The Ashes She Gave MeChapter 1

Stella insisted I wear the silver locket she gave me after her tragic miscarriage. I hated wearing jewelry, but her eyes had been so hollow, so desperate, that I eventually caved and fastened it around my neck.

This morning, the ultrasound screen was a black, silent void. My perfectly healthy baby had lost its heartbeat. Meanwhile, sitting in the very same waiting room, Stella texted me a picture of her positive pregnancy test.

I walked out of the hospital clinic like a wandering ghost. The sunlight felt cold. Suddenly, a scruffy old man stepped directly into my path, his piercing eyes locked onto my chest.

"Girl," his voice rasped, sharp as an ice pick. "You are carrying a child, yet you wear the ashes of the dead. You are trading your own flesh and blood to buy life for someone else's womb."

A chill violently violently down my spine. Stella's sudden pregnancy. My baby's vanishing heartbeat. I shoved past the old man and ran. I didn't stop until my lungs burned and I was safely behind my own front door.

My hands shook wildly as I tore the silver locket from my neck. Without thinking, I roughly looped it around the neck of my pregnant black Lab, who was resting on her bed.

…

I stood in the entryway, panting, staring at the little silver pendant. It was filled with a fine, grayish-black powder.

Bone ashes?

My mind went entirely blank.

"Those are the ashes of a stillborn!"

The old man's grave expression flashed in my mind. "It's a dark exchange. Life for life. The baby inside you will rot, and the one who gave you that locket will give birth to a perfectly healthy child."

My chest tightened until I could barely breathe. Stella and I had grown up together. We were closer than blood. When she lost her baby, I waddled over to her apartment with my own heavy pregnant belly just to cook for her and hold her hand. I couldn't believe she would do something so evil to me.

But what if? My baby's heartbeat was really gone.

Outside the hospital, when I tried to throw the locket into the street, the old man, who introduced himself as Danny, had grabbed my wrist.

"The ritual started the second it touched your skin," he warned. "If you want out, you must pass the burden to another pregnant vessel to complete the cycle. Toss it away blindly, and both you and your child will die."

I had begged him for another way. I wasn't going to curse an innocent woman just to save myself.

"You have until midnight to pass it on. Once it's done, call me. And remember, do not alert the ones who cursed you." He handed me a crumpled piece of paper with his number and vanished into the crowd.

It was five in the afternoon. Seven hours left.

My thoughts were a chaotic mess as I stumbled deeper into my house. The moment I approached the study, a sound froze the blood in my veins.

Heavy, satisfied panting. The distinct, wet sounds of the aftermath of sex.

Then, Stella's breathless giggle drifted through the cracked door. "You should have seen your wife walking out of the clinic, Nolan. She looked like a walking corpse. I almost laughed out loud."

My husband's voice, low and coaxing, replied. "Just wait until the ash ritual is complete. When she finally passes that dead lump of flesh, she'll cry her eyes out. It'll be hideous, but you'll love the show."

Lightning struck my brain. Danny was telling the truth.

I wanted to kick the door open, scream at them, tear them apart with my bare hands. But Danny's warning echoed in my ears. Do not alert them.

Biting down on my lip so hard I tasted copper, I silently backed away. I slipped out of the house I shared with Nolan and drove straight to the small apartment I owned before we got married.

The second I locked the door behind me, my knees gave out. I collapsed onto the hardwood floor and sobbed until I choked.

When I finally wiped my face and looked up, my pregnant black dog was cowering near her crate, keeping a wide distance from me. I had raised her for seven years, yet she never warmed up to me or Nolan. Strangely, she absolutely adored Stella.

Looking at her swollen belly, a dark, desperate thought clicked into place. Danny never explicitly said the locket had to go to a human.

A cold hardness settled in my eyes. They wanted to play God with my child. Let them burn.