Chapter 69 Run

Chapter 69 Run
69: Run

There are moments in life when the world doesn’t explode simply… goes silent. No lightning. No shattering glass. No dramatic thunder.

Just a woman packing her life into a single torn bag while her hands shake so violently she can barely tie a knot.

The moon was still high when I began. Dawn was hours away, and every second mattered. I moved in the dark so no one would hear, see, or smell the truth.

I folded nothing, organized nothing, I just grabbed essentials. Herbal salves. A cloak. Spare trousers. A hand-carved wolf figurine Lucian once gave me before love became war. I hesitated only once, fingertips brushing the painting on the wall, the one of Lucian holding me like the world depended on it.

I turned away before my heart could whisper stay.

No more staying.

I placed a protective hand over my stomach. “We’re leaving.”

No one answered yet someone did. My child fluttered inside me, small, scared, alive. That was all I needed.

I slipped out through the servants’ passage, barefoot. Boots were too loud. The stone was freezing, but fear has a way of warming you. Every shadow felt like a pair of eyes. Every drip of water sounded like footsteps behind me.

I forced myself forward.

If fear wanted to stop me, love insisted I keep going.

The back gates of Dravenmoor were sealed every night, guarded by two sentries with silver armor and sharper loyalty. I couldn’t escape that way.

But Lucian once showed me something not knowing he was giving me my freedom one day. Beneath the armory, behind a dislodged marble slab, was an old escape route, once used in wartime.

The Queen had forgotten it. But I hadn’t.

I crawled through the opening, breath short, dress snagging on jagged stone. The earth smelled damp, ancient. My knees throbbed with each movement. The tunnel narrowed until I had to flatten myself to keep moving back scraping stone, belly pressing cold earth.

Halfway through, I paused, breath ragged.

What if I was hurting the baby doing this?

I shut my eyes, panic rising.

“I’m trying,” I whispered into the darkness. “I’m trying to save you.”

As if in answer or mercy, the flutter happened again.

Not pain. Just presence. Courage returned. I pushed on.

The tunnel eventually widened, leading to old wooden stairs I prayed would hold. I climbed them slowly, terrified of falling or making a sound. And finally, finally I reached the exit.

A rusted grate blocked my way out.

I dug my nails into it. Pulled. It didn’t budge. I tried again, groaning under my breath, metal grinding, muscles screaming.

“Come on,” I choked. “Please—”

The grate ripped loose with a groan. I froze, waiting for footsteps. Waiting for shouts. Waiting for Lucian.

Nothing.

The gods were silent for once, on my side.

I slipped through the opening and into the outside world. The forest that once felt like a threat now felt like a fragile miracle.

Free.
But not safe.
I ran.

I didn’t know where I was going, only where I could not stay. Every step hurt; every breath burned; every heartbeat reminded me I wasn’t alone anymore. I held my bag close, then my stomach, then both when my body trembled from exhaustion.

My legs eventually gave out somewhere deep among pine and snow. I collapsed to my knees, gasping, tears spilling uncontrolled. There was no dignity in survival, only instinct.

The moonlight was bright enough to see my breath fog in the air.

The cold bit into my skin, numbing, stealing strength I didn’t have.

I wrapped the cloak tighter around myself and the child I would protect until my last breath.

No fires. No footprints. No trail. Every rule drilled into my bones since the Queen discovered I was pregnant.

Run quietly. Run invisibly. Run until no one calls you Luna again.

I leaned back against a tree, exhausted beyond speaking, beyond crying.

Then in the distance the sound I feared most.

A wolf’s howl. Not wild.
Royal.
My blood froze.

Lucian’s wolves were searching.

If they found me, they would bring me back. Not to safety but to a throne that would decide whether my baby lived or died.

My throat closed.

“Not again,” I whispered. “You will not take this from me.”

I pushed myself to my feet, barely steady. I ran deeper into the forest, through bushes and frost, ignoring the pain ripping up my spine.

Branches tore my skin. Thorns cut my ankles. I didn’t stop. Hope was louder than pain.

Somewhere ahead, just beyond the trees, faint golden lights flickered lanterns. Civilization. A village. Shelter. Help.

I staggered toward it, barely upright, until I reached the ridge overlooking it… and collapsed again, unable to move another inch.

My breath misted in the air, my pulse frantic. The howls were growing closer. My vision blurred.

I curled around my stomach instinctively shielding my child with my body as my last act of defiance.

“If this is where I fall…” I whispered, tasting blood and snow, “then I fall protecting you.”

But the forest answered in a different voice a rustle behind me, heavy footsteps, snapping twigs.

Not wolves. Not Lucian. Someone else. A figure approached, cloaked, tall, face hidden. I forced myself to lift my head.

If I had to beg, I would. If I had to fight, I would lose but I would still try.

“Please,” I rasped. “Help me.”

The figure paused in front of me, then slowly knelt not to restrain, not to attack but to offer a hand.

“Aria Quinn,” the stranger said softly, voice trembling with shock. “Gods… what have they done to you?”

I knew that voice. Familiar. Impossible. My breath hitched.

“Rowan?”

His jaw clenched with fury and relief mixed into one.

“You’re safe now,” he whispered. “I’ve got you. I won’t let them touch you. Either of you.”

For the first time since leaving Dravenmoor… I allowed myself to collapse into someone’s arms.

Not because I was weak. But because my child and I had survived the first step. We ran. And we were still alive.