(Daciana POV)
The bloodline thread burned my fingers, but touching it showed me the shape of the trap more clearly than fear ever could.
The child inside Ashina was not only alive.
The child was listening.
Not with ears.
With blood.
It felt Ashina’s terror, Gonzalo’s shame, Adolphus’s command, Bardolph’s bond-fire, Conri’s protective rage, and my mother’s buried crown.
So much power pressed around one unborn life that my anger shifted before I expected it to move.
This child had been made as a key.
But a key was not guilty of the lock built around it.
I looked at Ashina, and for the first time since she entered my life with a tray and a hidden smile, I saw her trapped.
She was still cruel.
Still dangerous.
Still, the woman who smiled while Bardolph rejected me.
Still the maid
