The day began with frost, thick and glittering on the windowpanes of the west cabin. Inside, Aria moved slowly through her morning routine, though everything now took longer—getting dressed, sitting, standing, breathing.
Her belly had grown enough that bending was nearly impossible, and her ribs ached from where the baby kicked most often, always in the same stubborn spot just below her heart.
She didn’t complain. Not to Zara, not to Maela. But the weight of it all—physical, emotional, psychic—was starting to grind.
Still, it wasn’t the aches or the tether that haunted her today.
It was the knowledge that she was keeping something from Kael.
And it was intentional.
The decision had come quietly, like a stone sinking into water.
At first, she told herself it wasn’t a secret. She wasn’t hiding the truth so much as… waiting for the right time. Waiting for safety. Waiting to know what Kael really wanted. Waiting for him to prove he wasn’t just showing up out of guilt or obligation.
But the truth had a way of hardening when held too long.
And now, every time he reached across the tether—every dream, every flicker of his voice in her mind—she responded with silence.
Not rejection.
Just a wall.
Because she knew if she told him what she felt—what the baby was doing—he would come.
Not just to speak.
But to claim.
And she couldn’t risk that. Not yet.
Zara found her in the clearing that afternoon, sitting on the old bench near the river, her cloak draped loosely around her and her boots kicked off beside her in the snow.
“You missed patrol briefing,” Zara said, brushing snow from the bench before sitting.
“I’m not a scout.”
“You’re something bigger now. They expect you to show up.”
Aria glanced at her, a wry smile on her lips. “I didn’t ask to be anything.”
“No one ever does,” Zara muttered. “But that doesn’t stop people from handing you the crown and walking away.”
They sat in silence for a moment.
Then Zara added, “Kael’s been quiet.”
Aria nodded. “I’ve been blocking him.”
Zara turned. “You can do that?”
“Not completely,” Aria said. “But enough to dampen the connection. The baby… lets me filter.”
Zara studied her. “You haven’t told him, have you?”
“No.”
Zara’s voice lowered. “You’re sure that’s the right call?”
Aria didn’t answer immediately.
She stared out at the water, where ice was beginning to form in slow, delicate crystals.
“If I tell him now,” she said, “he’ll come with force. Not violence—just presence. Power. The full weight of his guilt and duty.”
“And you don’t want that?”
“I want him to come because he wants us. Not because the child made the decision for him.”
Zara exhaled. “You’re giving him a choice he never gave you.”
Aria nodded. “Exactly.”
That night, the tether pulsed again.
She was mid-dream—wandering the halls of the Draven estate, barefoot, searching for a door that kept moving—when it hit.
Kael’s presence.
Urgent. Flickering.
Desperate.
His voice came through jagged, like a radio not tuned to the right channel.
“Tell me you’re okay.”
She sat upright in bed, gasping.
Zara stirred instantly, reaching for her blade before realizing it was just the tether.
Aria’s eyes were distant. “He’s pushing through.”
Zara’s expression tightened. “What do you want to do?”
Aria shook her head. “Nothing.”
“You sure?”
“No,” Aria admitted. “But I need to wait.”
In the days that followed, the baby grew more active.
Maela confirmed what Aria already suspected: the pregnancy was progressing faster than average. Much faster. The child was developing in weeks what normally took months.
“They’ll come early,” the healer warned. “And they’ll come strong. You need to be ready.”
“I am,” Aria said.
But she wasn’t sure that was true.
Because the baby wasn’t just growing stronger—it was growing smarter.
Sometimes when Aria thought too loudly, she felt a nudge—not physical, but mental. A soft, curious hum, like the child was listening in.
Or choosing what to hear.
She caught herself whispering apologies into the night, hand pressed to her stomach, promising things she wasn’t even sure she could give.
“You don’t have to carry everything I’ve been through. You’re your own person. You don’t belong to me. Not fully. You belong to yourself.”
The baby would respond with a shift. A ripple of warmth. Almost… forgiveness.
It terrified her.
And it awed her.
One morning, a letter arrived.
No raven. No courier.
Just a folded note tucked into the edge of the cabin door.
Aria found it before Zara did. The seal was unmarked. The handwriting was Kael’s.
You don’t have to answer me. But I need you to know… I still see you when I close my eyes. Not the girl I hurt. The woman who rose after I did. I don’t expect anything. I just hope one day you’ll let me say it face-to-face: I’m sorry.
—K
Aria read it twice.
Then burned it in the hearth.
Zara said nothing. Just watched the ash curl and disappear.
“He means it,” she said.
“I know.”
Zara waited. “And?”
“And it doesn’t change anything,” Aria whispered.
But the truth gnawed at her.
The longer she kept the psychic tether a secret, the more it hardened into a choice with consequences.
She knew Kael could feel something. That’s what made it worse. The confusion in his dreams. The questions in his voice.
He wasn’t ignoring her anymore.
He just didn’t understand.
And she wasn’t ready to help him.
Because helping him meant cracking open the wall she’d spent months building—and letting the man who shattered her see her again.
Vulnerable.
Changed.
And no longer his.
On the first night of full moon, Aria stood atop the eastern ridge and watched the light spill over the trees.
The wind carried distant howls—packs far off celebrating their cycles, their unity.
Zara approached quietly, cloak pulled tight around her shoulders.
Aria didn’t turn.
“I’m going to keep it from him,” she said. “At least until the birth.”
Zara was quiet. Then: “You’re sure?”
“I’m not hiding the child. I’m hiding what we are. What we’re becoming.”
Zara stepped beside her. “Then I’ll protect the lie.”
Aria finally looked at her. “It’s not a lie.”
Zara met her gaze. “Then I’ll protect the truth, too.”
Somewhere far beyond SilverCrest, Kael stood alone in his war tent, unable to sleep.
The tether had gone quiet again.
Too quiet.
He pressed a hand to his chest, fingers twitching as if to reach for something that wasn’t there.
She was blocking him.
He could feel it.
And for the first time, it wasn’t the silence that scared him.
It was what she might be keeping inside it.
