On the day of the birthing, I watched through half-closed lids as my cousin, Pom, swapped my egg with hers. I feigned sleep, letting it happen. I let her take my child to be broken. And I continued to nourish her egg with my own heart’s blood, day after day, night after night. In the end, her egg hatched a Celestial Phoenix, a prodigy of immense power, cherished by my husband and me. Mine hatched a common sparrow, dull grey and devoid of magic, its tongue clipped short by Pom’s own hand, its body defiled. When the day of the selection for the new Phoenix Ascendant arrived, my cousin fell to her knees in tears, claiming the children were switched at birth. A slow smile touched my lips. “I’ve been waiting for this day, too.” I was in the courtyard, guiding Niamh through her morning practice, when Pom arrived with her retinue. “Dearest cousin,” she chirped, her voice dripping with false concern. “You work the poor girl so hard. She’s only a child.” She rushed to Niamh’s side, dabbing sweat from her brow, fussing over whether she was thirsty, or hungry, or tired. I offered a noncommittal smile. It had been this way for a century, ever since she’d stolen my child. She seized every opportunity to be near her true daughter, masquerading as a doting aunt, whispering that I was too stern, too demanding, that I didn’t know how to raise a fledgling. My gaze drifted to the girl trailing behind her. My own daughter. Her clothes were rags. She flinched from my gaze, her body a roadmap of blue and purple bruises. There wasn’t a spark of magic in her. I am a Phoenix. My husband is a Phoenix. Yet my daughter was a flightless, grey sparrow. She tried to smile at me, revealing a dark, empty mouth. Her tongue had been severed, leaving her to speak in a wet, slurring whisper. “Greetings to my lady aunt.” Ash. That’s the name Pom had given my daughter. Ash. Pom paused, seeing my lack of reaction. A flicker of secret, cruel delight danced in her eyes before she turned back to Niamh, her hands clutching her daughter’s. “Is your training going well, my sweet Niamh? My family has a Heart-Lotus that can help you withstand the coming trials. I’ll have it sent to you tomorrow.” Her voice was a coo. “Don’t you ever be a stranger to your auntie. In my heart, you are my own dear daughter.” Niamh, her chin high with a practiced, gentle pride, answered, “Thank you, Aunt Pom. I will strive to be worthy of our name. I have already ascended to the rank of a Celestial Phoenix.” At this, Pom’s face bloomed with triumph. Of course, it did. I had fed Niamh with my own life force for a decade while she was still in the egg. Since she’d hatched, she’d been nurtured with the rarest of artifacts and elixirs. Her innate talent was undeniable, a rising star among our kind. Perhaps buoyed by the thought that she was the true mother of such a prodigy, Pom puffed out her chest, then turned. With a vicious tug, she dragged my daughter forward by her hair. “Look at your cousin Niamh,” she spat. “Now look at yourself. If I’d known you’d turn out like this, I would have smashed your egg and been done with it.” My daughter, Ash, whimpered, her voice a choked gasp of “It hurts.” The sound only made Pom pull harder. “Don’t you dare shrink from me.” She yanked until a clump of dark hair came away in her fist, the roots glistening with blood. She held it out for me to see, dangling it in the air between us. “Let this be a lesson, cousin,” Pom said, her eyes boring into mine. “This is how you handle vermin.” Niamh frowned slightly at the display. Pom immediately noticed, rushing to soothe her. “Don’t worry, my sweet. The little wretch deserves it. You two are nothing alike.” She shot another venomous glare at Ash. My daughter scrambled to her feet, quickly wiping the blood from her scalp and bowing her head. “Lady Niamh,” she mumbled, “I am sorry. I didn’t mean to frighten you.” That was her first instinct. Apologize to Niamh. She had learned long ago that her own suffering would only end when Niamh was no longer upset. The apology earned her a savage kick to the stomach. “Who gave you permission to call her ‘Lady Niamh’?” Pom snarled. “You are not worthy. You will call her ‘Your Grace.’” That evening, when I asked where Ash was, Pom was peeling grapes for Niamh, her head bowed in concentration. “My greatest mercy was not strangling her at birth,” she said without looking up. Her gaze flickered to me, heavy with meaning. “A common sparrow has no right to live among the Phoenix. As her mother, I live in constant shame. I should have offered my own life to atone for the disgrace.” I pretended not to understand the barb, letting her savor her petty victory. At the banquet that night, Pom was a whirlwind of devotion around Niamh, arranging her cushions and serving her the choicest morsels. Niamh loved the shimmering river-sprites, but their bones were notoriously fine. Pom forwent her own meal to painstakingly debone the fish for her. Meanwhile, my own daughter was