She prayed.
Not because she believed someone would answer — but because she didn't know what else to do.
Kneeling on the floor, her hands red from scrubbing, her knees raw, she whispered every name she'd ever heard in temple songs.
> "Gara of the Fields… Silune of Flame… Eras of Light... hear me."
Silence.
Only the wind — soft, like a child breathing in her womb.
She tried again.
> "Help me. Tell me what this is. I don't ask to be healed. I only ask to understand."
The candle beside her flickered.
Then went out.
Not from wind. From something else.
---
Far above the village, in the golden plane where the High Gods watched the world, silence fell across the thrones.
The god of justice squinted into the mortal realm.
> "She still lives."
"She should not," said the god of purity. "We stripped her of light."
"We did not create what grows inside her," murmured another.
The youngest god — childlike in form, eyes wide and unblinking — simply asked:
> "So who did?"
The others turned away.
---
In the cold of her hut, the woman looked up. The walls had grown dark. Her candle wouldn't light. The warmth inside her belly spread, crawling like ink across her skin.
Then—
A whisper.
Not from within the room… not from outside.
> "You are ours."
She gasped. Spun around. No one.
But she knew the voice.
Old. Deep.
Forbidden.
---
Centuries ago, before temples and hymns, there were gods born from hate, loneliness, and abandonment. The world tried to forget them.
But they never forgot the world.
One of them had touched her fate.
She didn't remember it.
She didn't have to.
The child inside her wasn't a punishment.
It was a gift — from the dark gods who saw her pain and smiled.
She collapsed to her knees, shaking, but not in fear.
> In her belly, the heartbeat no longer mimicked her own.
It beat stronger. Louder. Different.
And somewhere in the bones of the earth, one of those dark gods began to stir.