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Gaze cast from mine, he cocked his head to the side and cleared his throat, undoubtedly trying to stave off tears of his own. “Farryn …”
A thick dread filled my lungs, every breath toxic and greasy with the misery of unspoken words. Dead. Gone. No more.
The black void of before fizzled inside my head, to the moment when I looked down at myself and saw the blood. Too much of it, pooling onto the mattress. The blonde standing beside me. The ringing in my ears.
“No,” I whispered. “No, no, no.” Gripping my stomach, I curled into myself.
“I’m so sorry, my love.”
Jericho’s words were a distant sound to the pounding of blood in my ears. Agony tore through me like a hot blade, and the sound that ripped from my chest was foreign. So desolate and hopeless. A suffocating vapor of misery hung on the air, and my lungs locked. I couldn’t breathe.
I buried my face into the pillow and screamed. Screamed for the baby I would never cradle in my arms. The clean and innocent scent I would never breathe in. I screamed for the smiles and giggles and tiny handprints drawn on walls. I cried for the quiet nights whispering to Jericho as the baby slept between us. For never seeing him hold his child for the first time. I cried for every lost moment fate had stolen from me.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m so, so sorry.”
“Sorry for what? This isn’t your fault.”
“It is. I should’ve … I should’ve eaten better. I should’ve taken better care. I did so many things wrong.”
“You didnothingwrong.”
I had. And now the baby was gone.
Forever.
* * *
Eyes swollen and burning, I stared off toward the open space of my room that my head had convinced me would never see the likes of a cradle. Deep in my heart, I knew. Knew that the baby was just not meant to be. It felt as if I’d cried every tear left in me, but I knew there was more to come. I’d lived through months of pain after I’d lost Jericho. Except, he’d come back to me.
Strong arms wrapped tightly around me, as Jericho held me against him, his chest to my back. Just breathing.
My chest felt like a roomful of butterflies catching fire, leaving me to choke on the delicate ashes. Everything hurt. Everything burned. And yet, at the same time, I felt nothing at all. Numb. “Was any of this real? The baby? Was the baby even real?”
At that, he took my hand and pressed his palm to mine. “Stre vera’tu,” he whispered in my ear.As real as the stars.
Anger twisted in my stomach, stoking the pain there. The pain of an empty womb. How cruel was it that we not only suffered loss, but the agony of our bodies slowly coming to terms with the hollow, the ache of emptiness. “Then, God must be cruel. Why would He give something real--something mine, and then take it away?”
“I wish I could take this pain away from you. I would take it all.”
An idea struck then, one I hadn’t even considered before. “Could we … could we reverse time? Like I did when Remy and I returned to the mortal realm. I could go back to just before we arrived in Nightshade. We could stay in the mortal realm. Can we do that? Can we go back?”
He planted a gentle kiss to my shoulder. “I can’t bring back the baby, Tu’Nazhja.”
“But you’re not. You’d just be reversing time.” My words were frantic. Desperate. Pathetic. “I promise I’ll do it better next time. I’ll do everything better.”
“Farryn, listen to my words. Reversing time will not put the baby back inside you. You would return as you are now.
“That can’t be true. I can’t be pregnant one day, then not pregnant the next.”
“The universe will adjust for discrepancies. You would suffer as you are now on the eve before your return.”
There it was again, the small pinprick of hope fading off in the distance. “This is my punishment, isn’t it? This is what I deserve. I defied Him by bringing you back. And so He took from me. Eye for an eye, right?”
Arms wrapped tighter around me, his muscles damn near suffocating me. “Don’t do this, Farryn.”
“I will do this. Ineedto do this. Because pain is, and will always be, the consequence of love.” My voice broke, and more tears, endless tears, welled in my eyes. “I never wanted a baby. Never saw myself as a mom. When you told me pregnancy was the only way to break the curse, for a split moment, I felt imprisoned by that.” The tears slipped over the bridge of my nose and down my cheek. “I hate myself for that.”
Jericho didn’t say anything, only stroked his fingers over my arm in a slow and calming pace.
