the red moon pact
661 Words
Chapter 12 – The Red Moon Pact
The sky bled.
It wasn’t just the moon—it was the air. Crimson veined clouds twisted above the cottage roof, like the heavens were hemorrhaging. The world had gone silent. Even the birds didn’t dare sing under a cursed moon.
Gift stood barefoot in the clearing behind the inn, the grass cold and damp beneath her feet. In her hands was the scroll—the one the hooded man had given her. Its parchment now glowed faintly, like it breathed. Like it hungered.
Alex stood just behind her. His heartbeat was loud in his ears, but his voice was steady. “If we read it, something changes.”
Gift nodded. “No… everything changes.”
“Then let’s do it together.”
She unrolled the scroll. Symbols—twisting, pulsing, ancient—writhed across the page like snakes made of ink. The curse was more than a blood bond. It was a forgotten contract. One made between her ancestors and something not quite human.
She began to read aloud.
At first, nothing happened.
Then the wind screamed.
The earth shivered.
And the mark on her chest—where the blood oath was sealed—burned like wildfire.
Alex dropped to one knee, clutching his ribs. “What… is it doing… to me?”
Gift dropped beside him, her voice shaking. “It’s rewriting you. Merging us. Not just by blood… but by soul.”
The ground split.
Not wide—but enough.
Enough for her to rise.
A woman.
Ethereal. Barefoot. Skin made of stars and shadows. Eyes like galaxies. She looked at Gift with a cruel kind of love.
“You were the last seed,” she said, voice echoing like bells in a crypt. “The final daughter of my bloodline.”
“Who are you?” Gift whispered.
“I’m the curse you carry. The woman who loved too hard, and died screaming for revenge. My name was Orasha—and you, my child, were born to complete what I began.”
Alex tried to stand, but Orasha lifted a single finger, and he froze—levitating, breath stolen.
“You love him,” she hissed. “But love was my prison. I will not watch you repeat my doom.”
Gift’s tears blurred her sight. “You were wronged. I know. But I am not you. And this love—this man—he’s not the one who cursed you.”
Orasha tilted her head. “You think curses die with the guilty? No, child. They haunt the innocent. That’s the lesson. That’s the legacy.”
Gift took a shaking breath and stepped forward, her body flickering with strange fire. “Then I’ll break it.”
Orasha laughed. It was bone-deep and chilling. “You’d sacrifice yourself for him?”
“Yes.”
“And if I told you that by breaking the curse… you’ll lose him anyway?”
Gift looked at Alex—his eyes wide, lips parting in silent panic—and then back at Orasha.
“Then let fate rip me apart—but I won’t live in fear of love.”
The red moon flashed.
The scroll turned to ash.
And Orasha… vanished.
Alex crashed into her arms, his chest heaving with new breath. The curse mark on Gift’s skin turned gold… then disappeared.
But before she could even celebrate the freedom… she felt it.
A new pain.
Deeper.
From inside.
Alex looked at her. “Gift… your nose…”
She wiped it. Blood.
Her fingers trembled.
Then the vision came.
A child—screaming. A temple. Fire. Chains. A voice calling: “She carries it now—the curse’s heir.”
Gift gasped, falling to her knees.
Alex caught her. “What did you see?”
She looked at him, pale, lips quivering.
“I’m pregnant.”
His eyes widened.
“And it’s not just a baby… It’s her.”
End of Chapter 12
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