Page 73 of Revealing Fate

Imogen opened her mouth. She hadn’t expected the question. “That you were taken from your family.”

“I wasn’t taken, Elder. I volunteered.”

“What?” Imogen blurted, visibly stunned. “Why would you do that?”

“I want to serve the Goddess and my kingdom. The priests in our temple said I was blessed with a supple body and a resilient spirit. I have prayed so long for the Goddess to show me how I can be useful to her. Then I met Mender Vulgren. He told me of the Fated Mothers and their divine purpose. I knew immediately that this was the answer to my prayers.”

Railah stated it so plainly, as though giving up her freedom and endangering her life was a logical decision. Imogen had difficulty processing what she was hearing. Volunteers to the Fated Mothers had become virtually unheard of. She had volunteered only because she’d been desperate and hadn’t fully understood the gravity of what would be expected of her. Vulgren hadn’t exaggerated Railah’s eagerness. The young woman felt she was answering a spiritual calling. The notion didn’t just perplex Imogen; it horrified her.

“But what about your family?”

Railah shrugged. “My brother left when I was young. I stopped begging my mother to attend temple ceremonies with me long ago. She planned to leave the city and force me to give up practicing my faith.” She leaned forward and dropped her voice to a hush. “I do not think she is Faithful Cursed, Elder. I think she’s a traitor.”

Bile seeped into Imogen’s esophagus, threatening to bubble up her throat. She forced it back down.

Railah straightened. “Is it true what the others say? That you succeeded in becoming pregnant? That the Goddess blessed your womb with a fruitful seed?”

The hungry, hopeful light in Railah’s blue eyes made Imogen ill. Words stuck in her chest. She didn’t even mean to, but she nodded absently.

The light flared brighter. “Blessed Goddess,” Railah breathed. “I am honored, Elder. Truly. Mender Vulgren said that my womb is ripening. I will enter a fertile cycle very soon, and then it will be my turn to try for a chosen seed. Will you teach me? Will you show me how you did it?”

Imogen was going to be sick. She felt the blood drain from her face, sensed her complexion turn ashen.

“I will do whatever you ask, Elder,” she insisted.

Imogen had the sudden, horrifying thought that if she instructed Railah to mutilate herself to improve her chances of becoming pregnant, she’d do it unquestioningly.

“Mender Vulgren said you would be there.”

“I…” Imogen replied numbly, the jarring reminder of what Vulgren expected of her stealing all coherent thought.

Railah smiled. It was a full, genuine, sunny smile. Her eyes sparkled. “He said, when my time comes to service my chosen male, you will be present to help me. To oversee a proper coupling.” Railah grasped Imogen’s clammy hand with warm fingers. “Thank you, Elder. The Goddess has sent you to be my guiding angel.”

Imogen barely escaped her meeting with Railah without voiding the contents of her stomach. To say the girl’s fanatical obsession with what she perceived to be her divine purpose was disconcerting might have been the understatement of the age. She didn’t know what had driven Railah into the open arms of the Faithful Cursed, but the young Fate was now fully ensconced within their grasp, buried in their doctrine.

Imogen had answered Railah’s questions in a disconnected stupor. She couldn’t even remember half of what she’d said beyond the initial pieces of conversation. Her brain had operated independently of her awareness, likely out of self-preservation. These old wounds of hers were still too tender and raw. It was one thing to comfort a female subjected to abuse, but to face one so willing? So eager? She blanched.

“Are you unwell, Elder?”

Imogen glanced up into Prestyn Gore’s concerned gaze. She forced an unsteady smile. “I’ll be fine, Lieutenant.”

He didn’t look convinced. “Was she…”

“Unexpected,” Imogen finished. “She was unexpected, is all.”

Imogen descended another flight of steps and soon found herself standing before the bars to Karrick’s room. The guards unlocked the cage and let her in.

Karrick was seated at the table with a blunted piece of charcoal, scrawling on a sheaf of worn parchment. He glanced up as the door bolted shut behind her. His black eyes roved over her in quick assessment. He was before her in a blink.

“What happened?” he demanded.

Imogen suddenly regretted coming here. She’d intended to discuss the plans she, Mender Alcuin, and Cinah had been poring over for the past several days. Had planned to solidify the time and place of their escape. But now that she was here, standing before him, the conversation with Railah came flooding back, and it was all she could think about.

“They want me to watch,” she heard herself say. Horror leached the color from her face and painted her voice. “There’s a new Fate. He’s going to give you another woman and make me watch as you…as she…”

“Hey,” Karrick said. “Hey, easy.”

It was too much. She wasn’t supposed to be coming apart like this. She was supposed to be collected. The caretaker. The capable one. The elder. Yet Imogen felt stitched together with tattered thread, and the pieces were being wrenched apart, straining the very fabric that wove her into one whole. She never allowed herself even a moment of vulnerability. She kept her fear and pain locked within an inviolable vault. She didn’t have the luxury of safety. And now, now of all times, the emotion she’d spent years carefully, dutifully bottling, was threatening to crack her shell.