Ryatt
“What did you just say to me?” I have to force the words out. My ears ring with Ella’s whimpering. Her suffering is the only thing taking up space in my head.
I can’t think straight.
“You’ll lose the Luna if something isn’t done immediately,” the healer says sharply, waving her knife in Ella’s direction. “I can stop the bleeding with herbs, but it will kill the babe. Or, I cut the child from her womb. You decide, Alpha King. Your Luna or the baby?”
“Ryatt!” Ella’s voice is thick with despair. “Don't–please! Don’t let her hurt the baby! I–she can’t be born yet. She’s not ready; it’s too soon!”
I slowly tear my gaze from the healer to my mate and feel what’s left of my heart shatter to pieces in my chest. Ella is bleeding out. The sheets and mattress are black with her blood. Her skin is clammy and gray as she clutches the blood-damp sheets and throws her head from side to side in agony.
“Please, Ryatt. Please–”
“Alpha!” the healer shouts. “She will die if you don’t make a decision right this instant!”
I turn to my mate, the love of my fucking life. I can feel her slipping through my fingers with each passing second. I kneel at her bedside. “Ella, listen to me–”
She weakly curls her shaking hand around my forearm. I know it takes all of her strength to do so, and it kills me. Her fevered eyes meet mine and hold my gaze so intensely I wonder if this is it, if this is the last moment I’ll ever see her alive.
“I can’t lose her. I can’t live knowing we lost her, Ryatt. Choose her. Please. Choose her.”
“Ella.” That's all I can say. The baby won’t live. She’s too early. Early by almost four months.
I’m going to lose them both.
I feel tears sliding down my cheeks–hot and furious and full of the deepest, most desperate form of despair.
“Choose her!” Ella begs, digging her fingernails into my arm while the healer shouts somewhere behind me, trying to get my attention, to force me to choose. “Please, Ryatt. I can’t–don’t take her from me, please. Don’t take my baby–”
Those words are my complete undoing.
“I will cut the child from her, then. Move!” The healer bustles forward, her blade catching the light of the fire burning in the soot stained hearth in the corner of the room. The gnarled woman clutches my shoulder, and I act. My mind is blank. My body moves on instinct. I whirl, then grab the woman by the throat and look into her hateful eyes as I snap her neck.
Her lifeless body crashes to the ground in a heap of flesh and filthy, blood stained clothing.
Slowly, I turn my attention to the servant girl standing in the corner of the room holding that fucking useless bucket of water. “Go get the witch you mentioned.”
The girl drops the bucket and runs outside without a word.
“Ryatt–”
“I’m right here.”
I rest my knees on the weathered floorboards, ignoring the dead body at the foot of Ella’s bed. I clutch her hand, weaving my fingers between hers. She feels like she’s on fire. With every minute that passes, her fever gets worse. Even the sheets around her are hot to the touch.
“Do-do you remember–” she sucks in an unsteady breath. “Do you remember that night on Maatua when we went d-dancing?”
I’m falling apart. I clutch her fingers hard enough her bones scrape together, but she doesn’t flinch. “We finally got our dance that night, Princess.”
“You loved that music–I remember–how you smiled, and I–”
She’s struggling to breathe now. Every breath she takes causes her body to jerk. More blood soaks into the mattress.
Kill me. Let me take her place. Take me instead of them. I will do anything.
I rest my forehead against our joined hands. My tears seep between our fingers as my chest begins to rattle with sobs.
“Bury me with her,” Ella whispers.
“Ella, please,” I rasp, lifting my head to look at my beautiful mate. “Stay with me!” Her eyes are open and locked on the ceiling. A soft smile touches the corner of her mouth as her eyelids flutter closed again. She stills. “Ella? Ella!”
The door to the cottage opens with such force it nearly comes off the hinges. Wind races inside the room, blowing out the fire, the only source of light in the room.
A flash of lightning illuminates two figures. A tall, graceful woman steps inside, followed by the shy servant girl now carrying a lantern. Her cheek is puffy and red from where that beast of a healer slapped her across the face for even mentioning the witch now walking slowly in my direction.
White witch, indeed.
