Chapter 10: The Prophecy Ignites
Elara POV
The taste of Cassian's blood still lingered on my lips.
I sat in my chambers, hands trembling as I touched my mouth. I couldn't believe I'd actually bitten him. Couldn't believe I'd finally stopped pretending to be his obedient wife.
The defiance felt like freedom and a death sentence all at once.
Outside my window, I could see Darius's escort preparing to leave. Horses stamped impatiently while servants loaded supplies. In a matter of hours, he'd be gone. Banished to the far reaches of the kingdom while I faced Cassian's wrath alone.
A knock at the door interrupted my spiraling thoughts. "Enter."
Helena stepped inside, her face pale. "Your Majesty, the king commands your presence in the ritual chamber. The High Seer has requested an emergency reading."
My blood turned to ice. The High Seer only performed emergency readings for matters of life and death. For prophecies too urgent to wait for the monthly ceremonies.
"What kind of reading?"
"I... I don't know, Your Majesty. But the entire court has been summoned to witness."
This was it. Whatever Cassian had planned as punishment for my defiance, it was beginning now.
I followed Helena through corridors filled with whispering nobles. They parted before me like water, their eyes curious and fearful. Word of my public humiliation in the throne room had spread quickly.
The ritual chamber sat deep in the palace's heart, carved from black stone and lit by dozens of flickering torches. Ancient symbols covered the walls—wolf runes, moon phases, prophecies written in the old tongue.
Cassian waited beside the ritual circle, his split lip already healing. When our eyes met, his smile was razor-sharp.
"Ah, my dear wife. How good of you to join us."
The High Seer stood in the circle's center, her ancient eyes milky with cataracts but somehow still all-seeing. She'd served the crown for sixty years, and her prophecies had never been wrong.
Which made what was about to happen infinitely more terrifying.
"Your Majesty," she said, her voice like dry leaves. "The visions came to me in the night. Urgent. Undeniable. The Moon Goddess herself demands they be spoken."
"Then speak," Cassian commanded.
The court gathered around the circle's edge. I noticed Mireille standing close to the king, her green eyes glittering with anticipation. Whatever was about to happen, she knew about it.
The High Seer raised her gnarled hands, and the torches flickered as if touched by an otherworldly wind.
"Behold," she intoned. "The vision of the White Wolf's child."
My heart stopped beating.
"I see a babe of two worlds, two bloodlines, two destinies. Born of forbidden love under the cursed moon." Her blind eyes turned toward me with impossible accuracy. "The child that will bring down the lion's reign."
Gasps echoed through the chamber. Several nobles stepped back, making signs against evil. But the High Seer wasn't finished.
"White fur and black, moon and shadow, love and war." Her voice grew stronger, more commanding. "The bastard child of the true mate bond shall wear the crown that was never his father's to claim."
The words hit like physical blows. She was describing my child. Darius's child. Our baby, not even born yet, was the subject of ancient prophecy.
Cassian's face had gone deadly pale. "You're saying the queen's bastard will steal my throne?"
"I speak only what the Goddess shows me." The High Seer's voice never wavered. "The White Wolf carries the child of prophecy. Born of the bond the crown tried to break, raised in the shadow of a false king's fear."
"False king?" Cassian's voice cracked like a whip.
But the High Seer had fallen into the full grip of prophecy now. Her eyes rolled back, showing only white, and her voice became something otherworldly.
"The mate bond cannot be broken by politics or steel. The child born of true love shall reclaim what was stolen. The false king shall fall, and the bastard prince shall rise, and the White Wolf shall—"
"Enough!" Cassian roared, his voice echoing off the stone walls.
But it was too late. The entire court had heard. The entire court knew that my child—my unborn child—was prophesied to destroy him.
The High Seer collapsed, the vision released her. Servants rushed to help her, but the damage was done.
Silence stretched through the chamber like a blade.
Then Cassian began to laugh. Low and bitter and completely without humor.
"A bastard prince," he said, his voice carrying to every corner of the room. "My brother's whelp, prophesied to steal my throne."
He turned to face me fully, and what I saw in his eyes made my blood freeze. Not just anger now. Something deeper. Something that looked almost like madness.
