DESDEMONA

“Your pregnancy has awakened your bloodline.”

Healer Mara’s words remained in my mind long after the light beneath my mark had faded. I sat frozen in the chair, one hand resting over my stomach while the other gripped the edge of the table. I had come to the cottage hoping to discover whether I was pregnant, but I had never imagined that the answer would lead me deeper into the secrets surrounding my birth.

My child was real. The strange changes in my body were real. And now, according to the healer, my pregnancy had awakened something that had been sleeping inside my blood for generations.

I didn’t know...