Draven.
I had sworn silently, and fiercely that I would remain beside Valtira until the very end of it. That no force in this realm would tear me from her side while she fought to bring our child into the world.
Yet even as that vow settled into my bones, her screams rose higher.
Louder.
More desperate.
They reverberated against the stone walls, raw enough to make my skin prickle and my heart twist painfully within my chest. Blood stained the linens beneath her, the sight both sacred and unbearable, and I found myself swallowing against the tightness climbing my throat.
Every instinct urged me to take her pain into myself if such a thing were possible.
Then the chamber doors burst open.
Yulfred staggered inside, breath ragged, chest heaving as though he had outrun death itself.
