"You selfish bastard!" she screamed at him, "You will come to regret this!," she turned away from his astonished face, and all but whispered, "and so will I."
There is no word for it, when ones greatest hope is at last realized... and it brings them nothing but anguish.
He loved her. Her Aeden, her life's breath, the very source of all she now loved her life for...loved her. This was both the most glorious, and horrible of days she ever dreamed of living; when he would break her heart by filling it to bursting with the revelation that he wanted her, needed her... loved her.
She foolishly breached the question once again; confessed her 'weakness' for him, told him she wanted to know he didn't feel anything for her... (please... don't love me - I beg... ) ...fool; asking for a lie from HIS lips.
Such misery she felt, but never imagined it coming from hearing what inside her hidden heart had desperately hoped for. She found it hard to face that fate could delve to such depths of cruelty by granting her most fevered wish after she had come to the understanding of her life's cause; and knew that he could NEVER be a part of it - it would cost him everything to join her in her wonderous plan. He would be reviled. Gone would be his earned fame, his earned respect, and honor, and ultimately his life. She could never ask him to give up his entire world, only for a hope that their own son would in fact not kill him on sight out of a residual memory of the anguish of the babes former life's end.
She fruitlessly tried to reassure herself that it would all be well in the end; the necessary pain one must suffer to give birth to a new day for all; they two agonized for the greater glory of those who had known not but suffering. To bring the hope to those who were cruelly condemned to the fate of being needlessly feared from the very moment of their birth for having been given the blessing of magic by no intent of their own, that their child would bring. (HIS child. YES A child he can never see, never touch, never hear call him 'father'. The small, simpering fools in love with their hate, fears and ignorances would hunt him down to bring a slow, torturous death for the act of fathering him. I love him too much to do THAT to him! and especially now... when I know he loves me. DAMN YOU!... my love... my sweet, honest, true Aeden; why could you not lie when I all but begged you to?)
(Fool! Woman had you not eyes?! What in his manner did not scream he was in love with you as deeply as you with him?) 'Love is not a weakness(?!)' he had told her. (How can you say that?! You foolish, wonderous man? I almost killed myself for the loss of it, the loss of you, with only the belief of your death to belly it! AEDEN! My love, Why must we BOTH suffer for the ecstasy of this thing that tethers us to one another? Why did you tell me this?! Fate punishes the dreamer by granting them their dreams upon waking. I did not want to break your heart my love! I wanted to be the one to dwell alone in the fires of lost love till the embers cooled and I could go about the task of rearing our son, the fruit of this terrible, wonderous emotion, into a steady burning beacon of hope for all YOU have fought to free, and helped me to see. I have seen beyond my self, through your eyes - my love. I hoped for you to be free of this fate you inspired, but you should never be punished for. Now we both will suffer - forever the loss of this thing we have no choice but to bear.)
He had called her mad, the one who had made her so, but it did not stop him from granting her the bliss of his lips, the warmth of his arms, even though she had forbidden him her body. (I can take it no longer, the pleasure only your body can grant me, knowing I will all too soon never feel it again.) He didn't hold that against her... her love, her heart, her Aeden; he STILL loved her.