faerie rift chronicles 01 - faerie rift (132 page)

Laova watched him with great, dark, unreadable eyes as he felt carefully down her abdomen, to her distended, very pregnant, stomach.

Just yesterday he’d lain beside her, touching her intimately, becoming familiar with all the lines and planes of her body.

This was impossible.

Taren stared, dumbstruck.

Laova stared into Nemlach’s eyes, waiting. Things had changed in her; it was obvious, now that the jolt of her sudden return was passed. Her face… she was older. Not, perhaps, in years, but in knowledge.

“Laova…” he whispered. Nemlach hadn’t meant to whisper. “Where have you been?”

Her lips parted, and Nemlach watched as doors closed in her heart at the very question. Sadness quieted her voice as she answered. “Many places. Oh, gods, Nemlach, many places.”

He laid a hand on her stomach. “How… long?”

“I don’t know,” she replied.

He glanced down at the swell of her belly; a prickle of hurt twisted inside him. “Who?”

Laova squeezed his arm. “A god. He goes by many names. But this is the child of a god.”

***

It was easier to descend from the mountain; without the storm, the only obstacle was occasionally slippery footing. It had been cloudy for days; they hadn’t been able to see the sky lighten over the past week, preparing to receive a reborn sun.

But as the three of them stood on the high slopes of Star-Reach, Nemlach holding Laova’s hand, watching her every step, the brightening sky unexpectedly broke open. A sliver of sunlight struck them, and after so long in the dark it was blinding. Except to Laova; it was as if she had been in a lighter place, where sunlight had never fled.

She looked out over the world that lay below, beneath scuttling clouds and towering mountains. It was a wronged and ravaged world, one that her people did not understand. She set a hand on her burgeoning stomach and thought that despite everything that had happened, perhaps all was not dark.

Not yet.

- THE END -

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