Life and death are two laws that are irretrievably linked. Understanding one is like understanding both. This is often referred to as the cycle of rebirth. Life becomes death, and death becomes life.

~Arianrhod, Goddess of Rebirth and Fate

Cia stared at the stone ceiling above her through the bars of her cell. The coppery scent of blood from the pit below had long since faded from her sense of smell. Her gaunt body looked frail and wilted from a lack of a regular diet. While her eyes stared upward, it was a blank stare that didn’t have the capability of seeing the present.

Other guards refused to enter her cell and slid her food into the room from behind the door. No one would even talk about her openly, but in the corners where the whispers hid, a name started to circulate—Death Murmur. Even Cia had not realized what was happening as her mind remained buried in her Soulscape.

It was because if anyone came too close, she’d suddenly stiffen, and her black eyes would glare at them. Once she did that, the guard couldn’t even move, only listen as she murmured crazily. Spouting madness about dying in horrible ways, she sometimes spoke in such graphic detail that more than a few guards wet their pants. No one laughed or poked fun—not anymore.

At first, her warnings were dismissed as the ravings of a madwoman. One by one, those guards forced to listen to her death murmur died. Their deaths were never pleasant and always precisely as she described. After the first three guards died, they attempted to kill the demoness in secret. Their first attempts were poison, but none of those appeared to do anything to her. As a consequence, she death murmured two more guards. They tried to stab, burn, and even crush her, but that resulted in four more guards getting cursed.

Reluctantly, they decided to avoid her, not even entering her cell to retrieve the bowl or clean the place up. Besnik was the only man who would still enter the place, and he spent some time cleaning it up before attempting to clean her.

He gasped at how frail and emaciated she was. She weighed practically nothing, and he could lift her like she was nothing more than air. This was the woman he swore to protect, and now she looked like death warmed over. Her eyes no longer looked human, and he had to look away from those inky black orbs. A speck of light within seemed to follow him, which only caused him to shudder even more.

It was an understatement to claim that her current state broke his heart. Besnik ran his hand through his black hair that was almost more silver than black. The aged lines in his face were bent with worry. He retrieved some food he prepared from his Shield and slowly fed her. Cia reacted accordingly and chewed diligently, but it was as if she was a puppet going through prearranged actions. There was no life in her. She seemed to have lost her mind, but he knew she wasn’t totally lost because her occasional ranting included her son’s name.

It didn’t matter. Besnik knew she was near the end, which made him frown in consternation. He had not resisted against Gideon when he wanted to throw her down in this cell, but only because he was confident that Conall would come for her.

“Where are you, you fucking bastard?” He asked under his breath. Time was short, and if that man didn’t show up within the next two weeks, he’d have to take her away from this place himself. Sadly, that was not easy to arrange in the short amount of time he had.

“Lady Cia? I’m sorry. Gideon knows I come to visit you and plans to send me away. If you can hear me, don’t neglect yourself. Try to eat and endure.”

“Besnik?” Cia’s dry throat croaked, and her unseeing black eyes turned toward him.

“I’m here.”

“You’ll die at my son’s hands.”

“L-lady Cia, what are you saying?”

Cia sat up and turned to face him. Those black eyes stared him down while a cruel grin adorned her face. “You don’t remember the promise you made when you went to murder him? Or do you remember the promise he made when you cursed him?”

“How…?”

“Fools like you often forget that a Witch can scry the past. The past isn’t related to fate, and so I saw all the ways you betrayed me.”

“No! I was doing what I could to save your life.”

“At the expense of my child’s? Would you make that trade for your own son?”

“That…”

“My son won’t go after your family unless you force him. He is so much like his papa.” Cia didn’t notice the tears rolling down her cheeks. “You will understand soon. Both of them have endless love in their heart, but that comes with endless rage and hate. I’m sure you know what my husband is doing now. He is removing the roots of your organization systematically, and do you know what happens to even the largest of trees if they have no roots?”

“They fall,” Besnik said.

“It is good that you know.”

“Lady Cia, I’ve only ever been faithful to you. You have to know that,” Besnik claimed and loosened the dagger strapped to his back. It was hidden under his leather jerkin, so not even the other guards knew he had it.

“Tell that to my son who suffered daily at your hands. TELL THAT TO CROW!” She shouted the last part with such vehemence that even Besnik backed off. “Take your family and leave. That is the only warning I’ll give. At best, it’ll prolong your life and prevent your family from dying when my husband arrives.”

“Gideon is already sending me away. I leave in two weeks, and I’ll bring them with me. If your husband doesn’t show before then, I can take you, too.”

“Do you know why I named my son Crow?” Cia asked, and her random topic changes were leaving Besnik bewildered. Even if she sounded lucid, he couldn’t decide if her mind and truly snapped or not.

“I don’t.”

“People think they are harbingers, but they are very social creatures with high levels of intelligence which makes them mischievous and playful. They respect friendships and gather together in flocks to protect each other. Some species can even use tools. But, that is not the main point. If you treat a crow respectfully, they’ll bring you gifts, warn you of danger, and more. Treat them unkindly, and they’ll remember your face. They’ll share it with their family and friends. And they don’t forget grudges. If they can’t stop you, they’ll bring all their friends and swarm you. They are relentless. People label their groups as Murder. A Murder of Crows makes those intelligent beasts sound evil, doesn’t it? The truth is they should be a Vengeance of Crows, or maybe even a Justice of Crows. Aren’t they only returning ill with ill? That hardly justifies as murder.”

