The sky still hadn't healed from the fire.
Ash floated like snow across the ruined terrain, miles from what used to be the Inquisition's most secure stronghold. Not a single structure remained. Just rubble, burned bones, and blackened earth that still sizzled with molten streaks. Some of the stones still bled.
And now? Word was spreading.
The witch was pregnant.
Not just a vessel- but a mother.
A new child of storm and fang now stirred in her womb. The snake had bred. The lion had claimed. The witch had been marked.
When news reached the seat of the Holy Inquisition, silence fell so heavy in the chamber, it could have shattered glass.
Siobhan didn't move.
Didn't breathe.
Behind her porcelain mask, painted with sanctified gold and delicate white filigree to conceal her rotting, self-cursed face, her eyes twitched. One, milky. The other still a brilliant emerald, burning with the remains of a once brilliant mind twisted by envy and divine rejection.
She stood before the altar of Saintess Yidali, the holy mother of judgment and purity.
But no prayer passed her lips.
Only a single word:
"Prepare."
The chamber stirred in confusion.
One of her lieutenants stepped forward, the white sash of a high commander brushing the stone. He bowed stiffly.
"Prepare for what, High Mother?" he asked, voice cautious. "The compound is gone. Entire squads… evaporated. We don't even know how many survived. And if Elena Matteo is truly pregnant with-"
CRACK.
The back of his head exploded before the sentence could finish.
A streak of red arced across the marble floor as his body slumped forward. His executioner, a silent acolyte dressed in crimson robes, already wiping the blood from his blade.
The room froze.
Siobhan didn't even look away from the altar.
"You dare speak her name in this holy hall?" she hissed. Her voice sounded like stone crumbling in winter. "Witch whore. Snake's cunt. Goddess of rot and ruin. She thinks she can birth a god and we will bow?"
She turned then.
Even behind the delicate porcelain mask, even as her cursed face remained hidden, her presence alone was enough to make grown men fall to their knees.
Her hand lifted.
More blood dripped to the floor.
The others did not speak again.
"I don't care how long it takes," she growled. "I don't care what we must sacrifice. We will burn that sanctuary. Every man, woman, child, and beast. Until the earth forgets their names."
Another commander stirred. This one younger, more cautious. "And if she refuses to surrender?"
Siobhan didn't hesitate.
"Then we slaughter them all. We'll send her the ultimatum in due time. She'll come. She will. The serpent's belly is still soft. The lion's heart still bleeds. The gods made flesh are still flesh." She turned back to the altar and spat.
"Let the witch choose her martyrdom. Either way, I will crush her unborn god beneath my heel."
The other commanders said nothing. Not after that.
Azura had watched from the rafters, cloaked in illusion, her silver feathers pressed close to the stone ceiling.
The moment the blood hit the floor, she had turned and flown through a small crack in the upper window, disappearing into the night like a shadow of wind.
She flew fast. Fast and low, her wings black against the stars.
There was no time to waste.
She had to reach Alejandro.
Had to tell them all what she'd seen.
The war they feared was no longer coming.
It had already begun.