Mouths hung open. No one spoke. No one dared.
Kaya looked directly at the elder who had challenged her, and her expression hardened into sothing final.
"Okay, fine," she said. "You want an answer? Then I’ll give you an answer."
She took a breath, and the room held its breath with her.
"Here’s the answer," Kaya said clearly, voice steady and cold as stone. "In this life, as long as I am his wife, he will not have any child."
The silence that followed was deafening.
Veer’s father’s face went from red to purple. The elders looked at each other in shock and confusion. Robert’s mouth fell open. Even Veer’s brother took a step back, stunned.
And Veer—Veer just stood there, staring at Kaya, caught between horror and sothing that looked dangerously close to awe.
One of the elders stepped forward, face twisted in outrage. "You—you dare curse him?"
Kaya looked at the man without saying a word, her expression flat and unmoved.
Robert sneered from the side. "Huh. And here you said you weren’t infertile."
Kaya turned to look at him slowly, then spoke with perfect clarity. "I am definitely not infertile." She paused, letting the words settle. "And secondly, I swear it—as long as I’m his wife, he won’t have a child. Because, you know, there’s a thing called *not wanting* a child."
She tilted her head, voice sharpening. "And I’ll let you in on a secret. My tubes are tied. So even if your god of peace or even your god of birth ca down to this land right now, as long as I don’t want to, and as long as I don’t return to my ho, no one could make give birth to a child."
Her eyes swept across the room. "Do you understand?"
Then she pointed directly at the elder who had accused her. "And you—talking about such a thing in public. Not only that, you’re all *n*. None of you are won. And you dare to talk to about propriety?"
Her gaze snapped to Veer’s brother next, cold as ice. "You want to treat him as my father? Tell him to act like one first. Then I’ll think about it."
Without waiting for a response, Kaya turned on her heel and walked back toward her room, her steps asured and deliberate. The door slamd behind her with a sound that echoed through the entire house.
One of the elders turned to Veer, voice shaking with anger. "See? See what you brought here? Is this how she speaks?"
Veer, who had been smiling faintly while watching Kaya’s closed door, turned to face the elders. His expression shifted instantly—from warm to cold, from soft to lethal.
Cutie and Sparrow moved beside him, their faces just as hard.
Veer’s voice ca out low and dangerous. "It’s mine and her matter. And I’m really happy that she won’t have a child." His eyes burned with fury. "So you just fucking shut up before I kill you."
Cutie’s eyes flashed blue, bright and inhuman, making several elders flinch back. Sparrow’s jaw tightened, wings twitching like he was ready to attack.
The elders took a few stumbling steps backward, suddenly very aware that they were standing in a room with three beastn who had just been insulted.
Veer turned his glare on his father. "Dad," he said, voice hard as stone. "There’s elder brother and everyone else. If you want a grandchild, then go and talk to them. Don’t co to my door."
He pointed toward the entrance, his hand steady and final. "And next ti—knock when you enter. Wait for permission." His eyes didn’t waver. "Now my wife is also living in this house."
The silence that followed was thick and suffocating.
Veer’s father stood frozen, caught between rage and shock, unable to speak.
And sowhere behind the closed door, Kaya sat on her bed, breathing slow and steady, knowing she’d just burned every bridge with Veer’s family—and not caring one bit.
Veer’s father stared at him like he’d grown a second head. His chest rose and fell faster, anger pushing his breath out in short bursts.
"Are you crazy?" he snapped. "Did you even hear what that woman said? You are not marrying her." His tone left no room for argunt—at least, that’s what he thought.
Veer didn’t flinch.
"And you’re not the one marrying her," he shot back. "So don’t talk like it’s your choice. It’s not an option." His eyes burned, voice steady. "I want to marry her. I *will* marry her. And only her. In my life, she is my first and last wife. Nothing else."
He swept his gaze across the room, taking in every elder, every relative, every vulture who dared to et his eyes.
"If anyone *dares* to target her," he said, voice dropping low, "listen carefully." He jabbed a finger toward them. "She is *my* wife. Not this tribe’s prize. Not the council’s toy. She has no obligation to the vulture tribe. Only to ."
Veer’s father’s face twisted. "You brought her here. You think we don’t see it? You all ca here to feed on what this tribe has built. To *eat* from it."
An elder stepped forward, trying to take the moral high ground. His eyes fixed on Veer. "Watch your tone, Veer. We are your elders. And that woman—there is sothing wrong with her. Her aura is not good."
Veer stared at him for a heartbeat—then laughed. A sharp, humorless sound.
"Aura?" he repeated. "We’re talking about aura now?"
He took a step closer, eyes cold. "Which of us has a good aura, exactly? We eat the dead. Even dead beastn. We’re not even qualified to be called proper beastn ourselves." His lip curled. "We eat our own kind. And you want to stand here and talk about ’clean’ aura?"
He jerked his chin toward Kaya’s closed door. "Even if she is a hundred tis worse, we are a thousand—no, a *million* tis worse than her."
The elder’s mouth opened, but no words ca out.
Veer leaned in, voice suddenly quiet and deadly. "Do you want to remind you how you lost your daughter-in-law?" His gaze didn’t move. "Or should I remind you how you lost your wife?"
The elder froze, color draining from his face.
Veer straightened and turned, sweeping his eyes over the others.
"How many females have we lost to this so-called ’childbirth’ you keep worshipping?" he asked, voice rising. "And what great children did we get out of it?"
He pointed toward a few vultures in the back who had lowered their heads, shoulders hunched. "Them? The sons who can’t even fight right? Or those idiots—" he jabbed his finger at another group, "—who can’t even match in a race?"
No one spoke. No one dared.
"You can’t do anything without causing a ruckus," Veer went on. "Always losing to your instincts, tearing into corpses like mindless carrion, and then standing here like so holy judges talking about *aura* and *propriety*."
His eyes narrowed, voice dropping to a harsh whisper that still carried through the room.
"And *you* think you’re eligible," he said slowly, "to say anything about a woman like her?"
Silence.
Heavy, suffocating silence.
No one t his eyes.
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