*Varon*
‘If you are not with your fated mate,’ the Oracle’s words burned through my head, ‘as she brings your cub to the world, all three of you will die, never once having been in one room together.’
It had been going through my mind for the past couple of months. The Oracle had given me the prediction almost as soon as I had returned from the South East Pack. And her words made me want to turn around immediately and go right back.
If not for the other part of her words.
‘But if you are with her for any other part of the pregnancy,’ the Oracle continued, ‘then everything will be lost.’
The meaning was simple. The pregnancy had to be almost done, and only then would it be safe for me to go near Tiessa. It had sounded strange in the beginning, until I learned that what I could do, and what my child would one day be able to do, was not all that strange and wonderful after all.