Wolf and the Fey

Chapter 3

It was nothing for a while. Just emptiness and the feeling of falling for miles.

Nexus gasped as his vision finally settled onto a growing light. He felt small but firm hands gripping his arm. His gaze landed upon the Queen's, whose face had returned to normal. Shadow still blanketed them as the light grew brighter, and shapes started to become visible.

"What is this?" He glanced around into the deep black of nothingness before he settled back onto the pool of light that now spread around their feet. The shapes started to become more familiar as it came closer.

"Memories."

The light cleared into moonlight, and the shadows at the edge of the light twisted into trees. A forest.

The smell of oncoming rain perforated the air, the wind blowing and softly rustling the green leaves that hung onto all of the foliage. He looked towards the Queen as her own gaze turned leftward to a small path.

They seemed to be in the middle of nowhere, yet somewhere all too familiar to him. He couldn't place it.

A few moments of silence passed before the rustling picked up, and footsteps were thundering down the path. A woman burst through a few bushes that were covering the trail, her arms wrapped around a swollen belly. The moonlight lit her white mane, and her fearful, glowing lilac eyes looked around frantically. Bruises mottled her face, and her eyes were puffy and swollen with tears. The once white gown she was wearing was shredded and coated in a growing layer of blood. Her legs were coated in that blood.

Nexus' eyes grew wide as he went back and forth between this woman and the Queen next to him. The similarities were eerie, but this woman's features were more square like, more refined. He settled back onto the woman who now collapsed onto the forest floor, a blood curdling scream coming up from her chest.

"No, no, please." She begged to absolutely no one. She managed to crawl to a tree nearby and propped herself against it, her hands holding her swollen belly as if it were a precious gift. The scratches that marred her body poured the same crimson that grew between her legs. She writhed in agony as the blood grew and a gush of fluid burst onto the grass.

It was quick.

Within moments, the forest was filled with nothing but her screams  as she birthed her child on the grass. The king held his hand over his mouth as the scene burned into his mind.

The child was not alive. It was barely big enough to be apart from their mother's womb, but, yet, here they were. Smaller than any infant should have ever been, coated in blood and it's umbilical cord darker than the shadows around them. Nothing about the child's body was proportional. It needed to grow for several more months before its birth should have happened. The woman knew this. It's why she had been begging.

She slowly scooped the child up from the grass as her screams grew into cries, the blood now staining her chest. Her cries were broken and hoarse, the tears pouring down her face in rivers as she collapsed sideways, curling herself over her baby and begging to the stars above.

The hand that was wrapped around his arm quickly tugged him, and suddenly, they were back in the King's office. The sun shone brightly through the window, but the flame that once lit the fireplace was out, and the room felt eerily cold for a summer day. The king was breathing heavily as he gathered his surroundings; he was back to sitting in his seat, as was the Queen herself. Her eyes were watching him carefully, her own expression numb and stoic. Her arms folded over her chest as she leaned back into her chair.

"What -who- was that? Why did you show me that?"

She clicked her tongue as her head shook back and forth.

"You are dense." Her eyes landed back on his as her head cocked slightly to the side. "That was what your great grandfather did to my great-grandmother. That's why Lithia belongs to me. Do you understand they were to have a child together until he revoked his love, attacked her, and scarred her? He murdered his own child in her womb and planned on ending her life, too. She barely escaped with what little energy she had left. She cut that umbilical cord herself, carried that baby home, and buried her in our family graveyard."

Nexus sat silent for a long moment, his eyes hard as he fought with the information. She knew the battle within his eyes all too well.

"How do I know those were not falsified?"

A tired laugh left Frost this time.

"You'd know alteration if you came across it. Everything becomes distorted and blurred. This was not. This was the same memories my great grandmother gave to me on her deathbed. I spared you from showing you your family's monstrosity. You owe me. Lithia is mine. All she wanted was the ruins of the city back where her heart was full and where her first born was conceived. She wanted memorials there until your great grandfather razed it to the ground in spite." A snarl kissed her lips as she stood from her chair. He looked up at her, mouth agape again as if he was going to say something but found himself short on words.  She was to the door when he finally spoke.

"I need to think about it."

"Take all the time you need. I will not leave until a compromise has been found or one of our blood stains your land. Choose wisely, King Balor. I am a kind and just woman until you force my hand. Don't let me show you why my reputation is the way it is."

And with that last utterance, she left the room without even looking back at him and left the King to sit with the memory she showed him and the grotesque knowledge of his family's cruelty.