Ophelia Healsbane's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Ophelia spread the seven pages across her kitchen table for the eighth time, her hands shaking just enough to make the paper rustle. The words blurred together now, familiar as her own heartbeat but no more useful. She pressed one palm against her swollen belly and felt the baby shift inside her. Her eyes caught on a single line she had read dozens of times before: *decreased movement in the final days may indicate distress*. The baby had been still for hours. Not sleeping-still. Wrong-still. She had told herself it was normal, that the cramped space meant less kicking, that her fear was louder than the truth. But the page didn't lie. The ornate book with its gold patterns had given her the answer every time she looked. She just hadn't wanted to see it. Now she did. The moonbloom extract sat in its vial across the room, and she had run out of time to wait. She closed the book and stood, gripping the table edge until the dizziness passed. Her small house suddenly felt too warm, the hearth fire too bright against the snow-covered windows. Knowledge alone had failed her, just as it always did when it mattered most. She took the vial from the shelf and held it up to the light. Four years of work, distilled into something small enough to fit in her palm. She tucked it into her pocket and reached for her cloak. The person who could help her lived close enough to reach before dark, if she left now. Outside, she paused at the wooden table she had set beside the door. Her healer's tools lay arranged on red cloth, each piece cleaned and ready. The scalpels and clamps gleamed in the fading light. She had prepared everything she knew how to prepare, but the tools were useless without the knowledge to guide them. She turned away from them and started walking, her breath clouding white in the cold air. The moonbloom vial pressed against her hip with each step, a weight she had carried for years and would finally surrender. She had chosen to trust someone else with what mattered most.