Page 1 of A Haven of Brimstone and Darkness

Chapter 1

Caedmon

20 years ago…

Blood soaks into the pale linen sheets, spreading towards the edges like a sinister disease wishing death upon all that it touches. There’s so much of the damned liquid, that it's a wonder the body can hold it all within the thin confines of skin and bone. Another gush of crimson is preceded by a groan from the woman splayed out on the sunken bed of the hovel-like inn.

Ariadne had demanded that we stop for the night, her brow puckered and face cold with sweat. I’d never seen a woman in the throes of labor before. Even as old as I am, it just wasn’t done in our world and in this … well, pregnancies between ‘Gods’ and mortals aren’t exactly celebrated. Now, I know why all the tales of childbirth are so secretive. I can’t imagine that any woman would want to bear this kind of agony if they truly knew what to expect.

Ari’s baby is coming, and I fear it will kill her.

"Hold on," I urge even as panic seems to skim up every single one of my nerve endings. Oh, God. The baby. I close my eyes as Ipray to long-forgotten phantoms of the old world—ourold world—for strength.

"I can't." Ariadne's face holds no color. Her cheeks are sallow and jaundiced-looking at the edges. That's not right, is it? Shouldn't she be flushed from all of the grunting and pushing she's been doing? From my position at the end of the bed, I glance up the length of her body and then back to the sheets soaked in red.

She's not going to make it.

For the first time in my life, I'm not sure if it's aknowingfrom the future or my own fear. Normally, I can distinguish the two. Not now. Now, my best friend—my only love in the whole of this forsaken existence—is dying and she's giving birth to another's child.

"Caedmon." When I look back to Ariadne's too-pale face, staring into eyes the color of ocean storms, sometimes blue, but most of the time a stark gray, I want to beg her not to do this. I know it's ridiculous, the plea I wish to make of her. I can forgive her for loving another. I can forgive her bearing this child. What I cannot forgive is her death. I don't care if it means that this child will not exist. Nothing is more important to me than this woman. "Please." The word is far hoarser than it should be, pain tinging her lyrical voice and turning it into something new. Something I do not want to hear. "Help my child."

I close my eyes.Help my child. Not 'help me.'Fresh pain lances through my chest. When I reopen my eyes and settle them upon her face, I realize that she's reclined back. Rather, she's sunken down, unable to hold herself up on her elbows any longer. A grimace steals over her beautiful face. All around us, I can hear the skittering of little creatures—in the walls, in the ceiling, beneath the floorboards. They've all come to her aid, lured by her pain and power.

Fine silvery lashes flutter as Ariadne closes her eyes and breathes shallowly. If I don't do something here and now,she'll die.I nearly sway on my feet.Thatis a true knowing; the reminder of my own abilities and what I can see means that I can change the outcome—at least, in this instance—if I work fast enough.

"Stay here," I say, whirling towards the thin door.

A low, tired chuckle follows me and as my hand lands on the handle, I look back over my shoulder. Her lashes lift and she turns her head my way, a shadow of a smile playing across her lips. "Are you sure?" she asks. "I thought I might go for a turn out in the garden."

My jaw drops. Her lower body is coated in fresh blood, her face is pinched tight with agony, and yet, she still makes jokes. With a shake of my head, I turn the handle and step out into the dimly lit hallway. "I shall return quickly," I tell her. "Hold on until then, Ari. Please ... if you care for me at all, do not die before I return."

When I next look at her, the smile is gone. Her eyes are hardened pits of steel and stone. "I will not die before this child is brought into the world," she tells me, and somehow ... that eases my concern. No matter what the future I am forced to foresee holds, I have the distinct impression that Ariadne, my closest friend and confidant, would bend the laws of the world to see her child born. I have never been more grateful for the evidence of her rejection of me.

I bow my head slightly and let the door shut. The second she's out of sight, I race to the end of the narrow passageway. When we'd come into the small village on the outskirts of the Hinterlands, far from any of the God cities, I'd seen plenty of the mortal farmers in their fields. They had oxen and horses. Surely, someone in this village had helped an animal give birth. Thoughit's less than she deserves, Ariadne will have her help and she will have her child.

Half an hour later, with a harried female rushing on my right side and a rather plump man with a gray beard on my left, I return to the structure that acts as both a tavern and inn for the village. I rush the two of them up the creaking stairs to the second floor, taking the steps two at a time for myself until I'm barreling back into the room.

Gasping and chest heaving, I stride across the room to Ariadne's side. Her eyes are open as my knees hit the uneven floorboards. "Ari, I've brought help," I tell her, taking one hand into both of mine. She's cold. Too cold. I try to rub some warmth into her flesh, but it doesn't seem to work.

The man waddles into the room and takes up residence between Ariadne's legs. The woman is at his side in an instant, her face pinched. The man, a cattle farmer, had confessed his experience with assisting many living creatures give birth, and the woman is a retired midwife. Though she claimed to not have assisted in a birth in several years, she was better than nothing, and I hadn't been willing to waste any more time on my search.

"Can you help her?" I demand, rubbing insistently at Ariadne's hands.

The man bows his head, lifting the sheets that had fallen back down over Ariadne's legs now that they are no longer bent upward at the knee. She must've been too tired to hold them up. The midwife's face is pale as she takes in the scene.Please,I beg silently.Please help her.

When the man appears once more, his face is set in disapproving lines. "I'm sorry, sir, but with all of this blood, I don't have high hopes for the woman or the child."

"But you can still do something," I snap. "Can't you?"

He shakes his head. "In instances like this, I would recommend cutting the mother to save the child—that way atleast one of them will live. If it continues much more like this, they will both die."

Cutting the mother... "No." Rage bubbles up inside me, an emotion I've never felt quite this strongly before. Wrathful. Hot. Full of sharp fury. "No, she is not going to die."

The woman comes forward, her face scrunching up in that way I've seen plenty do when they're feeling sympathetic. I wave her off with a curse. "Don't," I seethe. "Don't you dare tell me that there's nothing else to be done."

The man stands, looking down at Ariadne with his hands planted firmly on his hips. "This much blood tells me that the child is probably turned," he says. "It's trying to come out the wrong way. Were your wife one of my heifers I'd simply reach in and turn the calf, but..." He holds both hands up and I see the problem without him having to explain it. He's a large man with rather large hands. No matter that Ariadne's body should be built for birth, her strength against his mortal bones would break him if he even managed to get inside. I don't bother to correct him on the assumption of our relationship. The man slowly lowers his arms back to his sides and takes a step back. "I am sorry, sir. I cannot help you."

With that, he turns and strides for the door. Hope sinking, I cast a look to the woman who's hovering nearby, her eyes going from Ariadne to the collection of blood-soaked sheets at the edge of the bed and back again.

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