Prologue
772 Words
The infinite white noise of rain and hail pounded on the tin roof of the small shack like hammers desperately trying to get in. Drowning out the agonizing screaming coming from it's occupants inside.
One was on the brink of bringing new life into the world while the other was on the brink of giving up his.
"Please hang on!" Kia pleaded to the bleeding man next to her "I can't do this alone!" Tears were streaming down her face as she watched the love of her life try to hang on but succumbing to his wounds
"Ahhhh" She screams as another contraction hits.
"Make sure she knows that I love her" Cocidus asked weakly while one hand was holding hers and the other was holding the wound on his stomach.
"Tell her your damn self!" She screamed angerly at him. "You can't leave me! . . . I need you!" She sobbed. Soon another contraction hit. She couldn't tell what hurt worse, her body or her heart.
"Kia, you have to take her to my brother." He tried to get her listen to sense.
"How could you say ahhhh." She was interrupted by another contraction.
"They'll never stop trying to find her." He took the opportunity to try and get her to listen to reason.
"If our situation isn't obvious enough, they will do anything to get to her. We have to protect her."
"How can I trust him. How do I know he won't just rip her away from me and give her to them. He is them."
"He is not like them. He won't hurt her." Cocidus promised.
"What about me? Can you promise he won't hurt me?"
"I can only hope that he won't." He told her honestly with a grim expression. "I love you Kia, I wouldn't suggest this if it wasn't yours and our daughters best option out of this." His head hung low. "I'm sorry I brought you both into this."
Kia stayed quiet before another contraction hit. Their daughter was about to arrive any minute.
"Coci, I'm scared." She admited, using the same nickname she used to call him when they were children.
"I am too Kia." He tighten his grip as she screamed through another contractions. This time she felt herself crowning.
"She's coming!" She screamed. After a few more screams and pushes their beautiful daughter was now laying skin to skin on her mother's chest. Her little lungs screaming to indicate that she was okay. In which both worried parents were relieved. Fearing for the worst in this bleak and disheartening situation.
"Is she marked?" Cocidus asked.
"I don't see anything." Kai said as she look her daughter over.
"She's not the one." Cocidus breathed a sigh of relief.
"The seerers were wrong." He leaned his head back against the shed. The storm was finally over and the moons light was beginning to beam in through the holes in the roof.
"Seerers are never wrong." Kai told him trying to hold back her panic.
As the baby lay rested with its tummy against her mothers chest a small symbol began to appear in the light of the moon.
"No." Cocidus almost cried at seeing the mark of the beast on his daughters shoulder.
"It'll be okay." Kai tried to comfort him."We'll be okay. Just hang on and we'll get through this, together."
"You have to take her. As soon as you have the strength, you have to leave here and never look back." He warned her.
Placing his hand on his daughters tiny back "You will do great things one day my little star. I'm sorry I won't be there to see it first hand but I will always be with you, watching over you." He grimaced from the pain as he reached to kiss his daughters tiny head.
"Always remember, your father loves you so much." His voice was weak.
"Don't you dare talk like that!" Kai pleaded with her husband.
"We both know I'm not leaving here. I love you always." He said as his tears began to fall. Pulling his hand from his wound, he cupped his wife's face one last time. Mustering the last bit of strength he had left to kiss her. "You are my everything and I'm so sorry it had to be this way. "
"Please hang on." She pleaded again as she watched him fade away. "Don't leave me." She couldn't hold back the sobs as she felt his hand slip from it's place on their daughter's back and her face, to limp at his sides.
"I can't do this alone." She cried harder.
- Writer
