41. Stella

41

STELLA

I don’t know exactly what wakes me at first. It’s something different.

A disturbance.

I stretch, the sheets wrapped around me carry Stoneheart’s scent. I’m in our bedroom. It gives me pause.

The bathhouse wasn’t a dream, was it? But as my sleepiness fades, the aches of my body bloom. My smile is full of secret delight as I press a pillow against my face.

Last night had been perfect. I sigh, but the off sensation that woke me is still there, begging for attention.

I take stock of my magic. Is there some upset occurring around me that my instincts are warning me about? But the bedroom is peaceful, my wards humming sweetly against my senses.

I frown and turn my searching inward. It doesn’t take long to realized what’s different.

I gasp, sitting up so fast that the world spins.

Low in my belly there’s something new.

Oh, holy shit. I’m pregnant.

Oh shit. My eyes go wide. Panic like I’ve never known makes it hard to breathe.

No—this is a good thing! I tell myself. This is exactly what we wanted, and now it’s happened. The people in the territory will feel more secure in our place here.

“You are welcome here and planned,” I say to the tiny disturbance, trying to calm myself when the self pep-talk doesn’t cut it.

I’m going to be a mom.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. What have I done? I laugh at the ridiculousness.

It’s what have we done?

“Don’t worry,” I say to it. “I’m going to get my head on straight really soon and stop freaking out. I just need to tap someone else in.”

I need support.

The pain in my heart is sharp when I realize I can’t call Mom about this. Not with how we left everything.

I told her I can do this. I can’t go to her the moment I start flailing.

I need Stoneheart to give me a grounding kiss in triumph, and Ben to whisper that I’m going to be great at this because I only got so far as what an heir would mean for the politics of the situation and the idea of having something of my own.

I did not really consider that we were bringing a whole other person into this.

I take deep breaths and throw on some comfy leggings and a T-shirt instead of the protective shield of a sleek appearance.

The people in this penthouse have started to feel like family, and I’m in a hurry. I don’t need to don armor up here.

The kitchen is empty. What time is it? I shake my head, unwilling to be distracted from my destination.

I’m surprised I haven’t run into Ben yet, but the best place to find Stoneheart if he’s in is the library.

Silas waits in front of the closed library doors, his tail twitching in…worry?

I learned that the sound proofing will stop people from being able to listen to discussions and blocks large noises, but if you lean in close, you can tell when the room is occupied by the soft murmur of speaking.

But when I lean in the voices sound angry.

“What’s going on?” I ask.

“My lady,” Silas jumps back. “Barnes and Stoneheart seem to be in an unscheduled meeting. I’m just waiting until the coast is clear.”

Silas inhales, and his expression does something I’m not familiar with. Can a lizardman pale? He’s doing his best attempt to.

Foreboding sinks in my chest.

“Are they fighting?” I ask, pushing open the door without waiting for his answer, or considering his shock.

“ Fuck you, ” Ben says, and it’s full of sad venom.

“What’s going on?” I ask the room this time, walking to the two of them.

They glare at each other, and I shrink a little on the inside, but my news can’t wait. My heart is already pulled so tight between wonder and worry that I’m going to explode.

“I have something to tell you,” I say, hopeful I can derail whatever argument they’re having and solve my touch of panic all in one go, but Ben’s attention drops to my stomach and the expression on his face is shock.

“Impossible,” he whispers. He raises a hand as if feeling or seeing something that I can’t.

Well, I guess there goes my announcing the news. Confusion scrunches my brow. Why does he look so pained?

I take a couple of steps forward, wanting to ease his obvious hurt, but Ben stumbles away.

I turn to my husband, alarmed, but he’s no help.

Stoneheart’s nostrils flare. “Fuck.”

“Did you plan this too? Did the both of you set me up?” Ben asks.

“You think I would plan this?” Stoneheart asks, his voice nearly a growl.

