Firna gasps, but I ignore her, my eyes trained on the princess. She stares back at me, afraid and strong in the way that only mothers can truly be. To feel all of the possible futures in their hearts and to grasp at the best one for their child, holding on tight with everything they have.
The baby is a lucky child to have such a mother fighting for him.
“What will it be, Princess? Are we going to break this curse together, or will you leave it to the Unseelie Court, hoping they someday get around to doing something about all this pain and heartache?”
She swallows, her brow still slick with sweat and her cheeks flushed from the pain she’s in. Small wisps of hair that have come loose from the braid stick out in every direction, framing her face, her limbs bare and shaking a little, but she’s never looked more beautiful or powerful to me.
She is female incarnate, and the moment her eyes meet mine, clear and sure, she nods.
“I won’t be burning another son on the funeral pyres. If you get him here safely, alive and unharmed, I’ll help you. I’ll get Soren to let you out of the dungeon.”
I shake my head and grab the burning bowl of incense, prying open the window and shoving it out to clear the room of its useless scent. “I’m not doing this for your favor. That’s not how I was raised. I’m doing this because you have a need for a midwife and I’m capable. That’s it. We can discuss your opinions on my treatment later. Let me get the room cleared first while I track the pains to be sure of how far you are into your labors.”
Her eyebrows stay bunched up, but she nods and slumps against the pillows while I work around her. Firna’s gaze follows me, but she doesn’t attempt to step in as I remove all of the useless herbs, oils, and flowers from the area.
Once I have fresh air in the room, I scrub my hands in the adjoining bathing room until I’m sure there isn’t a speck of dirt left on them. Then, sitting at the end of the bed, I watch the princess as she breathes through the next wave of pain.
She’s strong and focused, far more so than she was when I arrived. She truly believes I might be able to help her, and I’m glad for it. This will be much harder if she’s lost all hope.
“There are herbs that can help with the discomfort; I can give the maids a list to find for you,” I say but she shakes her head.
“I welcome the pain. The pain says he’s coming finally, each one a step closer to holding him in my arms.”
Her words are strong, but she still sounds sorrowful, as though she’s already preparing herself for failure. He’s coming soon, working his way out of her womb with every wave, and she’s trapped in the winding mess of the curse pressing on her body like an iron slab, held up only by my own magic. Curses are fickle beasts to best, but this one has been stretched thin. To cover an entire kingdom, it needs to be fed. I’d wager in the first centuries, there were many lives lost as the high fae came to understand what the curse was doing to them, and those unwilling sacrifices fed the evil and strengthened it.
I doubt there’ve been any sacrifices since the last baby Airlie lost, and before that baby, many centuries may have passed. The grips of the magic feel desperate, the clawing vicious as it digs to claim the baby. If I get the baby out alive, I can break the curse.
Shields have always been my greatest gift.
I build a wall around that little boy, pouring every drop of power the earth has been sharing with me into it until I’ve woven together an impenetrable cocoon to hold him. The curse fights me; it’s older than I am and a malevolent thing as it claws at me, but I’ve fought off far worse than this. If I can travel to the Northern Lands, become a soldier there and fight the Ureen for centuries of heartache, if I can take the little girl from the forest and form her into the female that I am now, I can protect this small babe.
I’m sick of watching everyone around me die.
“I feel as though I need to push, but it’s too early for that,” the princess moans, her hands clutching the bedsheets, and I send a warning look to Firna when she startles toward the bed in fear.
My tone is low and soothing, calm against the storm of Airlie’s fear and desperation, as I say, “Babies come when they’re ready, not on our timing. If your body says to push, then listen to it, I’ll do the rest. Princess, look at me and hear the truth in my words. I will do everything else, you just focus on getting him out.”
She chokes on a sob, another small sign of despair, but then the pains begin again. She grits her teeth, a low grunting noise tearing out of her unbidden as she pushes with every last fiber of her being.
The curse digs into the shield I’ve protected the boy with, and pain bursts behind my eyes as I force myself to ignore it and keep working. I cast my magic over her womb and feel the baby continue his descent, working with his mother to join her. The cord is coiled around his neck, and my magic eases it away a little as I ready myself to free him, a natural occurrence that I won’t let take him after everything else we’re doing to get him here safely.
The princess lets out a scream, and I have to stand up to get her attention before I can get back to work, a sweat breaking out over my forehead as the curse fights me with all of its might. “Stop pushing for a moment, just breathe, that’s it, short breaths, I’m getting his cord away from his neck, just a moment—okay, push again, Princess, we’ll get his shoulders out next. He’s beautiful, looks just like his father, one more push…there he is!”
I look down to find the baby staring up at me, his golden eyes bleary but curious in the way of babies, and he blinks at me as I catch him, one last scream tearing out of his mother as she feels the relief of his birth, the effort and pains over with in one final mighty push. The pressure of the curse feels as though it’s about to break open my skull, the final desperate push to hold onto the baby’s life and consume it, but my magic holds strong. Even as my vision blurs, I hold true. The princess fought hard for her son, and she’swon.
The curse shatters around us.
Blinking away the last of the stars from my eyes, the pain disappearing in an instant but my body struggling to catch up to its absence, I grasp the baby’s slippery form firmly in my hands. He’s small and a little limp with exhaustion, but alive. I move him quickly onto the bed to clear his airways, rubbing his back and then giving him a quick breath to get his lungs working the way they need to. He’s so small, maybe a little early in his arrival, but his arms are strong as he flails them in the air, searching for his mother’s warmth.
The princess collapses onto the bed with a sob, her entire body overtaken by grief as she mourns her son.
But he’s alive and well in my hands.
With one last breath from my lungs into his, he sputters out a cough and then makes the most beautiful sound a mother could wish for in this moment.
He screams for her.
CHAPTERTWENTY-TWO
