He took Marcellious, reverent, silent.Then, with a murmured word, he passed him to a waiting woman, who disappeared into the fading light beyond the tent flap.I watched every motion, every step, my eyes pleading, my heart hollowing.It felt like a piece of my soul was being carried away with my silent babe.Gone.
I couldn’t bear another loss.Not now.Not ever again.
“Roman!”The name burst from me like a cry of war.I clutched my living son, holding him so tightly he whimpered in protest.I pulled him against me, skin to skin, my body curled around him like a fierce, trembling shield.
“You can’t have this one!”I sobbed, hysteria rising like floodwaters in my throat.“You can’t take Roman.I won’t let you take him!”
Dancing Fire didn’t move.He stood before me, still, grounded, his eyes full of sorrow—and something more.Something ancient.A knowing that chilled me more than the loss.
“I won’t take him,” he said softly.“He is yours to raise.”
My breath hitched, raw and uneven, as I looked up at him, barely able to comprehend.
“Elizabeth,” he said, voice composed, despite the tremor of grief between us, “Roman is a Timeborne.Like me.”
Through the veil of my tears, I met his gaze, desperate to find a lie, a crack, some sliver of doubt—but all I saw was solemn truth, ancient and immutable.
“How do you know?”I rasped, my voice hoarse from crying, from screaming, from surviving.My heart pounded, a frantic rhythm against Roman’s tiny chest, his fragile life held close.Alive.Safe.Mine.
Dancing Fire said nothing.Instead, he reached into the folds of his garments and drew forth two daggers.At first glance, they seemed ordinary—but then I saw it.A faint glow pulsed from the intricate carvings on the hilts and blades, a soft, rhythmic light that shimmered perfectly with Roman’s heartbeat.It was not a coincidence.It was a connection.Proof.
I stared at the blades, my breath catching, the blood in my veins turning ice-cold.The memories came rushing back—memories of my father, of bloodshed, of Timebornes hunted like animals—my father’s cruelty, his thirst for control, painted in crimson across history.
“No.”My voice was hard, edged like flint.“Take it.Hide it.Bury it where no one will ever find it.He will never know about this.Never.”
Dancing Fire’s eyes didn’t waver.“Elizabeth, you can’t decide his destiny,” he said, and in his voice was the weight of centuries of lives lived and lost under the burden of prophecy.“This is who he is.”
Anger surged, blinding, fierce.It eclipsed my grief, burning through my veins like fire.“I can, and I will!”I snapped, my voice cracking under its force.My hands curled into fists, nails biting into my palms.“My father was a Timehunter.He slaughtered Timebornes—your people.If they find out Roman is one of you, they’ll hunt him too.He’ll die because of what he is.”
I pulled Roman tighter, closer, as if I could shield him with my body, as if I could force him back into the womb where nothing could touch him.My whole being trembled with the need to protect him—no matter the cost.
Dancing Fire knelt setting the daggers aside, his hand hovering over the them but never touching to honor my defiance and grant me this small illusion of control.
“Elizabeth,” he said softly, his eyes shadowed by something deeper than sorrow.“Not even the shadows of time can hide what fate ordains.”
But I had already made my decision.
Clutching the tiny, fragile beacon of hope that was Roman, I whispered, fierce and resolute, “I will never let him fall into the clutches of people like my father.”The vow etched itself into my soul, a binding promise written in blood and grief.
Dancing Fire’s words lingered in the air, heavy with a truth I didn’t want to face.“You can’t run from this forever,” he said, his gaze unwavering, dark, a mirror reflecting inevitability.
I pulled Roman closer, feeling his chest’s gentle rise and fall against my skin, each breath a fragile miracle.Sadness flooded me, hot and suffocating, until tears blurred my vision.“I’ve already endured too much heartache,” I said, my voice breaking.“First Amir… and now Marcellious.He’s gone.I can’t stay here, Dancing Fire.I won’t.Roman and I—we’re going back to England.We’ll start over, far from all this sorrow and this cursed land.”
My voice trembled, laced with mourning too vast to name—yet beneath it, a steel edge of determination.
“Elizabeth,” he began softly as if he could reach into my despair and pull me free, but the gentleness in his voice couldn’t dull the edge of the warning that followed.“You’re making a mistake.Stay.I will protect you.I care for you… more than you know.”
I lifted my defiant gaze as my heart cracked beneath the weight of it all.“Then what do you suggest?”I demanded, the question biting with desperation.“What would make this right?”
“Marry me.”
The words fell from his lips, simple and shattering.
“No.”My answer came too fast and harsh, recoiling like a torn open wound.“You and I—we come from different worlds.You’re a savage.A barbarian.And I…” My voice faltered.“I am a lady.”
The hurt in his eyes pierced me—quick and deep, sharper than any dagger could ever be.He stood abruptly, the shift in his body language a storm barely contained.
“You call yourself a lady,” he said, voice low and raw, “and yet you opened your legs to a man who wasn’t your husband.And you call me a savage?”His words struck like thunder, bitter, edged with betrayal.“A man who would die for you?”
