CHAPTER 202: CHAPTER 202: MONSTERS

The manor smelled of winter roses and rot. The scent clung to everything: polished marble floors, velvet drapes, and the faint, medicinal tang of burning ether oil Jonathan Clarke insisted on lighting to "purify the air." It didn’t help. Nothing could mask the undertone of decay that lingered in the house now.

Anna stood by the tall window, her reflection faint in the glass, one hand resting lightly on the pronounced curve of her stomach. The city beyond was a blur of snow and smoke, the air shimmering faintly with divine residue. Somewhere in the distance, the cathedral bells tolled, hollow and mournful, a reminder that winter had teeth.

Her husband, the newest of the self-proclaimed divine, god by ascension, and fraud by nature, had not come home. Since the rituals began, he has never returned to their home, or Clarke Manor. He occasionally received Anna in his cathedral office, but never for more than half an hour.

Jonathan’s reflection appeared beside hers, ghostly pale in the glass. His voice was calm, too calm. "You should sit. You shouldn’t strain yourself."

"I’m pregnant, not porcelain," Anna said, her tone clipped. "And I’d rather stand."

Her father hummed, the sound low and disapproving. "Still dramatic."

She turned then, eyes sharp. "You said you had news. About Elias."

He leaned on his cane, posture impeccable even in the dim light. "It’s nearly impossible to get near him now. Victor keeps him shielded like a national secret. Every attempt to make contact, divine or otherwise, ends the same. Memory loss for anyone who comes too close. Even his name is starting to vanish from the lesser archives. Professor Stone does not recall agreeing to assist us in bringing him back to the university labs."

Anna’s brow furrowed. "Because Victor wants to keep him hidden."

"Because Victor wants to keep him," Jonathan corrected mildly. "There’s a difference." He turned his head, regarding her the way one might study a malfunctioning clock curious, but detached. "You, however, still have what he doesn’t. Your dominant blood and ether. And blood leaves the most traces."

Her stomach twisted. "You’re talking about blood rituals again."

"I’m talking about opportunity," Jonathan said flatly. "Your husband’s ascension changed everything. We have a god in the family now. You should be grateful."

Anna’s voice trembled before it sharpened. "Grateful? For what? For the way he looks at me like I’m a vessel, not a wife?" She took a breath, steadying herself. "Do you even know what he’s planning for our child?"

Jonathan’s eyes narrowed, calculating. "He told you?"

Her blood ran cold. "So it’s true."

Jonathan didn’t blink. "Anna..."

"No," she said, cutting him off, her voice rising. "Don’t you dare tell me this is necessary. He wants our child to consume my soul, to feed on me. He wants to merge his divinity with something unborn! Did you think I won’t feel it?"

Jonathan’s hand tightened on his cane until the wood creaked. "And if he succeeds, the line will endure," he said evenly. "You’ll become part of it forever. That’s more than most mothers get."

The words hit harder than a slap. Anna took a step back, her heartbeat loud in her ears. "You knew," she whispered. "You’ve known all along."

His silence was answer enough.

Her throat burned. "And Elias?" she demanded. "What about him? You still want to get your hands on him even after everything. Why? He’s your son."

Jonathan’s gaze turned glacial. "He stopped being my son the moment he went against the family’s interest. But Victor turned him into something else entirely and Elias is a fracture in the order of things. That would need to be mended if we want our blood to obtain permanence."

"Mended?" Anna’s laugh cracked, brittle and bitter. "You mean destroyed."

Jonathan’s eyes softened with the kind of pity she saw her father use on Elias. She never thought that it would apply to her. "You always were too sentimental."

A low vibration began to hum through the floorboards. The air shimmered faintly, gold bleeding through the cracks of the door, divine light, bright and too wrong to belong to this house.

Anna’s stomach clenched. She felt it immediately, the cold crawling of her husband’s presence, pressing at the edges of her mind. His power was spreading again, seeping through the walls like a fever.

Jonathan looked toward the door, unbothered. "He’s here."

Anna backed away, her hand instinctively covering her abdomen. "You brought him."

"I didn’t need to," Jonathan said quietly. "He’s been listening the entire time."

The golden glow pulsed once, and the faint sound of footsteps followed, slow with a maddening rhythm, each step heavy with authority.

Anna turned toward the door, heart pounding, every instinct screaming to run. "Elias," she whispered under her breath, not even sure if she meant it as a plea or a prayer.

The handle turned. Light poured through the room like a wound torn open.

The light was blinding at first, pure gold threaded with something black at its core, too sharp to be holy and too warm to be natural. It crawled across the marble floor in tendrils, spilling into the room like liquid sunrise. The air thickened with the scent of ozone and ash, the unmistakable weight of divinity pressing against her lungs.

Anna flinched back, one arm curling instinctively around her stomach. The child kicked in protest as if it too felt the tremor that entered the world with its father’s presence.

"Anna."

Her husband’s voice rolled through the room, smooth and resonant, carrying the effortless calm of someone who no longer remembered what it was to breathe. His silhouette filled the doorway, tall, gilded by the light that clung to him like a second skin. Where his eyes should have been blue, they now burned with threads of molten gold.

Theobald Adler. Her husband. The god he’d become.

She took a slow step back. "Stay away from me."

He smiled softly, as he used to do before his ascension took away his humanity. "You’re trembling."

"You shouldn’t be here," she said. Her voice sounded smaller than she wanted, fragile under the weight of his divinity. "You said the rituals would take days."

"They did," Adler murmured, stepping forward. The light followed him, bending around his form as if afraid to touch him directly. "But I felt your fear. I came to soothe it."

Jonathan shifted behind her, and Anna realized he hadn’t moved to help her; he was bowing. Bowing to the god that used to be her husband.

"Don’t," she hissed, rounding on her father. "Don’t you dare..."

Jonathan’s gaze flicked to her, cold and resigned. "You’ll only make it worse."

"Worse?" she repeated, her pulse hammering in her throat.

Adler’s voice cut through the air like silk. "Anna," he said again, gentler now, coaxing. "You know why I’ve done this. Why we must. Our child will be perfect. a bridge between divinity and humanity."

Anna’s hand tightened protectively over her stomach. "A bridge?" she whispered. "Or a vessel?"

The light around him dimmed, just slightly. "You misunderstand."

"Do I?" Her voice cracked, but the words came faster, sharper. "You want it to devour me, to take everything I am before it’s even born!"

He stopped a few feet from her. For a heartbeat, she saw something flicker behind his golden eyes, maybe remorse or memory; she couldn’t tell. Then it was gone.

"You’ll live through it," he said softly. "Part of you will live in it. What greater gift can a mother give?"

The words turned her blood to ice.

"Don’t," she said again, but the plea sounded hollow even to her own ears. "You don’t understand what you’re doing."

Adler’s smile deepened, the kind that made her remember how easily he used to charm entire rooms into silence. "I understand perfectly. I’ve spoken with your father. He agrees, Elias was a mistake, one that cannot be allowed to repeat itself. This child will be the correction. The redemption of your bloodline."

Jonathan’s hand twitched in silent agreement.

Anna stared at them both and something inside her snapped. "You’re both monsters."