Part 3 — The Bracelet with a Pulse

Three months into my pregnancy, the king allowed me to visit my father.

The guards took me beneath Crownspire Palace, down six flights of wet stone steps and through three iron gates. Lord Gideon Veyne had once read the future of kingdoms in the movement of stars. I found him in a windowless cell, thin enough for the bones of his face to cast shadows.

He stood when he saw me.

Then his gaze dropped to the curve beneath my cloak.

"So the child has come," he whispered.

I reached through the bars and caught his hand. "You were right. A young king will rule Valedorn."

"Being right is a poor comfort in a dungeon."

"I will get you out."

Instead of smiling, he tightened his fingers around mine.

"You and the Crown Princess shared the dream?"

"Yes."

"Then the Crownfire touched you both. That gives her a path to the child."

Cold traveled through me.

"The Dragonstone recognized me. The dragonthorn bloomed."

"Blood chooses its bearer, but forbidden rites can move flesh." He glanced toward the guards and lowered his voice. "If Celeste offers you gold worked with two dragons, do not let it close around your skin."

Footsteps sounded beyond the gate.

My father released me at once.

"Remember," he said. "A stolen womb is only the door. What waits beyond it is death."

Celeste was waiting in my chambers when I returned.

She rose with a smile and carried a narrow velvet box in both hands. Since the dragonthorn bloomed, she had not insulted me in public. She had become considerate, soft-spoken, almost sisterly.

It frightened me more than her hatred.

"We have let one man turn us into enemies," she said. "In my world, women knew better than that."

"In your world, did women usually threaten to take one another's babies?"

Her smile barely shifted.

"I was angry. I am trying to make amends."

She opened the box.

Inside lay a red-gold bracelet formed from two dragons devouring each other's tails.

My father's warning rang in my head.

Celeste lifted the bracelet. "This came with me from my world. It never grows cold, never tarnishes, and protects its wearer from illness. I want you to have it."

Refusing would warn her. Acceptance might tell me what she planned.

I held out my wrist.

The clasp snapped shut.

Pain dragged through my abdomen. The child's lively humming stopped as if a hand had closed around his mouth.

"Mother?" he breathed. "It is drinking the fire."

I reached for the clasp.

Celeste covered it with her fingers.

"You would reject my most precious possession in front of the queen's servants? People might think you do not truly want peace."

Cassian entered before I could answer. His gaze moved from Celeste's hand to my face.

"She has made every effort to show you kindness," he said. "Do not use your condition as permission to humiliate my wife."

I let my hand fall.

"You are right, Your Highness. I will treasure it."

Celeste's relief was small but unmistakable.

Before leaving, she checked the clasp twice.

I waited until her footsteps faded. Then I wrapped the bracelet in linen and sent a guard for Elias Wren.

He arrived from the Royal Observatory carrying instruments inside an unmarked physician's case. Once the doors were barred, he held a blue alchemical flame beneath the bracelet.

Lines of crimson script appeared on the inner band.

Elias went still.

"Wombshift runes."

"Can you remove it?"

"Not without tearing the life bond. The bracelet has already tied itself to your pulse."

He slid a silver needle beneath the band and severed a thread finer than hair. The pressure in my abdomen eased. My child gasped.

"That stopped the drain," Elias said. "It did not break the spell."

"What happens when the spell is complete?"

"After seven days, the caster uses royal blood to open the rite. Your pregnancy, the child's body, even the outward signs of motherhood can be moved into another woman."

The bracelet pulsed once against my wrist.

I remembered Celeste touching Cassian's cut hand during the wedding feast, then fastening a new oath pendant around his neck the following morning. At the time, the gesture had looked tender. Now I understood why she had insisted on placing the chain herself.

"She already has royal blood," I said.

Elias looked up sharply.

"Then the ceremony is not a blessing. It is the trigger."

My hands began to shake. I pressed them flat against the table.

"Make a copy of every rune."

"Elara—"

"Celeste believes I know nothing. I intend to keep that advantage."

Elias studied me for a long moment, then took out paper and black wax. He pressed the hidden script into the wax, made two impressions, and sealed one inside his case.

I made him create a third copy in mirror script and stitched it into the hem of my winter cloak. If Celeste searched my rooms, she would find nothing. If Cassian seized the queen's copy, the Observatory would still have one. And if both of them failed, the evidence would remain against my skin.

"No single custodian," I said. "That is how my father's records were replaced."

Elias gave a grim nod. "Gideon would be proud of you."

"He can tell me himself when I open his cell."

"The second goes to Queen Lenora's first lady," I said. "Not the royal archive. Cassian can open it."

"And the bracelet?"

I pulled the linen away and let the red gold shine.

"It stays on me until Celeste shows us the rest of the crime."

Over the next six days, I wore it openly.

I powdered my face paler each morning. I left half my meals untouched. Whenever Celeste visited, I allowed my hand to tremble while pouring tea.

Her eyes always dropped to the bracelet.

On the seventh day, she made her move.

Before the king and queen, Celeste proposed a quickening ceremony at the Chapel of the First Crown.

"The heir should receive the blessing of his ancestors," she said. "Let the rite be held tomorrow."

King Edmund mistook calculation for grace.

"At last," he said, "you speak as a future queen should."

Celeste bowed her head.

From where I sat, I saw the silver knife hidden inside her sleeve. Its edge was already wet with blood.

Elias left the Queen's House after nightfall to deliver the final rune impressions.

He never reached the Observatory.

The guards found him beneath the western arch with a blade buried in his shoulder. By the time I reached the physicians' hall, he was unconscious, his pulse thin beneath blood-soaked bandages.

On the floor beside his hand, four words had been written in blood.

Not the womb. The life.