Page 12 of The Minotaur's Little Peach
My hand moves instinctively to my belly, to the small swell that's barely visible beneath my skirts. The baby he'll never meet, never hold, never teach to fight or laugh or love with the same fierce intensity he brought to everything.
That's when Mirath's expression shifts from grief to something sharper. Professional concern bleeding through personal pain.
"The baby," she says, her healer's training kicking in as she studies my face with new urgency. "Soreya, all this stress—it's not good for the baby."
The words land like stones in still water, sending ripples of fresh panic through the numbness that's settling over me. I feelmy pulse spike, feel the world tilt sideways again as a new kind of terror takes hold.
"What do you mean?" My voice comes out smaller than I intend, already knowing the answer won't be one I want to hear.
"Extreme emotional distress can cause—" She stops herself, probably reading the growing hysteria in my expression. "I just need to examine you. Make sure everything's all right."
But I can see in her eyes that she's worried. See the way her gaze keeps dropping to my midsection, the careful way she's choosing her words. And suddenly the grief isn't just for Korrun anymore—it's for this child who might not survive the violence of losing him.
"I can't lose the baby too." The admission tears from my throat like a confession. "Mir, I can't lose them both."
Because that's what this pregnancy is now—the only piece of Korrun I have left. The only proof that what we had was real, that it mattered, that it produced something beautiful in a world that seems determined to destroy everything good.
"You won't," Mirath says, but the uncertainty in her voice betrays her. "But we need to get you somewhere safe. Somewhere quiet where I can properly?—"
"How am I supposed to do this?" The question erupts from some deep place I didn't know existed, raw and desperate and completely without hope. "How am I supposed to raise his child without him? How am I supposed to wake up every morning and remember he's gone? How am I supposed to live in a world where he doesn't exist?"
The questions hang in the air between us like accusations, like prayers to Zukiev, the Lady of the Light, who've already proven they don't listen. Mirath's face crumples with fresh grief—for me, for Korrun, for the impossible situation we've all been thrust into.
"I don't know," she admits, and the honesty in it is both brutal and strangely comforting. "But we'll figure it out. Together."
Together. As if anything could fill the space he's left behind. As if anyone could replace the steady presence that made me feel safe in a world that's never been particularly kind to human women who love outside their species.
I let her guide me away from the colosseum then, my legs moving without any real input from my brain. Each step takes me further from the place where he died, from the last spot on earth where we existed in the same space. Further from the life I thought I was going to have and deeper into this new reality where everything is uncertain and terrifying and wrong.
The sun is still shining. People are still going about their daily business, buying fruit and haggling over prices and complaining about the weather. The world has the audacity to continue existing even though the most important part of mine just ended.
And somewhere in the growing darkness of my grief, a smaller fear takes root and begins to grow—that this baby, this last gift he'll ever give me, might not survive the violence of my breaking heart.
5
SOREYA
The weeks blur into a muted wash of light and shadow, days stacking into months without edges. I wake because Mirath tells me to, eat because a spoon is pressed into my hand, breathe because my body insists on the rhythm even when I'd rather stop. Time moves like honey, thick and slow, each moment stretching until I can't tell if it's morning or evening, Tuesday or Sunday. Nothing has meaning anymore.
Mirath moves through our small home with quiet efficiency—tending the herbs that grow wild in the window boxes, stoking the fire when the chill creeps in, changing the linens when she notices they're damp from tears I don't remember shedding. She's practically living here now, sleeping on the narrow couch more nights than not, her healer's bag always within reach like she's expecting disaster.
Maybe she is. Maybe I am disaster now.
"You need to eat more than this," she says, settling beside me on the bed with a bowl of something that smells like gankoya and warm milk. Her cinnamon-brown skin has taken on a gray cast from worry and too little sleep, dark circles shadowing her eyes. "The baby needs?—"
"I know what the baby needs." The words come out sharper than I intend, cutting through the fog that's settled over everything. But even the brief flare of irritation feels exhausting, too much effort for too little result.
She doesn't flinch at my tone, just keeps stirring the contents of the bowl with patient determination. Her thick black curls are escaping their usual neat arrangement, framing her face in wild spirals that speak to how little attention she's been paying to herself. All her focus has been on me, on keeping me functional when every instinct screams to just stop.
"Then you know you can't keep surviving on kaffo and grief." Her voice carries that familiar note of authority she uses with difficult patients, but underneath it I hear the strain. The fear that she's fighting a losing battle against something bigger than both of us.
The swell of my belly has grown heavier over these months, an undeniable reminder of what I've lost and what I'm about to gain. The child moves constantly now, restless kicks and rolling motions that press against my ribs and steal what little breath I have left. I feel every flutter, every shift of small limbs in the dark space inside me, and it hurts as much as it soothes.
Korrun should be here for this. Should have his massive hands pressed against my skin, marveling at the strength of his child. Should be talking to my belly in that gentle rumble he used when he thought no one was listening, telling stories about the sea and his brother's adventures. Should be building the cradle he promised, his careful fingers shaping wood into something beautiful and safe.
Instead, there's just me and this growing weight and the terrible silence where his voice used to be.
I take the spoon from Mirath's hand because it's easier than arguing, mechanically bringing the mixture to my mouth. It tastes like nothing, like everything tastes now. The gankoyashould settle my stomach, should ease the nausea that's gotten worse instead of better as the pregnancy progresses. But nothing eases the sick feeling that has nothing to do with the baby and everything to do with the gaping hole where my heart used to be.