chained to the leg of the table. She licked her lips, her eyes fixed on the platters, and whispered, “Mother… may I have a piece of bread?” Pom’s face contorted in rage. She shot up and struck Ash across the face, twice, the sound cracking through the hall. Then she scraped the leftovers from everyone’s plates into a wooden trough and shoved Ash’s head into the slop. “Eat!” she shrieked. “Go on, eat! Have you never seen food before?” My daughter’s face was smeared with filth, tears and snot streaking through the grime. Her eyes, wide and desperate, found mine, pleading for help. I took a slow, deliberate sip of the golden Emberwine. Exquisite. The scene had turned Niamh pale. Noticing her daughter’s discomfort, Pom immediately yanked Ash up by her chain. “You’ve upset your cousin, you little beast. You’ll pay for this.” Ash’s face was a mask of numb resignation. She knew what awaited her at home. New torments, new instruments of pain. The next day, Pom arrived as promised with the Heart-Lotus. My daughter was not with her. As if terrified I might miss the point, she stared directly into my eyes as she spoke. “Last night, I had three brutes ‘discipline’ that unruly thing for her lack of manners.” Her lips curled into a smirk. “She’s just a mongrel bird. It doesn’t matter. What matters is our Niamh.” She leaned in closer, her voice a conspiratorial whisper. “Isn’t that right, cousin?” I nodded. Beside me, my husband, Kaelan, shot me a look of deep disapproval. He had always been a man of rigid, tiresome morality. My assent seemed to thrill Pom. The thought of us—mother and daughter, both twisted around her finger—was her sweetest nectar. She presented the Heart-Lotus to Niamh like a holy relic. “Niamh, my love, this is the greatest treasure of my lineage. Consume it, and the trials will be as nothing to you.” Niamh hesitated, her eyes flicking to me. The gift was extravagantly precious. Pom, panicked that Niamh might offer the treasure to us, her parents, grabbed her hand. “This is for your own good. Don’t you mind anyone else. Anyone who would deny you this has a heart as black as pitch.” With that, she urged Niamh to shift into her Phoenix form to begin the ritual of absorption. Pom’s gaze was feverish as she admired the magnificent creature, but then her eyes narrowed. She had spotted a single, missing feather from the tip of Niamh’s tail. Her finger shot out, pointing at my face, her voice sharp with accusation. “How could you be so careless? A feather is missing, and you didn’t even notice! What kind of mother are you?” I raised an eyebrow. “Your own daughter is nearly plucked bald by your hand, and you’re having a meltdown because Niamh shed a single feather? Perhaps you should save your hysterics for your own child.” She trembled with fury at my dismissive tone, but she was powerless. Then, a new, venomous thought seemed to occur to her. A cruel smile spread across her face as she activated a communication crystal. “Scar the little wretch’s face,” she commanded the voice on the other end. “Niamh has been injured. The worthless creature’s bad luck must have tainted her.” A moment later, a thin, piercing scream echoed from the crystal. Ash’s fledgling voice, crying out in agony. “Help me… I’m sorry, please, save me…” Pom listened, her expression one of pure ecstasy, as if hearing a celestial symphony. Niamh, as always, remained silent on such matters, and I remained impassive. After severing the connection, Pom’s mood was visibly improved. My daughter’s screams were her favorite medicine. “Niamh is destined to be the Phoenix Ascendant, cousin,” she said sweetly. “You really should be more careful.” Niamh gave her aunt a reproving look. “Aunt Pom, the feather fell out by accident. It will not affect my power. There is no need for such alarm.” Tears of frustration welled in Pom’s eyes. “How can it not matter! You must cherish your body! Cousin, Kaelan, quickly! You must give Niamh more of your heart’s blood to restore her!” I narrowed my eyes, and she shifted uncomfortably under my gaze, forcing a dry laugh. “I am only concerned for Niamh’s well-being.” She quickly ushered Niamh into the house. “Come, my dear. Let your auntie help you absorb the Heart-Lotus. Then you will be unstoppable. And on the day you become the Ascendant, I have a great secret to share with you.” As the Heart-Lotus began to merge with Niamh’s essence, I quietly closed the door for them, a chilling coldness settling deep within my eyes. Yes, I thought. Some secrets were long overdue for a reckoning. The closer we came to the great selection ceremony, the more frequent Pom’s visits became. But I never saw my daughter again. Kaelan asked after her once, and Pom replied with a saccharine, venomous tone. “Why, brother-in-law, do you miss the little stray? Shall I send her to you? She could warm your bed as a concubine.” Kaelan, silenced and disgusted, could only sigh in frustration. Finally, the day of the ceremony arrived. Beings from every