Atop the Stalwart Throne, King Rowan looked down upon the body laid at his feet by Lord Palmer. He recognized Tessa’s slight frame and long, dainty fingers, but little else. His heart broke for Lord Palmer, death stole away with so much. 

“The delivery was flawless; I saw so for myself.” Lord Palmer stepped back from his wife’s body. The rest of the council had their hands folded and heads lowered. “She wept with joy when the child was delivered. We named our son together, she held him, but death came for her without warning. The post-mortem revealed nothing. Her pregnancy was without complication, her age ideal, and, again, the delivery was flawless, but she died anyway. They told me her heart just stopped, just like that. There was nothing to it.”   

Lord Palmer rejoined the other council members. All was silent for a time as they awaited the king’s response.

“I share in your grief, Lord Palmer. Losing Queen Pennifer was the hardest battle I ever fought. The gift of life often exacts a terrible price. Take solace in the fact-”

“You do not understand.”

No one interrupted King Rowan, no one.

“This is not the same. Queen Pennifer’s death was a tragedy, this is something far worse. Four weeks ago, Lord Radclyffe’s wife died under identical circumstances. When Tessa passed, we sent word out to the common folk, trying to find any evidence of a recent mother who survived childbirth. We found none, only a continuous trade-off between life and death. Unitare grieves for its fallen mothers.”

The king was still reeling. He had fought and won a war which spanned over a decade, only to come home to an enemy force far more sinister.

“Fourteen years, thereabouts. The only mothers we could find had their children fourteen years ago or more-”

“Nonsense! Fourteen years?! A plague such as this could not exist for so long without my knowledge. There must be some explanation, some missing evidence! A generation cannot pass with no surviving mothers! We would have known; we would have realized years ago!”

“Not during a time of war! The Blackstar Wars called on every house for over a decade. There were no children during this time. Every able-bodied man was out fighting for food, fighting for clean water. We fought to ensure the survival of our descendants. Now, we have returned home, and see that our survival has demanded a terrible, terrible price.”

“You mean to say…”

“The Blackstar, it is as the triarchs once predicted. We are a cursed people, in a cursed land.”

Triarch Amundsen of Bellmuth made his way from behind the council bench toward the Stalwart throne, stopping short of Tessa’s body. King Rowan’s mind wondered at the future, seeing nothing. When he reflected on the past, all he could think about was Xandrea and Ethan. Ethan, who had been born on the night the Blackstar fell from the heavens.

“The greatest minds in Unitare have investigated this unbroken trend and discovered nothing,” the learned triarch began. “We can, however, project our fate should this curse continue. There is not much to explain, really. The average female bears four children in her lifetime, half of which survive past sixteen. However, if each female capable of childbirth bears only one child, there is only a half-chance that the child will be another child-rearing female, and another half-chance that the child will live to an age in which she can bear children. What this means is that in a single generation, or about twenty years’ time, the female population will be quartered while the male population should level off, foregoing any additional wars or unexpected plagues.”

“There must be a way to save our mothers…”

Triarch Amundsen shook his head at King Rowan. “There is no scientific explanation for this phenomenon. Therefore, there will be no scientific solution.”

“How long?” It was a question hanging over everyone’s head. How long until the wars started again? How long until the fighting became futile? How long until all women vanished? How long until the entire kingdom faded away?

“Until annihilation? Hard to say. It is safe to say that things will get ugly very soon. Before long, word will spread, the population will panic, and women will become a priceless commodity, ten-times more valuable than gold. No matter what happens though, as the female population shrinks, inbreeding will be the first sign of our impending doom. In all likelihood, female children will be born sterile three or four generations down the line, assuming we make it that far.”

“We must conceal this curse for as long as possible,” the king reasoned. “Another war cannot break out, Unitare will not survive it.”

“We must warn the people!” Lord Palmer interjected, standing up from his seat on the bench. “Cancel tonight’s feast and the prince’s nameday tourney, make a decree enforcing abstinence until the curse can be broken! Our mothers and our daughters are dying! The people must know.”

“And they will know, come tomorrow. Tonight’s feast celebrates our victory in the Blackstar War, a victory we all fought for over a decade to achieve. After this council meeting, I shall send a raven to Benja Wynter, commanding him to find the source of this pall and to cut it off once and for all. In the meantime, we shall celebrate our victories and honor those that died to achieve them. Ethan’s nameday tourney will also not be canceled under any circumstances. That is my final word.”

“Have you no clue how dire this is, the kingdom will-”

“Enough! This meeting is adjourned. I expect you all to attend the feast tonight. Let tomorrow’s worries wait until tomorrow…”

The king stepped over Tessa’s body on the way out of the throne room.