Answers but more questions.
Answers but more questions.
Serafine POV
I barely slept last night, my mind was on everything else… On the fact that I’m pregnant with Xander’s baby. Part of me feels like I should return, but another part of me feels like that would have devastating consequences.
There’s no way to know how he would react to this news. I was a pawn, something for him to use. Would he see our child as a burden? Something inside of me says he would, or that he would use it as leverage against my father. If it is a boy?
The power that gives Xander… It’s terrifying, my father would want this child if it’s a boy. It can take over his pack, but the Alpha he always wanted. Xander would exploit that.
I keep whispering it to myself–pregnant. It still doesn’t feel real, though. I’m standing, looking outside. The city is quieter than usual. Then again, a fog lingers in the streets, rolling low over the cobbled stone. It’s like the final remnants of a dream that is not yet ready to let go and fade entirely.
Helena is waiting for me, and I know I need to move and do this. I walk out, and she’s standing in front of the library. She’s wrapped in a dark grey cloak that brushes against the ground. Her face is unreadable, and she doesn’t press me or speak. She simply offers me a quiet nod as we begin walking.
We walk in silence, and soon arrive. The healer’s house is tucked on the far end of the city. It’s a few streets beyond the market, and is nestled behind a veil of overgrown ivy and a high wrought–iron fence. Helena leads the way with familiarity. I simply follow her and keep my pace up to stay with her. My hands are buried deep in my coat pockets and I can feel the Threadborn journal pressing flat against my ribs beneath
the fabric.
I’m not comfortable leaving it alone, losing this would be like losing a part of myself. Every step I take echoes in my mind, the sound of worn boots on stone gets lost in the hum of my thoughts.
Helena walks to the door, and it creaks open before either of us knocks. A woman stands in the doorway and smiles at us. She’s tall, and pale–skinned with silver threaded through her thick red braid. Her eyes are the palest green that I’ve ever seen
-almost white.
She isn’t wearing a cloak or even shoes. Only a long tunic that touches the top of her ankles. Something about her prickles at the edges of my instincts, something ageless, but I can sense it from her.
“You brought her,” she says, looking directly at Helena and not me.
1/5
Answers but more questions.
Helena nods. “She needs answers.”
The woman steps aside to make room. “Come in.”
I follow Helena inside. The house smells of cedar, herbs and smoke. I can see dried bundles hanging from the rafters. The windows are shuttered tight, and the light inside is coming from a dozen candles. The fireplace glows low as well.
The air is thick in here, but warm, there’s also something else, something almost heavy that lingers.
I sit when she gestures me to a chair. Helena stays by the door and keeps her arms folded but her eyes are soft with worry.
Why is she worried?
“You’re the Threadborn girl,” the woman says. “I felt it the moment you stepped inside the city.”
My breath catches. “You… you felt it?” How? I don’t understand I thought no one knew about this?
She smiles slightly, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. “There are many who have the ability to sense things.” Her words have me pausing. “Some may just sense that you’re different, others may know the truth.”
I don’t respond, I don’t know how to.
“You’re carrying more than a child. You’re carrying legacy. Your line hasn’t walked the
wild in centuries.”
I don’t know what to say to that. My fingers tighten around the edge of the chair. A legacy? My line? What does that even mean?
“Lie back,” she instructs, and I do as she tells me while replaying her words in my mind. Her fingers are cool and dry against my abdomen. Her touch is light, but there’s something beneath it, something deeper than skin. It’s like her magic snakes through flesh, blood and memory.
I watch her and she closes her eyes, her hands still for a moment nothing happens. Minutes pass, then her brows drawn inward.
Finally, she steps back.
“You’re pregnant. A little over two weeks. But you already knew that.”
I nod slowly. Know, yes, believed? No. I’m still finding it hard to believe it.
She gives me a small smile. “There is something else as well,” she says, her voice
changing. It softens, but there’s a weight behind it, like bad news is coming. “There’s a pulse within you, a second rhythm…”
Well, obviously, the baby! I almost laugh at how crazy she sounds.
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Answers but more questions.
“And it is not your child’s heartbeat, that is strong, unmistakable. The pulse is something older, something sleeping and waiting.”
