Iver pushed open the unlocked door and followed the flow of magic through the room until he found Lily kneeling in the bathtub.
White Mist drifted through the bathroom, accompanied by rolling waves of heat.
It was a ritual known as the "Ovum of Lightlessness."
Not wanting to disturb Lily during the ritual, he did not go out directly.
Iver touched the emerald-green gem on his chest, and his entire presence became nothingness. His body turned transparent in the blink of an eye—as he stepped into the bathroom, moonlight passed directly through him and spilled onto Lily's back.
A shattered glass fell to the floor beside the bathtub. Complex, ancient patterns had already been carved into Lily's pale back.
Traces of blood trickled down her back, yet they had dyed the entire bathtub red. There seemed to be not a drop of water in the tub, only the overwhelming Blood Sea from the New Moon Ritual. It steamed with visible heat, and the billowing White Mist had roasted Lily's skin crimson.
Moonlight fell like frost that froze everything, trying to cover the wounds and stop the blood from flowing downward.
She whimpered softly, making tiny, almost inaudible cries of anguish.
Her hands seemed to be rinsing something. She struggled to grasp it in front of her, yet appeared unable to catch it.
Iver stepped closer twice before he saw what it was.
He was startled at once.
—It was a "baby" about to be born from Lily's body. It did not resemble a human infant. It was a bloody lump of flesh with a vague human shape.
Lily was not trying to rinse anything, nor was she trying to strangle it. She was trying to pull the baby out of her body.
Under normal circumstances, a difficult birth of this