TRIGGER

WARNING!

This content might touch on topics that are sensitive or triggering for some readers. Trigger Warning for mentions of Childbirth, Postpartum, Child Rejection
The wake of midnight sees the writhing of her body — a horrible squirming mass against a bloodied bed. The scent of iron wafts throughout the mire, and a horrible wailing is to follow; her vision sets hazily, only defogged by the sudden pang of realization which pierces her like a stake.

They are here.

Drowning in it all, her babies emerge and wail from her body. She gives herself to them wholeheartedly — silently gazing as they flail about within her soul. Horrid stains of red and pale cover the floor of the den, drowning them all in its presence alone. A roar releases for @Luther ♔; none other but him, for what need has she for nurses and servants. The hardest part is behind them, to curl in defeat now would be a pitiful show of weakness, of undeserving.

Gentle hands cradle and sob, clutching them to her chest. It is all that was taken from her, all she has wanted. Four little bodies, all pressed against her own beating heart — breaths and beats intertwined as one, they are whole. She is whole. She. She has all she ever wanted.

Eyelids gently lay across motherly eyes, yet her gaze halts so soon — fixated on one tiny body. The resemblance hits her at once, and it sends a shiver deep within her spine. @Björn. That's...This is...No, no. No. No. But...She watched him die. Watched him die right before her, helpless and infantile — so weakened and stripped apart in his starved state. Now here he sits, right before her. Crying, shaking, begging for mercy in this foreign land.

The pounding in her chest only strums with a beat more vigorous with every passing second she lays there staring at him. Her body finds itself rigid, and her sides begin to heave and wobble in unshakable terror. I watched you die. I watched you die. So what, have you come back to haunt me? To abominate me, to simply loathe and detest my very being? It was an accident. It was never meant to happen the way it did, so why couldn't you just—

Her hands shove him away. He isn't wanted. Not here, not like this...He should hide. Hide, hide, hide — lest a force most wicked is called to be at play upon his sweet little face. The baby reels and weeps, for he knows not what he has done to upset mother so; he slithers back on tender limbs, desperate for mother's love. She howls, lungs flooding with remorse.

Away. AWAY! GET IT AWAY FROM ME! Clutching the rest of her brood against her breast, the woman feels an icy trickle of tears dripping down the corners of her eyes. Away. Away. That one. He is back. Björn...Just...Just look at it. They look so similar. I cannot bear to see his face any longer, guilt floods her as the weight of her words finds its place along her back — crushing her beneath the sound alone.

But she knows what she sees, and she knows the feeling of what it brings to her. She must protect her young. She must not let this beast interlope among the writing of pure, innocent bodies. Away. Away.

Get it away.

@Viola @Von @Eufemia

bg x art x code

TRIGGER WARNING!
This content might touch on topics that are sensitive or triggering for some readers. Trigger Warning for mentions of infanticide, domestic violence, abuse, childbirth, postpartum.

Thunder, lightning. It crashed at midnight, but Luther had been calmly winding down for tonight. But it is not the storm outside that makes him rise from his slumber and head out. No. It was @Valentine's scream. Had the babes finally arrived? It was any moment now, and he was on the edge. After what had happened last time, he will be damned if any harm befell this litter.

Her frantic voice tore through the silence like a blade, jagged and raw, laced with something beyond the usual pains of labor. There was something in that sound that struck him as unnatural, a feral edge beneath her voice that made his pulse quicken with anger, with a sense of impending wrongness. Without hesitation, he moved swiftly, powerful strides carrying him to the entrance of the den, where the scent of blood and anguish hung thick in the air.

He entered the den to find her there, cradling three of their newborns tightly against her chest, her body hunched over them like a shield. Her eyes were wild, wet with unshed tears, staring daggers at the fourth—a small, helpless boy who lay just out of reach, trembling and wailing, his tiny form writhing on the bloodstained earth where she had pushed him. Luther’s gaze shifted from the child to Valentine, his fury coiling like a viper beneath his skin.

"Valentine," he rumbled, his voice a low and dangerous growl. "What madness is this?" He stepped closer, his massive frame looming over her, shadows playing across his face as his eyes narrowed, dark and unforgiving. "Our son and you cast him aside as if he were filth."His words were sharp, cold as winter steel. There was no warmth, no understanding—only the hardness of a man who would not tolerate weakness, nor cruelty to his own son. His heir.

But as he reached for the babe, to move it toward Valentine, he noticed the resemblance. It was uncanny. He looked just like their dead son. The son she had let the flood take. A flood that the witches themselves had brought, to take him down from the throne. He grit his teeth. Here, somehow, the boy had been born again. Genetics were a strange thing. Nature, right?

"Take him. Nurse him. He is your son!" he demanded his voice a command that left no room for defiance. The child’s cries echoed in the den, a pitiful sound, as the pale King sought to move the boy at Valentine's side. Where he belonged. He wanted to strike her, the itch crawling up his arm, but he knew that these moments were crucial for the newborns. "Do your duty." Or else.