Sitting up, I feel myself panicking. “What does that mean?”
“Your child is not just Threadborn by blood. It carries something awakened. Something that I know hasn’t been seen in generations. You said the Silvermane Hound wouldn’t leave you, that it wraps around you, right?”
Helena must have spoken of it, as this is the first time I’ve spoken with her.
I nod.
“And the Hollowfang Raven?”
“It speaks. Watches. Guides.”
What is going on?
She looks at Helena. “She’s bonded. Fully. The guardians have accepted her as one fo the old line. The Veyrathi. The original.”
Helena steps forward, frowning. “But that’s impossible. We don’t even know what triggered it.”
The healer turns back to me. “Your child is the trigger.”
A cold sensation spreads through me, tingling through my fingers and toes. I don’t want to know more, this is already too much. How can I be expected to do this?
“This child that you carry won’t be born normal. It will be marked. The guardians won’t protect it, they’ll follow it. It will lead them.”
“I don’t get it, isn’t that what they were doing with me?” I ask.
“Yes as you’re Threadborn, Veyrathi, which they are bound to protect, but your child? Your child will have the power to control them, and that… is dangerous in the wrong hands while your child grows.”
Helena whispers something under her breath but the healer ignores her.
“You need to stay hidden, Serafine. If the packs learn what grows inside you, they’ll come. And they will not come with offerings.”
I feel suddenly sick. “But it’s just a baby.”
“Exactly, that makes it more dangerous. Because no one knows what kind of power it might wield. Every single pack will want that child, someone who can control all the Threadborns and guardians? There’s no power like it.”
I sit in silence for a long time. My hands continue to tremble and I clutch the journal tighter under my coat.
Finally, the healer reaches out and places something cool and metallic into my palm. It‘
3/5
Answers but more questions.
s a pendant, a simple obsidian stone bound in twisted wire. I look at it then back to her.
“Wear it,” she says. “It will hide the heartbeat for now. It won’t shield you forever.”
Helena places a hand on my shoulder. “We’ll be careful. We’ll keep you safe.”
She says that but nothing feels safe anymore. Not my body, not this city, not even the guardians. Somewhere, far beyond the edge of my bond, I know Xander would have felt the moment the rhythm changed. The moment something ancient stirred.
Will he come looking for me to find out what it is, to get it and use it?
As we leave the healer’s home, Helena remains quiet for a long time. The wind picks up, and it rustles through the ivy covered gate as we walk. My thoughts continue to churn louder than ever. i keep glancing at the pendant in my hand and wondering what it means for something to be hidden that long.
What kind of child needs protection from the moment it’s just a few cells inside of me?
“She didn’t tell us everything,” I say after a few minutes. I know that there was more she could have told me but she didn’t.
Helena nods. “No, she didn’t because that’s how the old healers work. They never say more than you need. They ensure they only tell you what you can handle.”
I frown, unsettled. “But what if I needed more? What if she knows what this really is and didn’t say it?” I can’t help but wonder and panic.
Helena doesn’t answer. Her gaze is fixed ahead, her mouth pressed in a thin line.
I just wanted more answers, more truth. I wanted to know exactly what to expect.
When we return to the library I find myself drifting toward my room. I curl up with the journal and run my fingers over the edges. Slowly I begin to flip the pages, rereading the older passages.
There’s still so much that I don’t understand and the answers feel scattered like broken shards of something ancient that I was never meant to touch.
Grabbing the pen, I write down the question that has been burning in my mind since the Healer spoke.
What am I becoming?
The ink disappears, then the page writes back.
Not what. Who.
I stare at the paper, then write again.
Then who am I becoming?
The words faint and a reply shows.
You are not becoming. You are returning.
4/5
Answers but more questions.
Why can it never just tell me the answer straight away? I scribble down quickly.
To what?
The words fade, then the reply comes, and I freeze.
To the beginning.
The ink disappears, and no more words come. The pendant around my neck feels heavier than before. The beginning? What even is that? Every time I try to get an answer, I’m left with even more questions.
That night, I lie in bed with my hand over my stomach, and I dream of a great black forest lit with silver eyes, and wolves that bow not to an alpha, but to me.
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