I straightened, and my heart falls into quicksand and the sucking sensation makes me want to curl into a ball.

But we did plan this.

“Ben,” I say, reaching out, needing the comfort he’s always been able to provide.

“No!” he shouts.

I yank my hand back. His voice feels like it slices me to the bone, and it’s a wonder to me that the injury isn’t physical.

His eyes widen, his overwhelm reaching its zenith. “I can’t do this.”

And then he’s gone in a whisp of shadow. My rejected hand flies to my heart, and I press in on a pained gasp. He didn’t actually hurt me, so why does this pain feel real?

“What just happened? This was the plan.” My voice wavers, and I look to Stoneheart for answers. Did we make a terrible mistake? No, we created an heir to stabilize the territory. “We did it.”

“Congratulations, wife.” His tone is as cold as ice, and he looks like he wants to hit something. “But the child isn’t mine.”

It takes a moment for me to absorb the words with how caustic they are. “What?”

“I said, the child you are carrying is not mine.”

My brain stalls out at that because of course the baby is Stoneheart’s. He’s the one that bred me, knotted me even! It takes an embarrassingly long time for the mental math to make sense. Because if it’s not Stoneheart’s…

It’s Ben’s.

My hands cover my mouth in surprise. Fuck.

“But that’s not possible,” I say after the first tidal wave of shock. “We were careful.”

“Not careful enough,” he bites out.

The hair stands up on the back of my neck at the castigation.

“And you’re angry at me for this?” I ask.

Stoneheart’s eyes narrow. “Excuse me if I don’t jump for joy that my wife is carrying another’s child.”

“You were just as involved as anyone else. You gave him permission!” I’m grasping for logic to throw at him, to shield me from this revelation.

“Except for that last time.”

Now I actually want to throw something at him.

“Don’t act like you weren’t slinking in the shadows waiting to be able to punish us,” I say.

There’s a light of surprise in Stoneheart’s expression. As if I can’t tell when this gargoyle enters a room. It just made what happened last night better.

Until now.

He shakes his head and turns away, logic not making any headway. “It was supposed to be mine! You are supposed to be mine.”

Rage shakes his words, but I don’t cower. If anything, the anger distills the moment. The shocked panic that sent me to my lovers in need of reassurance evaporates with my own frustration.

I tighten my fists. Last night I would say I was his, but this morning, he’s quickly losing that privilege.

I can’t belong to someone who would discard me and everything we have so easily. I’m not that kind of masochist.

“I’m not an object to be owned,” I say.

The look he shoots me over his shoulder is scathing.

“We will speak about this later.” The growl in his words can’t be contained, just like the gargoyle himself. He throws open the balcony doors and, just like that first night not so long ago, leaves.

The numbness in my chest has teeth.

How did I expect this all to go?

I stare out the open balcony doors, lost.

I’ve lost.

I lost Ben. I lost Stoneheart.

It’s just me. Alone.

But I’m not alone either.

“My lady.”

I finally look up at Silas. His brow is creased in worry. He’s probably been trying to catch my attention for a while.

I wipe my cheeks, and the tears there are burning brands of shame. How can I possibly be so heartbrokenly disappointed and angry at the same time?

“Are you okay?” he hesitates. “Do you need me to contact a healer?”

The only reason to see a healer now would be to make the pregnancy go away. It’s a simple thing with it being so early, a magic trick. One moment there’s a thing in your life that’s set to disrupt everything, and the next it’s gone.

But that’s not true in this situation.

Even if there was no pregnancy anymore, I can’t reach for Stoneheart again. I don’t know if I’d trust him with my vulnerabilities.

I needed him. I needed them both. And they left.

So erasing this pregnancy won’t bring back the moments my love felt too big for my chest.

It would just be me losing something else.

How many more things do I have to lose for this territory?

Not this.

I may be the only one to care for it right now, but it’s mine to care for.

“I’m fine,” I say, my voice stronger than my insides.

