The Vampire & Her Witch

As soon as he realized Ashlynn had seen them, Ollie began to trot down the hill, wincing slightly as he strained the barely healed wound in his side but pushing thoughts about it to the side in his haste to reach Ashlynn's side.

"I have good news," Ollie said once he'd reached her. "Owain took one of the villagers in Old Nan's village as a prisoner. Her name is Noomi, and she gave birth to a son in the dungeons beneath the villa."

"He took a pregnant woman? What did he want to do, raise her child as a pet?" Ashlynn said hotly, glancing briefly at the woman in Ipiktok's arms and realizing that she was cradling a small blanket-wrapped figure in her arms. "But her son survived, even though he was born in the dungeons? That's incredible…"

"That's the second piece of news," Ollie said in a rush as Ipiktok and Virve drew closer. "Noomi and her son, Saku, survived because Samira cared for them. She's been sneaking them food for months, keeping her company, even smuggling her bits of firewood to carve a weaning spoon for Saku so she had something to feed him with."

"She, she what?" Ashlynn said, staring in confusion. The Samira she remembered was a simple woman, obsessed with earning Owain's favor and dreaming of their perfect life together in the future. She was also someone who had been completely lost dealing with the subtle nuances of the life of a noblewoman and the expectations that would be placed on her as someone pretending to be 'Lady Ashlynn Blackwell.'

Nothing she'd seen in her brief conversation with the woman gave her the impression that she would be venturing into the dungeons to care for an Eldritch woman and her infant child. It wasn't surprising because Samira struck her as some kind of faithful zealot, but rather because she struggled to imagine her doing something that would have been certain to infuriate Owain if he ever found out.

"Evidently, she and Noomi became close friends," Ollie said awkwardly, glancing over his shoulder at the approaching group. "So close that Noomi insisted on staying with Samira when she meets you. She's worried, um, actually, we're all a little worried, because…"

"Because Samira is carrying Owain's child," Ashlynn said, shocking Ollie and everyone else who was close enough to hear. "I already knew that he was using her to vent his lust," Ashlynn said to the stunned-looking young knight. "I accepted that this might happen a long time ago. From the look of her, she must have conceived as soon as she arrived in the Summer Villa, if not earlier."

"You, you're not angry?" Ollie said hesitantly as he tried to read her expression from her strangely calm face.

"Tell me something, Ollie," Ashlynn said quietly as Ipiktok set the two women down. "Does she still love Owian?"

"No," Ollie said instantly. "She's terrified of what he'll do if he finds out she's carrying his child. Evidently, she and Noomi have been trying to find a way to escape the Summer Villa together for more than a month now. When we attacked, Samira let Noomi out of her cell, and then she bumped into me while she was looking for food for their escape to the Vale of Mists."

"Then she's like me," Ashlynn said with a sad smile. "She's living the life I would have lived if my mother's advice had worked out. If I'd managed to bear a child for Owain, I would have lived forever in fear that he would discover the mark on my body. And when that day came, or when it became inevitable that it would happen, I would have faced the same decision she did."

"Stay, and risk that he'd kill me," Ashlynn said. "Or run with a child in the hopes that we could survive somewhere far away that he couldn't reach us."

"She's not that different from me, Ollie," Ashlynn said as she began to walk towards Samira and Noomi. "So how could I be angry at her? I fell for Owain's charm too, you know. I let myself believe that he wouldn't be cruel to me, just the same as I'm sure Samira told herself that Owain wouldn't be cruel to her."

"But Owain isn't like that, is he, Samira?" Ashlynn asked as she drew close to the pair of women.

"No, my Lady, I don't think there's anyone in the world he wouldn't be cruel to if he didn't need them for something that he would lose if he showed his true face," Samira said, offering as deep of a curtsey as she could given the weight of her belly and the weakness of her knees.

Samira had thought that she was prepared to enter the Eldritch world when she made up her mind to run away with Noomi but one look at the towering giant with his curled ivory tusks and the flexible trunk that could produce such terrifying trumpet blasts had frightened her so much that she would have fled back into the villa if it weren't for Sir Ollie's hand supporting her.

Ipiktok, however, proved himself to be incredibly considerate, offering to carry both mothers to meet with Lady Ashlynn instead of forcing them to walk or wait for Constable Daithi to send a cart for them. More than that, he let the arm cradling Noomi sway gently as they walked, soothing Saku as the powerful giant rocked him to sleep in his mother's arms.

Now, however, the comforting ride in the giant's arms had come to an end, and she stood before the woman she had spent more than half a year impersonating. Sweat trickled down her back, between her shoulder blades, and her entire body quivered as she found herself close enough to the real Lady Ashlynn Blackwell to reach out and touch.

"You don't need to bow to me," Ashlynn said as she stepped close enough to the other woman to wrap her arms around her in a gentle embrace. "I promise you," she whispered in the other woman's ear.

"Owain will pay for hurting you. I'll get revenge for both of us."