Her stark white hair is tied back in a loose braid that touches her waist as she pulls her hood from her head and looks Ella over from head to toe, ignoring me completely. She’s beautiful, and likely in her late forties, tall and lean and shielded by a cloak made of gray homespun that’s seen better days.
But her eyes are what’s most shocking. They might have been a rich shade of blue or green at one point, but they’re… clouded with gray mist that makes me wonder if she’s blind or close to it. She doesn’t look at me at all as she motions to the servant girl, who takes several steps into the room before turning back around to shut the door against the storm raging outside.
“Start the fire again. I need boiling water.” The witch's voice is deep and smooth, which isn’t what I’d expected after hearing the healer's reasoning for not allowing this woman near Ella. I imagined her gnarled and stooped with green skin and scales based on the healer's description.
Not this.
The servant girl bustles around the room with her lantern. The fire springs back to life in a matter of seconds. While the girl heats a fresh kettle of water and sets the witch’s herb to steep, I watch the witch lay pale, graceful hands on Ella’s stomach.
I clutch Ella’s hand tighter, unsure if she’s dead or alive.
The witch finally looks in my direction to ask, “How far along is she?”
“Six months.”
The witch nods gravely, her eyes leaving my face to dig something out of the pocket of her cloak. “The baby is still alive. But your mate is…” She looks at me again. Her hand curls into a fist as she draws something out of her pocket and keeps it hidden in her palm. “What is your name?”
“My name?” My mouth is incredibly dry.
The witch nods, turning away from me as she opens her palm to reveal several raw crystals she’s placed on Ella’s belly. They glint in the firelight, swirling with colors I’ve never seen before, then turn an inky black.
“Ryatt.”
“Ryatt… that’s an old name. A god's name.” She rolls my name over her tongue as she arranges supplies on the foot of the bed.
“What’s your name?” I ask, trying to keep my mind off my dying mate, who is now so weak she’s barely breathing.
“I don’t remember,” the witch says quietly. She sighs, closing her eyes. “Your mate might die.”
I lick my lips and squeeze Ella’s hand. “What can be done?”
The witch tilts her head to the side, her eyes still closed. She whispers something to herself in a language I’m only vaguely familiar with. It’s an old tongue–the language spoken when the other Firestone cities, like Veiled Valley, were still standing. She opens one eye, squinting, and adjusts the position of one of the crystals.
I glance at the servant girl, who is back to lingering by a wall, her eyes wide and hyper focused on every move the witch makes.
“This baby will be born and soon,” the witch says. “I can save the child for certain. She’s strong, this baby. She’s ready. But you will lose your mate.”
“No–”
“Losing a mate can make a male volatile. For the safety of the baby, you’ll need to leave. Just for a little while. A day, maybe two.”
“No, I’m not–”
“How long has it been since you imprinted on her?”
I glare at the witch. Ella takes a shuddering breath, her body twitching. “We’re fated.”
The witch goes rigid. She slowly turns her head, her milky eyes meeting mine. “I can’t sense that kind of bond between the two of you. You’re mistaken.”
“No, I’m not. Our bond was severed.”
“How?”
“She was tortured. I’m not sure the specifics, but K–someone cut her mark from her.”
The witch slowly turns back to Ella then snatches the crystals from her belly. “Where is the mark?” Her voice loses its earlier calmness. Suddenly, she’s frantic as she repeats, “Where is the mark that was cut out? Where was it?”
“Her thigh–”
The witch stands abruptly, the stool she was sitting on clattering to the ground. She rips the sheets from Ella’s legs and pulls her dress up just enough that the jagged, thick scar is visible. The swirling, whirling scar tissue looks worse than I’ve ever seen it before, especially covered in dark blood.
“Mom,” Ella whispers. “Mama?”
“Hush now, you’ll be all right,” the witch says with motherly softness.
Ella takes a shallow breath, her eyelashes fluttering. She’s waking up, which means the pain is going to start coming again. My heart starts to race as I watch the witch trail a finger down the scar.
“It’s a curse.” I let go of Ella’s hand and rise. I pray to whatever gods are listening that this is the witch we’ve been searching for.
The witch stares at me with an unflinching gaze, her nostrils flaring. “Who did this to her? To both of you? What witch–”
“Kane,” I growl.
She grinds her teeth and turns to the servant girl. “You need to leave. You weren’t here. You didn’t hear a single thing that was said in this cottage. Do you understand?”
