Chapter 86 Silence
I woke up thinking I was dead.
There was no sound.
There was no pulse.
There was no Link.
For a moment, I thought I had been ripped from myself—as if someone had opened my chest and taken everything that defined me. My symbol didn't burn. It didn't vibrate. It didn't exist.
I sat up abruptly, the air entering my lungs with difficulty. The walls around me were of dark stone, too smooth to be natural. Ancient. Marked by almost invisible runes that ran along every inch of the cell.
I recognized that type of construction.
Absolute blockage.
I tried to feel the shadows.
Nothing.
I tried to call the Link.
Silence.
Panic came too quickly. I urgently put my hands to my stomach.
"No... no... no..."
I closed my eyes, concentrating as I did in battle. I sought that gentle warmth that was always there, discreet, alive.
For a second, I felt nothing.
My heart sank.
"Breathe," I whispered to myself, my voice trembling. "Breathe."
Then... it came.
Weak. Distant. But there.
It wasn't magic. It wasn't shadow. It wasn't the Link.
It was life.
A gentle pulse against the total absence all around.
Tears came before I could stop them.
"You're still here," I murmured, pressing my forehead against my hands. "They couldn't silence you."
The cell blocked power. Blocked energy. Blocked anything that could be manipulated.
But that... that wasn't manipulable.
It was organic.
My son wasn't connected to black magic.
Nor dependent on the Link.
He existed beyond that.
A shiver ran down my spine.
If I was empty...
And it still pulsed...
Then what I truly carried inside couldn't be contained by those walls.
I stood slowly, my legs still weak. I walked to the bars. Not even the metal seemed ordinary—ancient, carved runes, gleaming almost imperceptibly.
Solange hadn't improvised.
She knew exactly what she was doing.
Or she thought she knew.
I brought my hand close to the bars, expecting to feel pain, resistance, some kind of reaction.
Nothing.
The cell annihilated me.
But it didn't annihilate what was growing inside me.
And for the first time since I was locked in there, a different thought replaced the fear.
Maybe this prison wasn't weakening me.
Maybe it was isolating something the world wasn't yet ready to face.
Narrated by Conrad
I woke up with the taste of blood in my mouth.
For a second, I didn't know where I was. The ceiling above me seemed too distant, the torches blurred by the hazy vision. My body ached as if I had fought an entire army.
Then the memory returned.
The council.
The decision.
The wolf.
Maya.
I sat up abruptly, but the world spun violently. Someone tried to hold me back.
"My king, you need to stay lying down—"
I pushed the hand away.
"Where is she?" My voice came out hoarse, closer to a growl than words.
Silence.
I looked around. I was in my own chambers. Two guards at the door. Kael near the window, his face too pale.
That was enough.
"You," I said, staring at him. "What did you do to me?"
Kael held my gaze. There was guilt there. And something deeper—fear.
"I stopped you from killing half the council," he replied with forced calm. "Or them from killing you."
I felt the wolf stir beneath my skin, restless.
"Where. Is. She.?"
Kael took a deep breath. "In the old cell."
The air left my lungs as if it had been hit.
The old cell.
Not just prison. Suppression. Absolute isolation.
"They blocked her magic?" I asked, my voice dangerously low.
"Yes."
My heart pounded once. Hard. Then again.
If they blocked the magic...
The baby.
The thought was like fire coursing through my veins.
I lunged toward the door, but the guards moved to stop me.
I didn't even think.
The wolf took shape beneath my skin again—not fully, but enough. My eyes burned, my fangs lengthened. A deep growl filled the room.
"Get out," I ordered.
They hesitated.
It was Kael who spoke.
"Conrad, if you attack now, you'll confirm everything Solange wants to prove."
I stopped.
Her name hurt more than any blow.
"She touched my queen," I said, each word controlled with brutal effort. "She touched the mother of my child."
Kael's eyes widened slightly. He didn't know.
Nobody knew.
"Then you need to be smarter than them," he said quietly. "If it's force against force, the kingdom will be divided."
I took a deep breath.
The wolf still wanted blood.
But I was king before I was beast.
And a king doesn't invade. A king tears down structures.
I looked up at Kael.
"Open the cell."
He hesitated.
"If not out of loyalty," I continued coldly, "then let it be out of fear of what will happen if I have to do this alone."
Silence fell.
And in that pause, everyone understood:
I wasn't asking.
I was warning.
Kael held my gaze for long seconds.
I saw the conflict there. Divided loyalty. Guilt. Fear of what might happen if I chose the wrong side.
"Conrad…," he began.
"She's pregnant."
The word fell like a blade in the room.
The guards stood motionless. Kael paled even more.
"Since before the meeting," I continued, my voice forcefully controlled. "And you locked her in a cell that blocks magic without knowing what that might cause."
The silence grew heavy.
"I didn't know," Kael murmured.
"But now you know."
I took a step forward. Not as king. As something more dangerous.
"If there's any risk to her or my son because of this imprisonment... it won't just be the council that falls."
Kael closed his eyes for a moment, as if seeing something we couldn't. When he opened them, there was a decision there.
"If I open the cell without authorization, Solange will declare treason," he said.
"Then let her."
He took a deep breath.
"No," he finally replied. "If we're going to do this, we'll do it right."
My jaw clenched.
"Explain."
"There are runes that block magic... but there are also limits," Kael said. "The cell wasn't made to contain life. Only power."
My heart pounded.
"If what grows in it is bigger than the runes... the cell might be weakening."
A crackling sound echoed through the air at that exact moment.
The torches flickered.
The ground trembled slightly beneath our feet.
I didn't need to look to know.
Something was happening.
And it wasn't coming from outside.
It was coming from inside the cell.
And, for the first time since I woke up, I didn't just feel fear.
I felt urgency.