Ashes of the Broken

Chapter 5

Chapter Five – Beneath the Moon

Doña Isolde’s P.O.V.

The Moon Goddess had always spoken.

Not loudly.

Not the way Alphas wanted her to.

She did not thunder from the sky or carve answers into stone because powerful men demanded certainty. She whispered through omens. Through blood. Through the silence before something ancient opened its eyes.

And for eighteen years, I had prayed I would never live long enough to hear her whisper this loudly.

The temple stood at the highest point of DeL Sol territory, hidden beneath cedar trees older than the Council itself. No warrior guarded the entrance.

None were needed.

The temple only revealed itself to those it allowed inside.

I lit the final white candle and placed it at the edge of the ritual circle.

Moonlight spilled across the stone floor despite the sun still hanging somewhere beyond the walls. Old magic had never obeyed time. It obeyed blood, vows, and truth.

Tonight, all three were trembling.

The doors opened behind me.

Aaliyah stepped inside first.

She wore black, as she often did when magic required blood. Her fire-red dreadlocks were pulled away from her face, silver charms woven through them that clicked softly with every step.

At forty-one, Aaliyah still moved like the assassin she had once been.

Quiet.

Balanced.

Dangerous.

Witchfire lived beneath her skin, but age had taught her not to waste flames just because she could summon them. That was the difference between young magic and seasoned power.

Young magic wanted to be seen.

Aaliyah’s magic waited to be feared.

“She wasn’t followed,” Aaliyah said.

“I know.”

“You checked?”

“I always check.”

Aaliyah gave me a tired smile.

“Still hate when you answer like that.”

“And yet you keep asking.”

The smallest laugh left her.

Then it faded.

We both looked toward the door.

Anna entered a moment later, wrapped in a loose cream sweater beneath a long coat. To anyone else, she looked like a grieving girl still too thin from loss.

That was the lie the world saw.

The spell had made sure of it.

For six months, Aaliyah and I had woven concealment over her body, her scent, her aura, and the impossible second heartbeat growing beneath her own.

Every full moon, the ritual became harder.

Every full moon, the child pushed back.

Anna stepped into the circle without needing to be told.

She knew the routine now.

That frightened me.

No eighteen-year-old should become familiar with hiding motherhood like a crime.

“How do you feel?” I asked.

“Tired.”

Aaliyah lifted a brow.

“That is not an answer.”

Anna sighed.

“Hungry, tired, angry, scared…”

She paused.

“Still pregnant.”

Aaliyah’s expression softened.

“Very pregnant.”

Anna shot her a look.

“You said no one can tell.”

“No one can.”

“Then don’t look at me like that.”

Aaliyah stepped closer and brushed a curl away from Anna’s face.

“I look at you like that because I remember holding you when you were smaller than my arm.”

Anna’s face softened.

Then grief crossed it.

Quick.

Sharp.

Carter’s name was not spoken.

It lived in the room anyway.

I motioned toward the center of the circle.

“Stand still, child.”

Anna obeyed.

Aaliyah moved to the eastern point of the ritual circle while I stood at the west. Between us, Anna closed her eyes and rested one hand against her stomach.

She did that more often now.

Instinctively.

Protectively.

Just like her mother.

I began the chant first.

The ancient words rolled from my tongue, older than Spanish, older than the first pack treaties, older than the men who now sat on thrones believing they controlled what the Moon Goddess created.

Aaliyah joined me.

Her voice braided with mine, lower and rougher, carrying fire where mine carried earth.

The runes beneath our feet awakened.

Silver.

Gold.

Crimson.

One by one, they wrapped around Anna and sank beneath her skin.

The concealment spell took hold.

Her scent dulled.

Her aura dimmed.

The curve of her stomach softened beneath illusion.

To the world, Anna Rivera remained untouched by prophecy.

To the world, she was only a daughter grieving her dead mate.

But old magic knew better.

Old magic always knew.

I placed both hands gently over her stomach.

The child responded before I reached.

A pulse of power rolled through my palms.

I closed my eyes.

There.

A heartbeat.

Strong.

Steady.

Too strong.

Not one rhythm, but three.

Wolf.

Witch.

Vampire.

Bloodlines that should have warred against one another moving together inside one unborn child.

The prophecy was no longer ink on ancient parchment.

It was breathing beneath my hands.

My throat tightened.

For decades, I had carried the words alone.

For decades, I had told myself they were warning, myth, metaphor—anything but truth.

But the Moon Goddess had never wasted prophecy on fear.

She gave warnings because the future still had teeth.

Aaliyah’s chant faltered.

“Isolde.”

“I know.”

The candles bent inward.

Not from wind.

From recognition.

Their flames turned silver, then blue, then white.

Anna’s eyes opened.

“What’s happening?”

“Do not move.”

Her hand tightened over her stomach.

“Is something wrong with the baby?”

“No.”

The answer came immediately.

The child was not wrong.

That was the problem.

The child was exactly what the prophecy promised.

The temple trembled.

Dust drifted from the ceiling.