The girl, petrified, nods.
“Go!” The witch shouts, and the girl darts out of the cottage, the door slamming shut behind her.
I watch with bated breath as the witch starts pulling things out of her seemingly endless pockets. Rocks and crystals and polished bones are tossed onto the bed, where Ella is starting to writhe again, her stomach tightening as more sharp contractions take hold.
More blood seeps into the sheets. The witch is mumbling again, her hands running up the length of Ella’s legs.
Crimson light skitters up Ella’s thighs.
I stagger backward, looking from Ella to the witch.
“You’re a Firestone.”
She says nothing as her powers sink into Ella’s skin.
“What are you doing to her?”
“She won’t survive this. This curse is ancient. He would have used an ancient blade to cut your mark from her skin, something made by the god’s to cut through the Moon Goddess’s powers. Cutting a mark away is never enough to sever a mate bond that’s been destined. But this weapon… this blade… it was created for this purpose and this purpose alone.”
“Then break the curse.”
She looks at me directly, and for a moment I think I catch despair behind her clouded eyes. “There’s nothing we can do, not at this point. It’s far too late. It’s in her heart now.”
“Then she’ll die?”
She nods, and I feel my legs give way. I stagger back to the bed and fall to my knees just as Ella begins to scream, pitching forward.
“She won’t survive. I’m sorry,” the witch says softly.
I shake my head, unable to think past Ella’s cries for help, for her mother, and for me.
“Can you ease her pain?” I choke out. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever said.
“Yes.”
“Is there truly nothing you can do?” I’m begging now, my voice strained and full of desperation as I shout the words over Ella’s screaming. The witch’s face undergoes a great change. Her stony expression shifts to something heartbreakingly sad as she shakes her head, her eyes meeting mine.
“There’s a spell, but it’s…” she tapers off, looking conflicted. “I could try. It’s dark magic, all right? Casting a spell like this would require some sort of sacrifice, some offer to the Goddess in exchange–”
“Do it. You have to do it!”
“If it works, there’s still a chance she won’t survive the birth. She’s lost so much blood. She’s fevered. This is enough to kill most women. She’s different, but–”
“She’s a Firestone witch, like you.”
“Still,” she says, shaking her head. “She’s weak now. She’s been losing strength for some time, hasn’t she? Even with the spell, her body has been through too much. The birth might be…. She’s lost too much blood.” She gently splays Ella’s legs apart and places a hand on her stomach.
“We’ve been traveling. I had to find you–” I choke on the words as Ella bucks off the mattress. Her face is tight with pain and so shockingly pale. “You were the one we were looking for, and we’re too late. We’re too late.”
The witch’s pale eyes are on mine as I come completely undone.
“Please, just… help her.”
She nods gravely.
I can’t talk about any of this anymore. Her pain cuts through me, shredding me, turning my very bones to dust as I sit next to her and pull her into my arms. I clutch her tightly, rocking back and forth as the witch begins to press on her belly.
“I’m turning the baby,” she tells me.
“No, no–please, help me!” Ella cries.
“I’m so sorry,” I tell her, closing my eyes and burying my face in her hair. “I am so sorry, Ella.” I did this to her. I couldn’t stop myself. Our bond put us in this position. The fates would have seen this end to our mateship.
And fate allowed this beautiful, loving, and brave woman to die.
“I will do anything!” I cry out. Ella screams, and the witch starts chanting softly, breaking her near silent song to whisper encouragement to my mate. I close my eyes and begin pleading with any and all of the gods, calling them out by name. “I will do anything, please! Please! Take me instead of them. Drag me to Hell. Punish me for what I’ve done. Take my powers!”
Something heavy and painful snaps in my chest like my ribs are breaking. “Take my powers. Take my titles. Take me instead. Spare my mate. Spare our child. Spare them.Spare them!”
My vision blurs, and Ella suddenly slumps against my chest. The witch stands with a bundle in her arms.
The smallest baby I’ve ever seen.
A flash of light nearly blinds me. That pain in my chest erupts. My shadows, my constant companions, shy away from the light and then wither away completely.
All that’s left as my vision goes black is the flickering sensation of a fine silver thread weaving its way around my heart.