Bloodline War
657 Words
The night was silent, but Zina couldn’t sleep.
Not really.
She had drifted off in Damian’s arms, her body exhausted, her heart oddly full. But something in the air shifted just after midnight. The stillness became too still. The darkness… thick.
And then it began.
She opened her eyes to a strange weight on her chest. At first, she thought it was a dream. But her arms wouldn’t move. Her lips wouldn’t part. And her mind—sharp just seconds ago—suddenly fogged like cotton soaked in oil.
Something was pressing her spirit down.
Zina tried to scream.
She couldn’t.
In the corner of the room, a shadow moved.
No. It slithered.
A thick, crawling thing with limbs too long and a head shaped like bone. But it had no face. Just a black blur where eyes should be, and a tongue that dripped salt.
It hissed—not out loud, but inside her.
“You are not meant to carry this child. You are not meant to rise.”
Zina fought. Fought with everything in her.
But her arms wouldn’t lift.
Then, just as suddenly, her body jerked awake like something had been pulled from her spine.
She gasped.
Damian was beside her in a flash, gripping her shoulders. “Zina!”
Her eyes were wide, her chest rising and falling like a drumbeat. “It was here,” she whispered. “Something was here. It… it entered me.”
He pulled her close, too tightly, like he feared she might slip through his fingers. “You’re safe. You’re here with me. You’re okay.”
But she wasn’t okay.
The necklace his grandmother gave her—thin and silver with a crystal seed at its center—was glowing softly against her collarbone. Warm. Too warm.
Zina held it.
It burned her palm, but she didn’t let go.
“Damian,” she said slowly, “I think… they’ve started.”
He stared at her.
“You mean—?”
She nodded. “My uncle. He’s using something deeper now. This isn’t just jealousy or greed anymore. This is war. Bloodline war.”
⸻
Back in Lagos Mainland, the night was darker than usual.
Inside a compound with no address, surrounded by silent trees and goats that didn’t bleat, Zina’s uncle stood in white cloth stained with ash.
His hands were lifted. His mouth moved, but no sound came out. Not human sound.
A bowl of burning herbs sat before him. A lizard’s tail twitched inside it. The flame flickered green.
Across from him, a figure watched—hooded and still. No face. No name.
“She bears a seed,” the figure said, voice like cracked glass. “A powerful one. If she carries it full term, you will lose all access to her path.”
Zina’s uncle spat. “Then make sure she doesn’t.”
The spirit only smiled.
⸻
Zina sat by the open window of Damian’s suite, staring at the moon.
It felt like it was watching her.
Like it knew.
Damian stepped behind her, draping a soft shawl over her shoulders. “You don’t have to be afraid,” he said.
“I’m not,” she whispered.
And she wasn’t.
But she was aware now.
That everything up until this moment—her uncle’s threats, the betrayal, even the kidnapping—had just been surface-level warfare.
This?
This was beneath the skin.
Zina touched her belly gently, her heart thrumming with a fierce kind of protectiveness. She wasn’t just carrying a child.
She was carrying legacy.
Destiny.
She stood.
“I need to go see your grandmother again.”
Damian blinked. “Why?”
“She said something the last time. About covering me before the battles come.” Zina’s eyes burned. “I think this is what she meant.”
Damian didn’t stop her.
He simply kissed her knuckles and whispered, “Then I’m coming with you.”
………….
- Writer
