelled as big as a balloon. It felt like it was going to pop at any moment.
The thing inside me twisted and kicked against my organs. I screamed as the gnawing pain consumed me. My hips felt as though they were being karate chopped down the middle. A sharp spasm flashed up my spine.
Felix shifted and sat me up, circling his arms around me and lifting me on my knees so that gravity was pushing down. Tired as he was, he held me up, murmuring words of encouragement. I cried out as a contraction coursed through me. My vagina clenched and unclenched. Pain shot up my spine and made my body rigid. My body was breaking.
Without warning, the pain lessened. I was still hot and sweating. My body spasmed, and pain flashed up my spine before fading. This wasn’t as horrible. I couldn’t feel anything below the waist, only my diaphragm being pushed into my lungs above it. Maybe this was the magical equivalent of Lidocaine or an epidural. I could still feel the pressure of birth, I just wasn’t overwhelmed by the pain of it.
It had to be pain magic.
I smiled. “Thank you.”
Thatch’s face was pale. His brows furrowed. I read confusion in his eyes.
“Clarissa, are you using your pain for energy?” he asked.
The baby kicked against my diaphragm, pushing the breath out of me.
Now that the pain had been lifted, I was aware of what was happening in a detached and distant manner. Fatigue and weakness made it difficult to concentrate. My awareness bounced around from under my skin to just outside, to the interior of my uterus housing a baby.
The thing inside me didn’t feel like a baby.
The monster within gnawed on my spine. I felt nothing because it had severed all feeling below my waist. I felt dizzy at the realization.
I gasped for air. “It’s killing me.”
“It? Tut-tut, ma chère,” said a woman’s voice, deep and sultry. The Raven Queen stood before us. “I should think you Witchkin would have the decency to call your baby a she or he.”
“Stay away from us,” Thatch said.
Queen Morgaine closed her eyes and inhaled, as if savoring the suffering in the air. “You make a sorry excuse for a midwife, Felix.”
She had followed us. I wanted to shoot lightning at her, but I didn’t have the strength or energy for it.
“Lift her to her feet.” The queen snapped her fingers at him. “Or do you wish for them both to die?”
He lifted me into a standing position. My legs were numb, my feet made of jelly. I felt the warmth of his arms holding me around the ribs, but nothing below that. The air was cold and clammy, but everywhere my skin met Thatch’s, I felt feverish. I leaned my head back against his chest.
Baba Nata’s prophecy had been correct. Tears spilled down my cheeks. It wasn’t supposed to end this way.
The Raven Queen stepped forward, unafraid, knowing there was nothing I could do to hurt her. The sky blazed as crimson as blood behind her.
She kicked at the inside of one foot and then the other to part my legs more.
She kneeled, arms outstretched. Her grin stretched from cheek to cheek, revealing sharp, predatory teeth. “This will be the only time I bow down to you, ma chère. Savor the moment.”
I would have kicked her in the face if I could have.
“Concentrate,” Thatch said. “Can you feel the contractions?”
I couldn’t feel anything but the pressure. I didn’t want to shift my awareness back to what was happening inside. Each time my awareness glimpsed the creature, it looked like something was trying to battle its way out.
“If you don’t want to be torn open, you might want to push,” the Raven Queen said.
I pushed with all my strength.
“Take a deep breath. Try again.” Thatch’s voice was calm, but his arms were shaking. He was warm against my back. His sweat or tears dripped onto my shoulder. I couldn’t tell which.
“Push,” he said.
I tried again. It took several times before a wet squelching came from below me. The pressure building inside dissipated. It grew easier to breathe.
Blood splattered across the Raven Queen’s face as I gazed down at her. She didn’t seem to notice. She only had eyes for her prize.
Queen Morgaine caught the baby in white swaddling, crimson smearing everywhere. “Aren’t you the most precious darling I’ve ever seen?” She made kissy noises at the creature she held.
The thing that came out was slick with blood. It didn’t look human. It was black and serpentlike, midnight scales shimmering with the light of pink stars. It held something in its claws. It looked like an organ. Maybe a kidney. I wasn’t sure.
That’s when I was aware of the warmth gushing from me. I looked down and saw the blood pouring onto the ground. One hip was twisted backward. I was cold. I hadn’t noticed the arrival of dawn. I’d thought the day would be warmer with sunlight, but it wasn’t.
Thatch used his feet to push my legs back together. He eased me back onto the ground. I shivered against him, my teeth chattering. The ground was wet beneath me.