Noah set the green lantern on Vanessa's empty dining chair the next morning.

"That seat is hers," he said.

He pushed away his eggs.

Damon stood in the doorway, exhausted and unshaven.

"Vanessa survived the night," he said. "The suppressants bought us a few hours."

"Then use them," I replied.

"They're failing."

I looked at Noah.

His eyes were swollen from crying.

The problem was no longer only Vanessa's medical crisis. It was the fear she and Damon had planted inside our son, the idea that my refusal was a countdown to someone's death.

I went to the healing wing with one purpose: to create conditions no one could reinterpret later.

I placed a typed page on Iris's counter.

"If I agree to a limited stabilization attempt, these are the terms."

Damon picked it up.

Half the standard transfer volume.

Continuous fetal monitoring.

Iris holds absolute stop authority.

Any fetal distress ends the transfer immediately.

No Alpha command or mate-bond override may reopen a severed array.

Damon's eyes reached the final line.

"You're willing?"

"I am considering one controlled attempt because Noah has been taught to believe Vanessa's death will be his fault if he can't convince me. That is not the same thing as believing this is safe."

Iris looked at me sharply.

"Aria, I still advise against it."

"I know."

She turned to Damon. "And I want the record to state that family pressure is affecting this decision."

"Fine," he said.

"Not fine. Accurate."

Iris handed him a pen.

Damon read every clause.

He stopped at the fetal-monitoring section and asked Iris what number would trigger a hard stop.

"Not one number," she said. "A sustained downward trend, uterine cramping, bleeding, or any sign the fetus is not tolerating the transfer. I decide. Not you."

"And if Vanessa crashes at the same time?"

"Then my obligation is to the patient on my table. Her team treats her. You do not get to merge two medical emergencies into one body."

I watched him absorb that.

"Do you really think I would risk our child?"

"Sign the paper."

He signed.

Four years earlier, his spoken promise had been enough for me.

Today I trusted ink more than vows.

Iris checked her tablet.

"I received Vanessa's latest blood panel. Her toxin curve doesn't match the seizure we witnessed yesterday."

Damon looked up. "What does that mean?"

"The measurable poison level was too low to explain that degree of convulsion. I want to wait for the external records before we start."

A strangled gasp came from the isolation room.

Vanessa's heart monitor accelerated.

Damon ran through the connecting door.

Through the glass, I watched Vanessa seize his sleeve.

"Go back to Aria," she gasped. "She needs you."

Her fingers remained locked around his shirt.

Damon sat beside her until the alarm slowed.

Only then did she release him.

He returned to us two minutes later.

"Under the conditions you wrote," he said. "Can we stabilize her now?"

Iris looked at me.

"You can still say no."

Noah stood in the corridor watching through the glass.

He clutched the lantern with both hands.

I thought of his question from the night before.

I thought of the child inside me.

Then I looked at Damon's signature beneath the sentence promising an immediate hard stop.

"One limited transfer," I said. "The second Iris says stop, it ends."

Damon nodded. "Yes."

I changed into a clinic gown.

A nurse attached two monitoring belts around my abdomen and took a baseline tracing. The tiny heartbeat filled the room, fast and steady.

One fifty-two.

I had heard it only once before, during the ultrasound. This time Damon heard it too. His face changed. He reached toward the screen, then stopped before touching it.

"That's our baby," I said.

His throat moved. "I know."

"Then remember that sound when Vanessa's alarms start."

Iris looked at him. "If you cannot keep those emergencies separate, leave now."

Damon pulled the stool closer instead. "I'm staying."

Before I climbed onto the treatment table, Iris closed the door and made Damon wait outside.

"I need your answer without him in the room," she said. "Do you consent?"

I stared at my hands.

"I consent to the limited attempt under the written stop conditions. I do not consent to any override."

"And if you change your mind?"

"You stop."

"Good."

She let Damon back in.

I taped the sonogram beside the fetal monitor myself.

"Keep that visible."

Damon pulled a stool next to me and took my hand.

His palm felt cold.

"Say the promise out loud," I said.

His gaze moved to the sonogram.

"If the baby shows distress, we stop immediately."

"No exceptions."

"No exceptions."

Iris activated the transfer array.

Silver runes lit beneath my body.

A bridge of magic opened between my blood and Vanessa's.

Cold entered first.

It crawled through my veins with the familiar bite of Moon Poison, a black-silver line appearing beneath the skin of my hand and winding toward my wrist.

I tightened my grip on Damon's fingers.

The fetal monitor clicked steadily.

One forty-eight.

One forty-six.

One forty-four.

I watched every number.

The cold deepened.

A cramp pulled low in my abdomen.

The monitor dropped again.

One thirty-eight.

Iris's hand moved to the control panel.

"That's our first warning. I'm reducing the array."

Damon leaned toward the screen.

"It's still within range."

"The trend matters," Iris said.

Another pulse of poison crossed the bond.

The number fell to one twenty-nine.

I turned my head toward Damon.

"Remember what you signed."

The fetal monitor gave one sharp alarm.

Iris's hand immediately went to the reduction control. "This is the moment your contract was written for. No improvising."

Damon nodded, but his attention had already shifted toward Vanessa's room, where a nurse was calling for another suppressant.

I tightened my fingers around his. "Look at me."

He did.

"If those alarms compete, you stay on this side of the glass."

For half a second, the old Damon returned—the man who once promised no duty would outrank his mate inside their home.

"I will," he said.

Then Vanessa screamed.