Bound by the Mark of Lies (BL) Chapter 261: Chapter 255: Unrecorded, But Real

"That’s... not supposed to happen."

Gabriel blinked. "That’s a phrase that inspires an extraordinary amount of confidence."

There was no smile in his voice.

The physician looked up from the screen, and sothing in his posture shifted—not panicked, not stunned, but very much the kind of stillness that ca from realizing the thing in front of you wasn’t in the manual.

He lowered the device.

"Gabriel," he said, and it wasn’t Consort, not Sir, not even Your Grace—just his na, plain and deliberate.

Gabriel blinked. The use of his na was rare. Rare enough that he straightened slightly.

The physician glanced at the data again, flicked through panels, and turned the reader once in his hand as if its shape might explain sothing its readings would not.

"Are you... a walking wonder?" he asked at last, as if the words themselves were half a joke and half a diagnosis, and he still wasn’t sure which side to fall on.

Gabriel gave him a flat look. "Is that supposed to be dical?"

"It’s not interference. Not ether distortion. And not a malfunction."

"Then what is it?"

The physician hesitated, which was rare. Then he tapped twice to bring up the sublayer readings, mouth twitching not in uncertainty—but sothing closer to disbelief.

"Your body," he said slowly, "is regulating two cycles."

Gabriel didn’t respond right away.

Not because he didn’t have words, but because he was parsing the implications faster than the physician could finish assembling them out loud. The room hadn’t shifted, the etherlight hadn’t dimd, but it felt like the walls had narrowed. Not dangerous—yet—but no longer safe, either.

"Two cycles," Gabriel repeated, his voice light but brittle at the edges. "At the sa ti."

The physician nodded once, slowly, the way a man nods when he doesn’t quite believe himself. "Yes. You’re sustaining a confird pregnancy at twelve weeks—viable, stable, low-risk—and simultaneously entering the early stages of a heat cycle."

"That’s not a glitch?"

"No."

"A reaction to external ether influence?"

"No."

"A hallucination brought on by exhaustion, sabotage, and your tragic lack of ginger biscuits?"

That earned the ghost of a laugh, though it didn’t reach the physician’s eyes.

"Gabriel," he said again, quietly this ti. "You’re not showing signs of instability. Not biologically. Not hormonally. Your levels aren’t fighting each other. There’s no drop in pheromone output. No conflicting rejection response. Nothing’s collapsing."

Gabriel sat back in the chair, fingers curling once around the fabric of his coat.

"So you’re saying I’m flawlessly breaking every biological rule on record."

"I’m saying," the physician replied carefully, "that you’re doing sothing I’ve never seen—and you’re doing it well."

There was a pause.

A longer one.

Then Gabriel’s lips parted around a dry, restrained breath. "So... I’m effectively pregnant and about to go into heat. At the sa ti. Without dying or triggering a dical panic."

His gaze didn’t shift, but sothing in it sharpened.

"I bet no poisoner could guess this," he added, his voice thin and flat with polished venom. "Not only am I pregnant, but vividly fertile. Maybe I should drink that tea after all—just to see if it tries to keep up."

Before the doctor could answer, the door opened with a soft hiss.

Neither of them turned.

The physician rely looked at the monitor and said, "Well. That took longer than expected."

Gabriel raised a brow. "Three full minutes. I was starting to think he wasn’t coming.

Damian stepped into the room like a man who had always been there—dark coat, expression unreadable, presence as sharp as glass beneath silk.

The physician gave a short bow. "Your Majesty."

"Leave," Damian said, calm and absolute.

The physician didn’t flinch.

"Don’t," Gabriel cut in. "Soone has to explain this nonsense to him before he assus I staged it for dramatic effect."

The physician glanced between them, unimpressed. "Wouldn’t be the strangest thing you’ve done in this chair."

Damian said nothing. But his eyes tracked every flicker of light from the still-active scan.

The physician cleared his throat and began quickly and professionally. "Confird safe pregnancy—twelve weeks, stable. Viable. Simultaneously entering early-stage heat. No rejection, no conflict, no known precedent."

Damian blinked slowly. "Both. At once."

"Yes," Gabriel said flatly. "Apparently I’m now a myth."

"A dical one," the physician added, unbothered. "So won experience ovulation while pregnant. Rare, but docunted. It could be sothing similar in his case—amplified by bond dynamics, secondary gender traits, or, more likely, stress-fueled biological spite."

Gabriel raised an eyebrow. "Is that an official diagnosis?"

"It is now."

Damian said nothing.

The physician adjusted the scan, then glanced between them with the expression of a man who had seen too much, slept too little, and wasn’t paid enough to deal with dostic tension laced with world-ending consequences.

"I recomnd he go through it naturally," the physician said crisply. "No suppressants. No heat dampeners. No ether recalibration therapy."

Damian’s jaw twitched.

Gabriel blinked once. "I’m sorry—naturally?"

"Yes," the physician said, deadpan. "The sa way you got pregnant."

Gabriel opened his mouth. Closed it again. The pause that followed was less about shock and more about deciding whether to laugh or set sothing on fire.

The physician, unbothered, continued briskly. "Suppressants could interfere with the gestation," he said. "Even low-dosage regulators might destabilize bond signals or compromise the fetus. Right now, everything is synchronized. Perfectly."

He flicked a finger at the scan. "And I an that dically. I don’t know how, I don’t know why, but your hormone systems are functioning in tandem. You break that rhythm with suppression or heat-blockers, and the entire sequence could collapse."

Gabriel stared at him. "You’re saying I have to go through heat. While pregnant."

"I’m saying," the physician replied, still utterly neutral, "that it’s your best option."

Damian’s hands curled slightly at his sides. "How long until it begins?"

"Three days. Maybe less," the physician said. "You’ve got forty-eight to seventy-two hours before the full onset. The early regulation has already started. Skin sensitivity, temperature fluctuation—"

"I noticed," Gabriel muttered.

The physician continued without pause. "You’ll need to monitor hydration, rest, and ether saturation. Any suppression of natural response could trigger rejection or destabilization in the bond."

Gabriel let his head fall back against the chair. "So in short, my choices are: lt into a hormonal disaster or lt into a hormonal disaster with consequences."

"That’s the dical phrasing, yes."

Damian finally spoke, his voice low, controlled, and sharp enough to cut between them. "Is there any protocol for this?"

"No," the physician said bluntly. "Because this shouldn’t be possible. But it is. Which ans we deal with what’s real, not what’s recorded."