corner of the realm gathered. Niamh, radiant in a gown of iridescent feathers, descended from the sky like a living rainbow. My daughter was dragged behind her, a chain hooked through her collarbones, led like a dog. A long, dark trail of blood marked her path. Just as the proclamation of the new Ascendant was about to be made, Pom fell to her knees, holding aloft a glowing Stone of Lineage, her face a mask of anguish. “A mistake!” she wailed. “It was all a terrible mistake! Cousin, Ash’s blood… it does not resonate with the stone! It proves she is not my child!” She choked on a sob. “Under duress, the old healer confessed! She switched the eggs at birth, too terrified of your wrath to admit her crime!” “Cousin!” she cried, clutching at the hem of my gown. “I am returning your daughter to you! Niamh… Niamh is mine!” Her performance was spectacular, a portrait of heartbroken motherhood. But the assembled elders were not convinced. “Niamh is a Celestial Phoenix. She is without a doubt the child of Lord Kaelan and Lady Yennis,” one declared. “You are a common nightingale. How could you possibly birth a Phoenix?” “Niamh has been raised in grace and power to become the Ascendant,” another added. “This… Ash… we hear she has been utterly defiled. How can there be an exchange?” “Everyone knows Niamh is the apple of Lady Yennis’s eye.” But a few dissenting whispers rose from the crowd. “You know… the wretch does resemble Lady Yennis more…” Ash lifted her scarred face, her eyes meeting mine for a fleeting second before she dropped her head again. My husband, Kaelan, looked back and forth between the two girls, his expression a storm of confusion. I raised a hand, calling for silence. A faint smile played on my lips. “If that is the case,” I said, my voice clear and calm, “then let us switch them back. Niamh is, indeed, your daughter.” Pom’s sobs caught in her throat. She had an entire arsenal of pleas and arguments she hadn’t even needed to use. Kaelan rushed to my side. “Yennis, how can you make such a decision alone? Think of all the love, the power we have poured into Niamh! I will not allow you to be so reckless!” The flicker of hope in Ash’s eyes died, turning to grey despair. Tears silently tracked paths through the grime on her face and fell to the dusty ground. But my voice was firm as I addressed the assembly. “It is true. Everything my cousin says is true. Ash is my child, and Kaelan’s.” I paused, letting the weight of my next words settle over the stunned silence. “After all, I was the one who watched her switch the eggs.” Ash’s eyes shot up, blazing with a renewed, desperate light. She took a tiny, shuffling step toward me, her mouth opening, the word Mother forming on her ruined tongue. Kaelan broke out in a cold sweat. “Yennis, we prayed to the ancestors for a hundred days to be blessed with our precious daughter. How could you possibly have watched her be stolen and done nothing?” He spun, his eyes wild and furious, scanning the crowd. “Who did this to you? Who is controlling you?” I pushed his hand away. “There is a simple way to settle this,” I said softly. “Bring the Stone of Lineage.” Ash eagerly held out her scarred arm, her eyes fixed on me. Kaelan winced at the sight of her wounds. A new cut was made, deep and red. Before the eyes of all, Ash’s blood merged perfectly with mine and Kaelan’s on the stone’s surface. The truth crashed down upon him. Kaelan stared at Ash’s mangled form, and a raw, guttural cry tore from his throat. His eyes turned blood-red with fury. He drew his sword and, in a flash of silver, ran it through my shoulder. “Yennis, why?” he roared, his voice cracking with agony. “Our daughter was tortured, right before your eyes, and you just watched? What is your heart made of? Stone?” I clutched my bleeding shoulder, saying nothing. When Ash heard that I had known all along, she finally broke. A terrible, ragged sobbing shook her thin frame. She dragged her broken body across the ground, crawling to my feet. Her voice was like sandpaper. “Mother… why?” she rasped. “Why didn’t you claim me? Was I not good enough? I can be better, Mother, I can change. Please… don’t throw me away.” Silence was my only answer. Her tears stopped. Her grief curdled into a century of pure, undiluted rage. With a snarl, she sank her teeth into my leg, biting down with all her might, as if she could drain all her pain and betrayal into me. Blood seeped through my gown, but no one moved to help me. They stared at me as if I were a monster, a creature of unnatural cold. A mother who would allow her own child to be tortured for a hundred years deserved no sympathy. Fine. If no one would help me, I would solve this myself. I looked down at the creature latched onto my leg, my expression turning from impassive ice to a cruel, chilling smile. I grabbed her by the hair and hauled her up from the ground. My hand closed around the fragile column of her throat.
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