บททั้งหมดของ The Luna’s Revenge : บทที่ 51 - บทที่ 60

Four weeks after the council was reformed, Nyx woke to sunlight streaming through the windows of the Alpha King’s residence and Theron already gone from the bed beside her. She lay there for a moment, listening to the sounds of Ashville waking up beyond the walls, the distant calls of merchants setting up in the market square and the rhythmic clang of the blacksmith’s hammer starting his day’s work. Normal sounds. Ordinary sounds. The kind of sounds that said the Northern region was functioning the way it was supposed to, without crisis or conspiracy or corrupt Alphas plotting in shadowed corners. It had been four weeks of this. Four weeks of council sessions that ended on time instead of dragging into the night. Four weeks of disputes resolved through proper channels instead of backroom deals. Four weeks of watching the region stabilize into something that looked almost like what good governance was supposed to be. She got up and dressed, choosing the formal coat that marked her a

The first trimester passed in a haze of nausea and exhaustion that Nyx endured because there was no other choice. Elara had been right about the sickness easing after the first few months, but “easing” was relative when you’d spent weeks barely able to keep food down and the improvement just meant you could occasionally eat a full meal without vomiting. The exhaustion remained constant, a bone-deep tiredness that no amount of sleep seemed to touch, and Nyx found herself struggling through council sessions and meetings with a focus that felt like dragging herself through mud. They kept the pregnancy quiet for those first three months, telling no one beyond Elara and Caelum who’d figured it out on his own after watching Nyx excuse herself from too many meetings looking green. The mate bond made hiding it from Theron impossible, but hiding it from the council was just a matter of careful scheduling and strategic absences and letting people assume her reduced presence was about delega

The hours after the birth were the worst.Nyx lay in bed holding the tiny bundle that had been her daughter, unable to let go even though she knew she should, even though holding a child who would never breathe was only making the grief sharper. Theron sat beside her, one hand on her shoulder, and through the bond she felt his anguish matching hers, felt him struggling to find words that didn’t exist for this kind of loss.Elara worked quietly in the background, cleaning up the blood and the evidence of the labor that had ended in nothing but emptiness. She’d tried to take the baby once, gently suggesting that Nyx needed to rest and let her body recover, but Nyx had held on tighter and Elara had backed away without pushing.“You should rest,” Theron said quietly after what felt like hours but might have been minutes. Time had lost all meaning in the space between one breath and the next.“I can’t,” Nyx said.“You need to,” Theron said. “Your body just went through labor. You’re bleedi

Nyx woke in the middle of the night to cramping pain that felt wrong. Not the sharp immediate agony that had preceded Lyra’s birth, but a dull persistent ache low in her abdomen that made her curl forward instinctively, her hands going to her stomach. She lay very still in the darkness, trying to assess whether this was something to worry about or just another uncomfortable symptom of late pregnancy, when she felt the baby move with a strange jerking motion that wasn’t like the normal kicks and rolls she’d grown accustomed to. “Theron,” she said quietly, and he was awake immediately, the mate bond flooding him with her concern before she even finished saying his name. “What’s wrong?” Theron asked, sitting up. “Something feels off,” Nyx said. “The baby’s moving strangely and I’m having cramps.” He was out of bed and moving before she finished speaking, lighting a lamp and coming back to check on her with hands that tried to stay steady despite the fear she could feel through the b

Nyx discovered she was pregnant for the third time on a grey morning six weeks after she and Theron had decided to try again. The nausea was familiar now, almost expected, and she lay in bed feeling the sickness rise and knowing exactly what it meant before she even confirmed it. Her body recognized pregnancy immediately this time, having done this twice before, and when the queasiness became too much to ignore she started to get up. Theron’s hand on her arm stopped her. “You’re pregnant,” he said quietly. Not a question. A statement. She looked at him and saw in his eyes that he already knew, had probably known before she’d even woken up. The mate bond had carried it to him, the subtle shift in her emotions and her body’s chemistry that signaled the beginning of another pregnancy. “Yes,” Nyx said, and saying it out loud felt like stepping off a cliff into darkness. Through the bond she felt his immediate joy, stronger this time because he’d been waiting for this, hoping for thi