“If you’re their mother, then why don’t you tell them then?”
“When they are faceless, they know I am safe, and that I will help. They know, even if they do not remember. They trust me. Why should I care beyond that?”
Reia’s felt herself paling at the idea. I think Orpheus would want to know where he came from.
“If you want to help him, then what do you need from me now?”
“Nothing, I came to help you instead. There is one thing I came to warn you of.” The Witch Owl pointed to Reia’s stomach. “I would be careful of your womb if you do not seek to give birth to darkness.”
Reia shuffled back a step while crossing her arms over her belly as if to hide it.
“What do you mean? I’m a human and he’s a Duskwalker. We can’t have children together.”
Her grin was confusing as she was upside down, appearing like a frown at the same time.
“But you are not a human. You are a phantom, as am I.”
She turned incorporeal in front of Reia’s very eyes, slipping from the tree branch to hover above the ground. She stood to face her and then walked forward.
She placed her hand on Reia’s shoulder and she felt it, in the same way she felt the pressure of her touching her own transparent flesh.
“He is made of spirit and human and has now made you spirit and human. Your soul is tied to him and now you walk on the cusp of life and death, never truly alive, never truly dead.” She placed her hand on Reia’s stomach. “You mate with a child of darkness, and you will make more if you are not careful. I was not ready when it happened the first time.”
“Then...” Reia stumbled away from her as unease filled her. “How the hell am I supposed to be careful? It’s not like I can just will myself not to have a child!”
And the likelihood that Orpheus would come inside her, fill her with so much seed that it literally poured from her, meant she’d probably be pregnant within a freaking day!
Oh fuck. They’d had sex three times last night! I could already be pregnant!
The Witch Owl was right, Reia was not ready for something like this. She’d only just made the decision to give him her damn soul.
“He has magic, he can learn. All he needs to do is have a reason to seal your womb from him, and it will be protected. He learns to do spells by wanting something, like wanting to protect a human he had brought to the Veil, or creating illusions to stop people and Demons from thinking he travelled alone.”
“He can learn something like that to prevent it?”
Her shoulders eased, but it didn’t stop the worry that it might already be too late.
“Yes, although all can learn to heal and protect, Orpheus is best with protection magic. They are generally filled with too much hunger to heal, which is why he has not learnt yet. He will do so with you now that you have taken away his hunger.”
“How did I even do that? He only ate my soul.”
She smiled once more for Reia.
“Because, like their father, they are soul eaters. They consume flesh in the desire to consume the soul it cases, but they cannot be eaten in this way.”
“It has to be given,” Reia stated, placing her fore knuckle against her lips in thought and tapping them with it.
“This is a lie,” she said, her face hardening for the first time. “The void can eat all souls, but he can only be given one to mate with. My children can only eat one soul, and then they are stuck with that human, whether they want to be with them or not. I have told him that he must be given a soul so he does not tie a human to himself that hates him, but it could have been taken if he truly wanted to.”
“Would he have?” Reia asked with creased brows.
“If he had thought it was possible, perhaps.” Her lips pursed with irritation. “And if he had done so with Katerina, he would have been miserable.”
“I understand.”
Of course, she understood after meeting her. She would never have accepted Orpheus, no matter how hard he tried to please her.
He would have taken mine when I was dying if he knew he could. Orpheus loved her, he wouldn’t have let her be apart from him. She didn’t know how she felt about that since she wouldn’t have wanted her choice taken from her.
“Is that all you wanted to tell me?” Reia asked, worried about what other damning things she could learn.
“Yes, that is all. However, I ask that when he has found a human, that you give the amulet to my antler-horned son. He will lose it if you give it to him now.” The Witch Owl turned physical and started pulling her cloak over her body more as if she wanted to hide inside it. “And thank you for making my Impala-horned son help him. I don’t think he would have gone as far as take him to the village without your interference.”
“No problem, I guess. You’re leaving now?”
With the way she was fidgeting, it appeared as though she was about to take her leave.
“Yes. There are many places I must be at once, and it is difficult to arrive always in time.”
She closed the middle seams of her cloak and began to change, feathers growing out of her body while she took on the shape of a white owl. Her face didn’t morph, but the hood drew down over it and grew a beak as eyes began to appear.
Reia’s eyes widened as she watched, taking in the awe-striking transformation.
Once she was done, she turned and immediately took flight, flapping her wings so she could dart through the canopy of trees. She was gone from view within seconds.
Standing there for a long while in confusion, shock, and being totally overwhelmed, she eventually sighed and shook her head. Screw this, I’m hungry and want tea. She’d think about all this while she was making herself dinner, since it was so late.
She walked back to the house, turning physical only once she was inside so the opening of the door didn’t wake Orpheus. Not that it mattered. She tried to be quiet, but cooking was always noisy.
He didn’t wake though, and she ate quietly while sipping on ginger and honey tea.
A solid hour passed while she thought, wishing that damn nagging pain in her abdomen would cease. Okay, so maybe he was right about holding back.
Once she was finished with her food, she sat at the dining table and was barely able to stop herself from twiddling her thumbs. It was unusual to be in the house by herself while he slept. He was always with her, and when he was out she could be as loud as she wanted.
I could read. The idea bored her.
She turned her head to the cabinet above the kitchen. He did ask me to make a new bell.
Quietly, more so that she didn’t get caught right in the act rather than actually waking him, she moved her chair to the kitchen counter and stood on it. She retrieved everything she wanted before returning it to the table so she could start to work on it.
She made it the same, and just when she was done, she heard heavy footsteps making their way down the short hallway.
“Reia?” he asked with a gravelly voice like it was groggy and sleep-filled, emerging while only wearing his trousers as if he’d quickly put something on.
“What’s wrong, Orpheus?”