Chapter Thirty-Six

In a daze, I made my way to the river and washed off the blood as Rue had bade me to do.

My father had long had a saying that prophesies were rarely wrong, but our interpretations of them could be. There were, after all, so many different ways to interpret words.

There might be time, I told myself as I watched the moonlight spread in the ripples of the water. The monsters had been the bane of our world for decades. There was no guarantee that this campaign would discover their origin. There was no guarantee that now was the time for the prophecy to be fulfilled.

I pressed my hand over my stomach as the tears ran down my face. Maybe there would be time for this child to be born. Half a year was all that I needed to give it life.

My breath dragged in on a sob and I pressed fingers icy from the water to my eyes, trying to stem the tears. My family would raise the baby for me. I did not fear for it, but I grieved what we would not have. How much time might prophesy give me with my child?