Silas doesn’t offer any arguments about how this makes everything so much more complicated. He only nods.

“Whatever you need,” he says.

“I need—” I break off to swallow the bitter rush of disenchantment. “I need to work.”

Stoneheart doesn’t return until late into the evening. That must be the time anyway. The actions of charm making soothed the numbness, but it doesn’t quell the anger or frustration.

Fucking men. Fucking Council. Fucking territory and all the people in it.

His presence announces himself. The dark air shivers across my skin, but I ignore it. I am no shirking bride tonight. I’m a coiled snake willing to strike.

I don’t respond to him entering the room. Connors leaves to wait outside. A talon taps the plate of dinner that’s long since gone cold at the far end of my worktable.

“They say you haven’t eaten much,” he says.

My stomach turns at the thought of food and the ridiculous observation. Why should he care? “I haven’t had much of an appetite.”

Pepper probably suspects about the pregnancy. It’s not like this is some secret to keep quiet even if Connors had delivered the food rather than let the female shifter close.

I could hide it. I could possibly make a charm that would remove the scent of Ben from me.

The thought of the demon stings, but he’s not who lulled me in with whispers of mutual caretaking only to turn away.

Ben always planned to leave. Maybe he’ll return, maybe not, but I’m not basing any plans on needing him either way.

Hiding that the baby is his indicates that I’m ashamed of it.

I’m not.

And I find I’m not so quick to want to capitulate to the cries of the mob. If they really think Frank is their best option at the end of everything? Maybe they don’t deserve to be saved. It’s a disingenuous thought, but it’s my current state of mind.

There’s an heir. So what if it’s not Stoneheart’s? It’s mine, and I’m the one with a blood right to this territory.

“Stella, about the baby—” Stoneheart starts as if reading my mind.

“I’m keeping it,” I say, glaring at him and unable to read the flicker in his eyes. “And I don’t want to talk about it with you, not yet.”

He nods, so giving and magnanimous in this moment but not when I actually needed him.

“You’ve been busy,” he says, gesturing to the partly completed charms around me. With each physical action of shaping the metals and stone, I plan my next moves. I grieved what we had between the three of us, but I’m moving forward now.

I know when he sees it because he flinches, and his expression becomes even more remote.

The labradorite is the center stone for the newest charms.

That gift had been a symbol to me. One I clung to as surely as the silver thumb ring that I wasn’t the only one getting too entangled in this.

When I returned to my workshop with my heart in pieces, I picked up the crystal I’d admired many times, had held onto when his motives were a mystery, and I chiseled it a part.

I deceived myself by thinking I could just love him one-sidedly. Dismantling the stone is the first step in building a different relationship. The professional one we were supposed to have.

“I believe you now,” I say, and I can’t stop the ache of my words even if tried. “About you not being a place for my heart to rest.”

Stoneheart clears his throat, but if I was expecting him to give me some reasoning or cajoling, I’d be left wanting.

“Good,” he says, but he looks anything but happy. There’s a long pause where I act like I’m getting back to work, though I see nothing of the silver in front of me.

“You should rest.” His voice is just as textured with complicated feelings without me seeing him. “I’m patrolling tonight, so you’ll have the room to yourself,” he says, as if offering an olive branch

The room of moody colors and romantic touches that gave me hope. The bedsheets that smell like us. The memories of Ben at the piano before he vanished.

I’d rather sleep on the chair, but I don’t say that. I only nod, turning back to my work. Funny how the intricate magic that was such a struggle to master is the only thing that makes sense right now.

There’s a pang in my chest that would make my breath catch if it were any stronger. It feels foreign, like I’m picking up Stoneheart’s emotions instead of my own. But with Ben gone, there’s nothing between us except the political gains of the other’s presence.

“Till we meet again, wife,” he says, and the words are soft.

I only nod as if to myself, and he leaves me again.

Maybe there will be a time in the future when his absence doesn’t hurt.