Six hundred years into our marriage, I found out my husband had a son.
I had ended my border patrol three days early, wanting to surprise Valerius.
Not far away, Valerius was channeling his exclusive magic, teaching a boy how to weave the darkness.
"Dad! I did it!" The boy looked up. His bright eyes were a near-perfect reflection of Valerius's.
My mind instantly went blank.
Dad?
A woman walked over.
She draped a small cloak over the boy's shoulders, her hand brushing against Valerius's chest with practiced familiarity. "Valeri, the wind is picking up. He'll catch a cold now that he's sweating."
Valerius naturally wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "My fault."
The image of them huddled together like a picture-perfect family was an ice-tipped needle driven straight into my eyes.
The sharp sting made my breath hitch in my throat.
The man who had sworn before the Senate to love me for all eternity—the man bound to me by a Soul Blood Pact—had already betrayed me!
A sudden, agonizing cramp seized my lower abdomen.
It was an old wound from six centuries ago.
When the Sunfire Curse nearly reduced Valerius to ashes, I had offered my high-born pure blood and my womb as a sacrifice to forcibly block the hex for him.
The price was permanent infertility, along with an excruciating backlash of pain I had to endure every single month.
Back then, Valerius had held me, his eyes red and tear-filled. "I don't want any children! I would rather lose my seat in the Senate than ever betray you!"
Yet the scene before me crushed those words into fine dust.
I stumbled backward, my chest feeling as though it had been ripped open by bare hands.
I was terrified I'd lose control and rush over to scream at him.
Worse yet, in the face of this cozy, happy family of three, I was afraid I'd look like a pathetic, unwanted outsider.
Suffocation gripped my throat. I turned and fled.