Besnik shivered for some unknown reason.

“I don’t hate you, Besnik. Angry, rage, and a desire to beat you to death, but not hate. I even have to thank you for teaching my son a valuable lesson about betrayal. What do you think Gideon would say if the demon he always feared was created by your actions? That old man’s anger made him forget the first rule my mother taught him about fate. Fate is flexible until a path is taken that cannot be untaken. Did you know that a single path, however unlikely, has a greater chance of becoming a reality once known? My coven had long known that simply telling people their future dramatically increased the chance of it coming true.”

“Are you saying your mother deliberately sent Gideon on a path of destruction?”

“Isn’t it obvious? When have you ever heard of any witch coven giving their prediction so plainly? It took me many years to realize why they couched their visions in riddles. They did that to achieve the best possible outcome—to prevent self-fulfilling prophecies.”

Besnik could only sigh in resignation. If Cia was correct, then they’d had all fallen into that her mother’s trap all those years ago.

“Do you understand? My mother never loved my father. She would rather scry and kill herself in the process. In doing so, she was always planning on taking the Blood Ember Sect down with her. Conall will strike fiercely and may even die in the upcoming battle, but my little Crow will finish what that man started. He’ll bring his Murder with him and slaughter everyone. Can you guess why?”

“What happened to you?” Besnik asked. He had never seen her like this, so filled with anger, bitterness, and even hate. This wasn’t the little girl he helped raise and protect.

“I died,” Cia said simply, but her tears were falling once more. “That should answer both questions. The guards poisoned me to death, but I was more surprised than them when I woke up the next day. After that, no matter what they did to me, I survived. I can’t die. Because I am dead and yet cannot die. I cannot die, and yet I am dead. I am a living paradox. I’m assuming I still live because I am the last of my coven. It is the only explanation, so I’m sure Gideon has killed all my mother’s people. This means even if you drew that hidden dagger and cut me into a million pieces, I’ll still be alive. You should be more concerned about my son finding out I’ve died. He’ll sense it the moment he sees me.”

Besnik didn’t understand what Cia was saying, but he didn’t readily dismiss her words as rubbish. It sounded like the rantings of a madwoman, but he was sure she wasn’t mad—distracted at best. Especially since she had the presence of mind to pay attention to his armaments. Besnik should probably take the threats seriously, but as she said earlier, fate wasn’t something fixed.

Almost everyone knew Gideon’s irrationality regarding his late wife and daughter had led him down a path of madness. It alarmed many people in the sect, but none of them had the power to stop him. It was as if the man imploded upon taking a simple reading too far.

“Gideon wasn’t irrational,” Cia said, and Besnik stepped back, fearing she was reading his thoughts. “Not your thoughts, but your emotions. Witches perform rituals and rites based on instinct which we gain through our empathetic nature. The worst of our kind feed off negative energy, which is why they perform cruel rituals and leave their victims alive.”

“Why are you telling me all this?”

“It is necessary.”

“Necessary for what?” Besnik felt that coming here might have been a bad idea.

“My mother wasn’t a normal witch. Her scrying wasn’t just focused on fate but on karma. It was our bloodline power. Only one among the coven will inherit it. Gideon didn’t know what that meant until he forced my mother to her death. It was at that moment that her prediction became a reality, and he knew it. He could feel the impact on his karma and sense his impending doom. He killed my entire clan because he wanted to force the bloodline power toward me.”

“And did you awaken it?”

Cia grinned and shook her head.

“Huh?”

“You don’t think I know why you’ve stayed by my side all these years? I know you are the assassin waiting to kill me the moment you think my bloodline activates, but you both missed something important.”

Besnik frowned. Not because her words hurt him in any way. He was a killer and had only hesitated one time because Cia’s mother had saved him. He really did cherish Cia like a daughter, but he was Gideon’s right-hand man. Still, he owed mother and daughter, which is why he requested to be Cia’s personal guard.

“We accounted for your entire coven. We missed nothing.”

“But you did. For a witch, most bloodline powers are inherited by our daughters. You failed to realize that my mother’s bloodline power wasn’t something that came from being a witch but from my grandpa. It is just that the Witch’s bloodline will almost always prevent them from giving birth to a son—unless the father’s bloodline is more powerful.”

“You are saying Crow has received your bloodline power?”

Cia’s black eyes shifted as if roaming over Besnik’s body. In response to his question, she shrugged, and her cold, impassive face stared at him. Even she wasn’t sure what the boy had experienced, but only she knew that she’d partially awakened the bloodline in her. It was how she could determine the deaths of the guards. However, it refused to open further. The mysterious power connected to her, but it also bonded with another. She had never heard of a bloodline power being shared, but she was sure the person on the other end was her little Crow.

“All you need to know is that he is coming. Every step my boy takes brings another powerful ally into his wake. They will follow him without questioning his orders. They will trust him without a single doubt. They will fight, kill, and be killed for him without him asking. That is true power and nothing at all like your foolish schemes. You are like children compared to him. He’ll conquer like a demon and reign like a king.”

“Then I’ll be sure to kill him for good this time!” Besnik snapped, finally losing his cool.

“You are still blind. Karma has turned against you. You have already failed.”

Cia laid back down, her face going slack once more as she faded into her coma-like state. Besnik felt she wasn’t lying to him but couldn’t picture the naïve boy he once cursed being the same man this woman claimed he’d be. Still, he couldn’t ignore the fact that she had thoroughly shaken his confidence.