Reborn: the Dragon God’s Bride Chapter 04
Ten days. That’s how long it took me to walk back through the ice and snow, half–starved and frozen, my body barely holding together.
But I made it.
The guards at the city gate saw me and went completely still. One of them dropped his spear.
“This…this isn’t possible!” He sounded like he was choking. “Sacrifices don’t come back! They never come back!”
didn’t say anything. I just pushed past them and kept walking toward the palace.
Word must have spread insanely fast because by the time they brought me to the throne room, it looked like half the kingdom had crammed themselves inside, Everyone was whispering and pointing.
Father sat on his throne. Damien stood next to him looking calm and composed, and Isadora was there too.
“Seraphina.” Father’s voice came out so sharp I almost flinched. “Start talking. Now.”
“I don’t know what to tell you.” My throat was so dry it hurt to speak. “I woke up and I was alone in the temple. Three months went by. Then the temple just.. closed. Sealed itself shut. I had to leave.”
“And the other nine girls?”
“Gone. All of them. I was the only one there.”
The room exploded into noise. People shouting over each other, their voices getting louder and more frantic.
“This has never happened before!”
“What does it mean?”
Is this good or bad?”
Father lifted his hand and everyone shut up. immediately. Then he looked over at the High Priest, this creepy old guy’in purple robes who’d always made my skin crawl.
The priest shuffled toward me, “Let me check her, Your Majesty.”
stood there frozen while his cold, bony hand pressed against my stomach. His eyes went huge.
Your Majesty…” He sounded terrified. “She’s… she’s pregnant!”
For two seconds, nobody made a sound.
Then all hell broke loose.
“Pregnant?!”
“How?!”
“What the hell did she do in there?!”
My legs almost buckled. Pregnant? I looked down at my stomach, which was still completely flat.
“The temple closed because the dragon god is furious!” The priest was going for it now, “This girl did something disgusting in that sacred place! She slept with some kind of monster and pissed off our god! We
have to burn her alive or we’re all cursed!”
Burn her!” someone in the crowd yelled.
looked at Damien and he was straight–up smiling.
Not even hiding it.
“Father, I swear I didn’t-”
“shut your mouth!” Father’s shout literally shook the walls. “You think you get to talk right now? You, who destroyed our family’s reputation? Who turned the most important ceremony in our entire history into a joke?”
“I didn’t do anything!” My voice cracked. “I don’t even now what happened to me!”
“You’re lying!” The priest pointed at me. “The temple wouldn’t close unless you did something wrong! The dragon god wouldn’t be angry unless you committed a sin!”
The crowd started pushing closer and I could see the disgust on their faces, the anger, the fear. These people used to bow to me. Now they wanted me dead.
This is exactly like before. When I had that baby with Damien. Nobody cared about the truth then either.
They just needed someone to blame.
Father stood up and the room went silent again. When he looked at me, there was nothing in his eyes. No love. No sadness. Just cold, hard anger.
“Seraphina,” he said, and his voice was ice. “You’re sentenced to death.”
closed my eyes. Yeah. Of course.
But then the priest spoke up again, “Your Majesty,
wait. The thing inside her might tell us what really happened. We should make her give birth first. See what kind of creature she’s carrying. Then we can burn them both together.”
I felt sick.
Wather stared at me for a long moment, his jaw dlenched. Finally he nodded. “Fine. Lock her up. When she has that… whatever it is… we’ll kill them both.”
The guards grabbed my arms and I didn’t even try to fight back. What would be the point?
They threw me into this tiny stone room in the most forgotten corner of the palace.
I sat down on the bed and just stared at the wall for don’t even know how long.
Every day a old servant woman would bring me food.
Sometimes I’d think about the scarred man from the temple..
Was it him? Did we do something and I just can’t remember?
But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t pull up any memories. Everything from the temple was just blurry light and warmth and then nothing.
Mother, you winter. You said the dragon god would see my told me my destiny was in the eternal real
blood. I pressed my forehead against the cold stone wall. Is this what you meant? Me locked up, waiting to die?
die? Is this my big destiny?
Three weeks crawled by like that.
Then one evening I heard shouting outside.
my door.
Guards arguing with someone.
The door flew open and Isadora rushed in.
She looked awful. Her face was pale, with dark purple circles under her eyes. Her fancy dress hung loose on her frame like she’d lost a bunch of weight.
Damien’s draining her life force. The thought just popped into my head. Same thing he did to me in my last life.
We stared at each other.
She looked shocked to see me like this, and confused.
“Isadora.” I set down my water cup slowly. “Why are you here?”
She took this shaky breath and glanced back at the guards standing in the doorway. Then she leaned in close, her eyes going wide.
“Sister, you’re not going to believe this.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “There’s a man outside the palace gates. He’s been there for three days. He says he wants to marry you.”
Everything inside me went still. “What?”