The news traveled like wildfire. The whispers had traveled in every passageway, every market stall, every training ground. The princess is pregnant.

By noon, rumor was proclamation: the accursed princess bears life, though none saw a mating ritual.

Kaelen overheard it first from the lips of two guards at the training grounds. Their thoughtless laughter, their whispered incredulity, cut his ears like knives. He stood frozen in the middle of a spar, his sword shaking in his hand.

...