CHAPTER 216: MY HANDSOME BOY

[ Old World - Eternal pool ]

Her mother’s eyes glowed with sorrow and fire all at once as she held Autumn’s shoulders tighter.

Her fingers trembled yet steady with the weight of truth.

"It is now your burden, Autumn," she whispered, her voice both tender and unyielding. "You must bear the cross... carry forward what was once given to us... what was once cursed...you bear the torch now,my dear...you carry the flame...Isolde’s resting place is no longer a sanctuary...it’s been infiltrated..."

Most of what her mother said, Autumn did not understand.

Her lips parted, a protest rising in her throat, a lot of queries building inside her chest. "What are you talking about? Wait, Mom...no...I don’t understand! What do you mean carry it? What am I supposed to..."

But before her words could shape themselves, her mother lifted her palm and pressed it firmly...correction, violently...against Autumn’s chest.

The touch wasn’t warm.

It was fire.

A pulse of ancient energy surged through her like a thunderclap.

Autumn’s breath caught...then it ripped into a scream as her entire body convulsed. She stumbled backward, her arms flailing...as if flung by the sheer force of it.

And SPLASH!!!

She went flying... back into the pool.

"Mom! MOM wait...MAMMA!!" she shrieked as the water closed around her.

But the pool wasn’t water anymore.

It ignited.

Blue flames roared upward, devouring the surface in a writhing inferno.

The fire didn’t burn the way fire should...it didn’t consume air or wood. It consumed her.

"NO...! NO, PLEASE!" Autumn’s scream tore raw from her throat as the liquid flame licked across her skin.

Autumn stared in horror.

Every vein, every nerve lit up in unbearable agony. She clawed at her arms, at her stomach, as if she could peel the fire away, yelled and begged for help...but it only sank deeper, fusing into her.

She saw it happen...she watched as it happened.

Her pale skin split, cracked, then reshaped...burning fairer, glowing faintly as if a thousand stars had been ground into her flesh. Her dark hair fell across her face, strands shifting, brightening, silvering until they glistened like molten platinum in the blue firelight. Her body stretched, sleekened, every line reshaping into something sharper, otherworldly, divine.

Her sobs broke into the blue mist. "What... What’s happening to me?! Stop...STOP IT!Let go...let go of me...somebody help!!!"

Her fingers clawed against her stomach, but then...suddenly...she froze.

The contractions struck back.

She had completely forgotten about them... as if time had stopped for those few moments when she was with her mother... like the contraction, the pain... nothing was there... but now it all came back... a million times worse.

Autumn doubled over.

Then her entire body arched upward as a scream ripped through her chest.

She screamed in panic... her baby... how could her baby bear this inferno that was smoldering her alive...Autumn shook with the intensity of that scream... but she had no control over the birthing... there was nothing she could do to stop it from happening... and it was happening right there...

She clutched her belly, crying out again, her nails tearing into her own skin as the agony wracked her from the inside.

"Baby... no... not now... you can’t come out now...Mamma can not protect you like this..." she gasped, sobbing, her tears hissing into the flames as they fell. "Please, please, just hold on a little longer..."

But it was as if the baby said, " No, Mommy. Time’s up. I am coming whether you like it or not! "

There was no stopping it.

The inferno inside her had chosen the moment.

It was consuming her, inside out. It was as if the fire was pushing from inside and also pulling the baby out.

Her legs thrashed in the burning pool, her body instinctively trying to push, to expel. The fire wrapped around her like hands, pulling, forcing, guiding. She could feel it...the baby sliding downward, forcing its way into the world with violent , impatient urgency.

Autumn shrieked, her voice raw, clawing at the sky above her.

She gripped the edge of the burning pool, fingers bleeding, eyes wide and wild as another contraction ripped her apart.

"PLEASE...!" she screamed. "PLEASE DON’T LET ME LOSE THIS ONE TOO!GODDESS HELP ME!!!"

The water...fire...liquid fire...plasma water...whatever you want to call it...churned around her. Like a cyclone of blue mist and flames.

And then...suddenly...her body gave way.

The push came.

It tore her scream into silence, her entire being focused into one desperate, trembling heave.

She felt the rush between her legs, felt her body stretch and burn with a pain so intense it blackened her vision.

Then came immediate relief.

A small, fragile weight slid free of her body, enveloped instantly in the same swirling, blue inferno.

Her child. Her baby boy!!! Eyes open wide, blue like the fire around him.

Her breath broke.

She sagged against the pool, eyes searching desperately through the mist. "My... my baby...my sweet sweet little angel...my love?!"

And through the fire, she fished him out and kissed his forehead.

The baby miraculously looked unfazed and unbothered by the fire. It looked around with its big open eyes as if taking in all the drama with great interest.

And this one didn’t even look like a new born. I mean it was very clean. No blood, no mucus... even the cord had been severed...And his skin glowed... just like Autumn’s , right now. Like there was stardust trapped under his skin.

He was one hell of a handsome baby boy!

Sure to grow up and break a lot of pretty hearts.

Autumn quickly shook her head... what the hell was she thinking... heart breaker? Really? No way this boy would be anything like his father. Autumn would never allow it!

He was her son... Autumn’s boy... he was a Ulfsen.

Suspended in that luminous flame, so tiny, perfect, glowing faintly... he definitely would be everyone’s envy in the least if not a heartbreaker.

Autumn’s tears fell freely, mixing with her shuddering laughter and sobs. She reached weakly, arms trembling, though her body still spasmed with aftershocks.

"My baby... my boy..." she whispered hoarsely cuddling him with all that she had. "You... you survived... we both... we survived..."

The flames curled gently around him, cradling them now instead of consuming any more, as if the inferno itself knew who he was.

Autumn’s strength gave way, her head falling back, body still trembling, chest heaving for air as she stared at the glowing infant through the haze of fire and mist.

And then...silence.

The blue inferno rippled, folding in on itself, as though waiting for what came next.