Aaliyah lifted both hands, witchfire sparking between her fingers as she reinforced the wards.

“Isolde.”

“I said I know.”

“You knew this would happen?”

I looked at the ancient mural carved into the far wall.

A wolf beneath a blood moon.

A woman cloaked in flame.

A child without a face.

“I prayed it wouldn’t.”

Anna looked between us.

The fear in her eyes made my heart ache.

“You know what this is.”

It was not a question.

She was Christa’s daughter.

Even terrified, she knew when someone was hiding the shape of the truth.

“Yes,” I said.

Aaliyah stared at me.

“You told me pieces.”

“Because pieces were safer.”

Anna’s voice lowered.

“The prophecy.”

The word changed the room.

Even the candles seemed to still.

Aaliyah stepped closer to Anna.

“We don’t have to do this now.”

“Yes,” Anna said, surprising us both.

“We do.”

Her chin lifted.

Grief had thinned her.

Fear had haunted her.

But steel still lived in her spine.

Christa’s steel.

Carlos’s calm.

And something entirely her own.

“I am carrying this baby,” Anna said. “I am the one lying to my parents. I am the one hiding from the Council. I am the one who has to wake up every day and pretend Carter didn’t leave a piece of himself inside me.”

Her voice cracked.

But she didn’t cry.

“So if there is a prophecy about my child, I deserve to know.”

Aaliyah closed her eyes.

Pain crossed her face.

She knew Anna was right.

So did I.

I stepped away from the circle and walked to the altar.

Beneath the white cloth rested a cedar box sealed with three locks.

One of silver.

One of bone.

One of bloodstone.

I had not opened it in eighteen years.

Not since the night Anna was born.

Aaliyah saw the box and went still.

“You had it here the whole time?”

“Where else would I keep a truth dangerous enough to start a war?”

I touched the first lock.

It opened.

The second.

Then the third.

Inside lay a strip of ancient parchment wrapped in red thread.

The edges had blackened with age, but the words remained.

Prophecy did not fade.

Not when written in blood.

Anna watched me unwrap it.

Her hand never left her stomach.

I did not give her the whole thing.

Not yet.

Some truths could crush a soul before it had the strength to carry them.

Instead, I read the first lines.

“When the daughter of the sun carries the blood of the dead,

the moon shall tremble,

the old crowns shall crack,

and the child of three hungers shall rise.”

The room fell silent.

Anna’s face drained of color.

“The blood of the dead…”

Aaliyah looked away.

Because to Anna, Carter was dead.

And yet his child lived.

Anna swallowed hard.

“What does it mean?”

“It means your child was foretold.”

“Foretold to do what?”

The parchment felt heavier in my hands.

“To change the order of every supernatural bloodline.”

Anna took a step back.

“No.”

Aaliyah caught her gently.

“Baby…”

“No.”

Anna shook her head.

“My baby is not an order. Not a weapon. Not some Council problem.”

Her breathing quickened.

“This is Carter’s child.”

Her voice broke.

“Mine and Carter’s.”

The temple pulsed.

The baby’s heartbeat thundered once.

Every candle went out.

Darkness swallowed us.

Aaliyah cursed under her breath and threw one hand up.

Witchfire flared, red and gold, but even her flames bent toward Anna.

Then another heartbeat echoed through the temple.

Not from Anna.

Not from the child.

This one came from far away.

Faint.

Ragged.

But alive.

Anna froze.

Her eyes widened.

“Did you feel that?”

Aaliyah looked at me.

I said nothing.

Because I had felt it too.

A bond did not die cleanly when fate refused to release it.

Anna pressed both hands to her chest.

“Carter?”

The name shattered the air.

For one impossible second, the temple answered with a low hum that sounded almost like grief.

Then the connection vanished.

The candles reignited.

Anna stood trembling in the ritual circle, tears shining in her eyes.

“What was that?”

Aaliyah looked at me again.

This time, there was fear in her face.

Not for the pregnancy.

For the secret we did not know we were standing beside.

I folded the parchment slowly.

“The world felt your child tonight.”

Anna shook her head.

“No. I felt him.”

Silence.

The kind that turned blood cold.

I had known the prophecy.

I had known the child would awaken old magic.

I had known the Council would sense disturbances without understanding the source.

But this…

This was not in the text.

Aaliyah’s voice was barely above a whisper.

“Isolde.”

I looked toward the northern mountains beyond the temple walls.

Iron Fang territory waited somewhere beyond them.

Cold.

Hidden.

Hungry.

“The concealment still holds,” I said.

Anna stared at me.

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I am not.”

I stepped closer.

“The spell hides you from people. From wolves. From witches. From the Council’s eyes.”

I looked down at her stomach.

“But it cannot hide what the Moon Goddess herself has chosen to awaken.”

Anna’s tears spilled over.

“He felt us.”

I did not answer.

Because if Carter Lykoudis was truly dead…

He should not have been able to feel anything.

And if he was not dead…

Then someone had buried a lie so deep that even prophecy had begun clawing it back into the light.