Chapter 454: Both Prisoners
That same night, long after the sun had set and the moon stood high overhead, at an hour when most people would be sound asleep, a dim golden glow began to peel back the darkness that filled the cells underneath the Summer Villa.
Water from the constant rains seeped through cracks in the ancient mortar, and the entire dungeon smelled of damp, rotting straw and unwashed bodies. In decades past, when the cells beneath the Lothian stronghold had played host to members of the Lothian family who couldn’t be trusted with their freedom during disputes over succession, the room would have been warm with a crackling fire burning in the central hearth and luxurious furniture behind the stout iron bars.
Now, however, the dungeons hosted only two people, and one of them had been born in these very cells. There had been several times since her village fell to Owain Lothian’s savagery that Noomi considered ending her own life before she could even give birth, but every time she brought a sharp claw to her neck, she swore that she could feel the arms of her fallen Esko wrapping around her.
"Our little kit will be born soon," she’d hear his voice whispering in our ear. "What should we name them?"
Every time she had that thought, her resolve crumpled, and she couldn’t bring herself to slice into the tender flesh beneath her soft brown fur. The Lothians had burned their burrow to the ground and with it, everything that Esko had ever carved with his own two hands. Now, the only trace of him that remained in this world was the child they’d made together.
Saku, their son, now lay curled in the only clean blanket in the filthy cell the Lothians rarely bothered to clean, snuggling tight against his mother’s body for what little warmth she could offer in the cold, damp cell.
"Noomi?" a soft, feminine voice called as a woman carrying an oil lamp entered the musty cells. "Are you awake?"
"I am awake, Lady Jailor," Noomi said, more politely than she had months ago when the strange human noblewoman started visiting her cell.
At first, the woman had said nothing, simply visiting in the company of several guards to stare at her. The soldiers had called the woman ’Lady Ashlynn’, and they attempted to persuade her to leave the cells where the air was foul and the ’aura of a demon’ was unescapable, but the strange noblewoman had insisted on not only staying for nearly ten minutes, but on returning several times later, especially as the birth of her child approached.
"I brought food for you, Noomi," Samira said as she walked carefully across the uneven cobblestones of the cells, holding out a small cloth-wrapped bundle. "I hollowed out the bread and filled it with tonight’s mutton stew. The meat might be a little tough but..." she trailed off, glancing at the wickedly sharp front teeth that protruded from the flat tailed demon’s mouth. "I, I suppose tough meat isn’t a problem for you."
"There’s cheese too," she added. "I’m told that it helps to sustain your milk while you’re nursing so..."
"Lady Jailor," Noomi said, looking at the nervous noblewoman with a complicated gaze. It had become increasingly obvious as the months progressed that the noblewoman’s belly was growing heavier by the month as a child of her own grew within her belly. Even if she hadn’t been more and more visibly pregnant as time went on, the questions she asked the captive member of the Heart Wood Clan made it clear that she was nervous about giving birth to her own first child.