Caitlin withdrew from the bathroom, her hands still trembling from the violent retching of morning sickness. The bell would call Marianne, who could make tea to wash down the awful taste.
But before she made it across the room, an acute pain gripped her stomach. She collapsed to her knees, landing hard on the wooden floor with a cry.
With her hands tight around her stomach and her forehead pressed to the floor, she cried out for help. "Kalen! Amandine... anyone..." She knew it was pointless to call for him while he was so far away, but she was beyond rational thought at the moment.
Amandine was there before she collapsed. "Caitlin, it's alright, I'm here." She lifted her up and cradled Caitlin to her chest, sweeping her to the bed. "How long has it been since you've eaten?"
Caitlin could barely keep her eyes open.
Another vise clamped around her stomach, drowning her under a wave of agony. She clutched at Amandine's black gossamer gown, trying to banish the pain. She'd never felt anything so dire; the pregnancy up to this point had been difficult, but not painful. Now, she thought she could very well lose the child.
Her life was hinged on the birth of Kalen's son, and if she miscarried...
She didn't want to think about the possibility, bracing for another ripple of invisible needles that worked over her stomach. At some point, she realized Amandine had set her down, and was now stroking her back as Caitlin lay on her side. "Breathe for me, Caitlin." That soothing voice broke through a prison fashioned from her own mind, drawing her back to the surface. "Breathe. I've already rang Marianne, and she will call the doctor. You're not well."
Caitlin scoffed between great undulations of pain, but had learned months ago that sarcasm wasn't the most effective way to communicate with their kind. "What's- happening?"
Amandine only shook her head. She, herself, had gone through the same, arduous process of bearing a royal child, but from what Caitlin understood, it was a rather average birth, despite the fact that it lasted three years. And the mother always perished.
Three years
, Caitlin thought, right before another contraction seized her belly. Her scream echoed off the bedroom walls as she held her stomach tight.
"I will see what's keeping her."
Amandine moved to stand, but she caught her arm. "No! Stay- stay with me. Don't leave."
"I'll only be gone a moment." She gently detached from her and vanished into thin air. They were fast, too fast for her to register as another squeeze clamped down on her and the child. Tears chased down her cheeks as she clutched at her only connection to life.
"Caitlin!" Marianne's shout roused her, though only slightly. "Oh, dear!" A warm hand grabbed hers. "Don't you dare give up. You're stronger than that."
The cool, impassive part of her brain found amusement in her words, but all she could do was let out an unfettered scream. She was not strong. She'd never been strong before, or after, she met Kalen. She wasn't strong when her father's successor, Gabriel, kidnapped her, only to conduct a test to draw Kalen out and kill him, planning to destroy the child inside her afterwards.
"Dr. Gray will be here as soon as she can," Marianne reassured her, running a thick hand up her arm. "It's going to be okay." Caitlin suspected she was trying to convince herself, more than anything. When a fleeting moment of clarity passed her, she saw the middle-aged woman's greyish-green eyes huge with worry. She'd never seen Marianne so shaken in all her time at the mansion.
"I can't- I can't lose him!" Caitlin arched with another spear of pain, clutching her stomach, her core shaking violently with the release of each contraction. It had barely been
three
months since Kalen did his princely duty, at the instruction of his father.
How could she last three
years
, if her body rioted so?
Marianne's voice was desperately hopeful, and lacked any convincing edge. "You won't, dear. The doctor will make sure of it."
The door burst open and she saw a wild mop of gray curls enter the room. "What's going on?!" Janice ran to her side and leaned over her, brushing back Caitlin's sweat-laced hair from her eyes. "She's too pale! Look at her!"
Caitlin shook her head, not wanting her mother to be this frantic as her body revolted. It was bad enough that this searing pain bore into her body.
She felt more than saw Amandine's return. After Gabriel's injections, sensing her mother-in-law was as effortless as feeling Kalen's energy approaching the mansion, even in a fit of agony.
"Janice. Marianne." The Queen's voice was cool in comparison to their panic. "I will take it from here. I appreciate your concern, and I'm sure Caitlin does as well, but you can't help her right now. Caitlin will need to eat when the wave passes. Please attend to her lunch."
Marianne was quick to rise, but Janice, not so much. "She is my
child
."
"She is." The words came out as daggers. "And if you care for her at all, you will do as I say." The voice gentled again, "Trust me, Janice."
Caitlin felt a pair of hands release so she could be alone in her agony. There was only one set of hands she wanted to feel, and they were not here. Amandine's, though, were a close second. When the room finally went blessedly quiet, the contractions slowed, just a little. "Caitlin. Open your eyes."
She screwed them shut, tossing her head to the side.
A had cupped her cheek. "You have to drink this, child." A warm drop touched her mouth, and her eyes flew open. Amandine had put a slender finger against her lips, having let out a little of her own blood on the tip, and was pressing it into her mouth. "It will help with the pain."
The drop passed between her lips before she could object, and a palliative calm rushed through her. She'd never tasted vampire blood before. Kalen was waiting until the moment the child was out of her before transitioning her. She had two choices once the child was out of her, become one of them, or die a human. Caitlin chose the former, if it meant meeting their son.
But what Amandine did... it was abrasive to their plans. And yet, so were these horrible contractions that racked her body. When the last of them ebbed away, she could breath without gasping. "Amandine... you-"
"I did what I had to, to save both of you." Amandine leaned over the bed, cupping Caitlin's face as a mother might her most cherished daughter, her eyes filled with concern. "Your body was attempting to reject the child. Don't tell Janice or Marianne what I did. They won't understand."
Caitlin passed her hands over the small bump that was only beginning to form. "Of course, I won't." There was no reason to worry her mother, or the servant. She rolled her tongue around her mouth, tasting the sweet metallic of Amandine's blood. She closed her eyes and threw her head against the pillow in relief. "Thank you."
She didn't not answer right away. "It won't come without a price."
Caitlin felt the guilt of it weigh down her words. "Nothing ever does, it seems."
*
