Content Warning:

Graphic descriptions.

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Husband and wife spent their days together once again. Anders lay awake praying for Gwynnyth’s survival while she groaned and gurgled beside him in bed.

At last, the Queen entered labor. Anders paced the hall with Krystofyr and a few courtiers while the midwife and her assistants tended to Gwynnyth.

My son is coming, he thought. God, save my Gwynnyth.

The time of the delivery was marked when Gwynnyth’s strained cries were drowned out by the other women’s shrieks. Anders bolted toward the door, but the midwife’s assistants burst out, flooding the hall with panic, completely ignoring their bewildered King.

Anders grabbed the midwife’s wrist and yanked her aside. “What happened?” he demanded. 

Wild-eyed, the old woman screeched, “Demon!” Black goop dripped from her fingers. She wrenched out of his grip and scrambled away. Anders’ friends backed away from the door, muttering and staring down at the wisps of cold, black smoke that trailed from within. 

Inside, Anders’ baby wailed.

He rushed past his skittish friends into the dark bedchamber. All the curtains were drawn as a protective measure for the delivery, but a ghostly blue glow shone from behind the black-stained bed. He approached the baby’s cries.

Gwynnyth leaned against the bedframe, sobbing, clutching her precious child to her breast. The half-formed fetus was pure black, cold, and perfectly still except for the black vapors emanating from its rubbery skin. Pale blue light glowed from every hole, crack, and socket of its bare skull. Although it had no heartbeat and did not breathe, it continued wailing like any newborn. Gwynnyth looked up at her husband with more pain than he had ever seen in his life.

A shadow’s son.

Anders was an incomplete man. He had received his incomplete son.