"Well, my dear wife," he said, moving toward me with predatory grace. "It seems your condition is even more... significant than I thought."
I backed away instinctively, but there was nowhere to go. The nobles had formed a circle around us, watching with morbid fascination.
"The White Wolf's child," Cassian continued, stalking me like prey. "The bastard prince who will steal my crown. How... inconvenient."
"The prophecy could mean anything," I said desperately. "Prophecies are often symbolic—"
"Are they?" His hand shot out, grabbing my wrist hard enough to leave bruises. "Because the High Seer seemed quite specific. Your bastard will steal my throne."
"He's not a bastard. I'm your wife—"
"You're my wife who fucked my brother and conceived his child." His grip tightened painfully. "A child that prophecy says will destroy me."
The nobles murmured among themselves, but no one moved to intervene. This was between their king and queen. They were just witnesses to the royal marriage dissolving in blood and prophecy.
"But here's the thing about prophecies," Cassian said, his voice dropping to something soft and deadly. "They only come true if the prophesied child lives to fulfill them."
Terror crawled up my throat. "What are you saying?"
His free hand moved to my stomach, pressing against the slight swell hidden beneath my dress.
"I'm saying that prophecies can be... prevented." His fingers dug into my belly hard enough to make me gasp. "If there's no child, there's no bastard prince. If there's no bastard prince, there's no threat to my reign."
"Cassian, please—"
"You want to know what's going to happen?" He pulled me closer, his lips almost touching my ear. "You're going to drink the same teas I gave Mireille. The same teas that ended her inconvenient pregnancies."
I tried to pull away, but his grip was iron. "And if you refuse, I'll hold you down and cut the little bastard out myself."
Horror flooded through me. Around us, the nobles watched in shocked silence. Even they seemed disturbed by his casual discussion of murdering an unborn child.
"You can't," I whispered. "It's your heir. Legally, any child I bear is your heir—"
"Not anymore." His smile was empty of all warmth. "Prophecy changed the game, my dear. This child isn't my heir—it's my destroyer. And I eliminate all threats to my crown."
The High Seer, still being supported by her attendants, suddenly lifted her head. Her blind eyes found mine across the circle.
"The child lives," she said, her voice carrying impossible authority. "The Goddess has decreed it. The White Wolf's child lives, and grows strong, and will wear the crown of two kingdoms."
Cassian's face contorted with fury. "Then I'll tear it from her womb myself."
The threat hung in the air like poison. Several noble ladies gasped. Even some of the men looked sick.
But I felt something else. Something fierce and protective blazing to life in my chest.
"No," I said quietly.
"What did you say?"
"No." I met his eyes steadily, no longer caring about the consequences. "You will not touch my child. You will not poison me. You will not tear my baby from my womb."
"Won't I?" He laughed harshly. "Who's going to stop me? Your precious mate is gone. Your people sold you to me. You have no one."
"I have myself." I placed both hands protectively over my stomach. "And I have the Moon Goddess. And I have the prophecy that says this child will live to see you fall."
His hand moved to his sword. For a moment, I thought he might kill me right there in front of everyone.
Instead, he leaned close and whispered words that chilled me to the bone:
"If a child quickens in your womb, I'll tear it from you myself. If prophecy says it will end me, then I'll end it first. And if you try to run, I'll hunt you to the ends of the earth and make sure you watch it die slowly."
He released me so suddenly I stumbled backward.
"Guards," he barked. "Escort the queen to her chambers. She's to remain confined until... her condition... can be properly addressed."
As the guards moved toward me, I pressed my hands tighter against my stomach.
"You can't fight prophecy," I told him, loud enough for everyone to hear. "The Goddess has spoken. This child will live. This child will wear a crown. And you will fall."
His face twisted with rage. "We'll see about that."
The guards seized my arms, but I didn't struggle. I walked out of that chamber with my head high, carrying the child of prophecy and the promise of a king's downfall.
Behind me, I heard Cassian's voice, cold and deadly:
"Ready the physicians. And send word to the herbalists. We have a problem to solve."