Chapter 24 I backed away, slow and deliberate, letting the full force of me sink into her trembling eyes, the blaze of my wolf burning behind them, fur rippling beneath my skin, claws itching to unsheathe. She looked pitiful in her silken dress, prey cornered by a storm. Powerless. Stripped of the illusion of safety, her bloodline once wrapped her in. Perfect, exactly as I wanted her. She tried to laugh, thin and broken, but it snagged in her throat like barbed wire. "They're just children," she rasped, voice cracking beneath my presence. "They don't deserve this They haven't done anything to you." I circled her the way a wolf circles a bleeding doe, every step slow, deliberate, my wolf pressing hard at the edges of my control, hungry for her fear. "No," I growled, my voice low and edged with a snarl, "they haven't. And that is why they stil breathe. Already more mercy than your mate ever gave my pack when he attacked us beneath the crescent moon." She sagged against the wall, shaking, her knees near collapse. "Please... Stella," she whispered, my name breaking like a prayer from a sinner's mouth. "Please Just let the twins go. I'll tell you anything, I'll give you Mark's location. Just... don't hurt them. Don't drag them into this war." crouched, slow as the moon descended, until my eyes met hers. My irises burned golden with the wolf's fury. 'They were dragged into this war the moment their father signed my death warrant. The moment you curled into his bed and played house while he buried my kin alive in silver chains. You want nnocence, but your silence was as sharp as his sword." -ydia sniffled, her bare face streaked with tears. 'He's not even in the country," she blurted. "He's in Corsova. New papers, new name. He moves every few days, but last I knew... he was at the old wine estate, the one with the red vines, on the south coast." Her voice broke. "I told you everything. Just... don't raise them to hate the world. They're only >ups." stood, smoothing my gloves over hands that ached to shift, trembling with the memory of blood on fur. I looked down at her desperation. 'They are your pups, Lydia," I said, venom lacing my voice. "Born with venom in their mouths. Born to carry the sins of their father, their grandfather." She dropped to her knees, clutching at my leg like she could anchor herself against the storm already swallowing her. "I'm begging you," she sobbed. "Don't become the monster they painted you to be." I let the silence stretch until it nearly crushed her. "Beg louder," I said finally, tilting my head, my wolf pacing inside me. "Perhaps the Moon Goddess will hear you this time, though She turned Her face away from me long ago." I turned to my guards, my wolves sworn to vengeance. Chapter 22 6:53 pm "Lock her in the dark," I commanded. "Strip the lights. Let her feel what it is to live as I did caged, starved, left to blackness. Feed her every two days. Just enough to remind her wha1 survival tastes like." Her screams echoed as they dragged her away, but I didn't flinch. My claws slid back into flesh as I adjusted my cuffs. Mark had no idea what was coming. But he would. By the time I was finished, even the underworld would spit him out. The Corsovan estate reeked of old money and older blood. Vines clawed at its stone walls, the earth soured with rot. Whatever beauty it once had was devoured by ghosts of the slaughte Mark thought he'd buried beneath marble floors. The air tasted mildew and forgotten bones. Mark believed he could hide here like a rat, his mercenaries with hollow eyes and cheap silver standing guard. He forgot who we were. Ram and Edrick moved through the estate like twin shadows. No wasted movement, only the precision of wolves who knew the hunt. Their blades were swift, their pistols swifter. The guards never even lived long enough to cry a warning. The estate groaned under its failing legacy. Chandeliers swung overhead as I crossed the mair hall, my boots splashing crimson across marble like a fresco from hell. The second floor tried tc hold it, but Ram set the staircase ablaze with silver oil. He said he never liked climbing anyway. I found Mark's room last, hidden at the end of the west wing. Locked, though not bolted, panic not preparation. When I pushed it open, the stench of fear was thick. The room was empty. Of course. He'd slipped through a hatch in the floorboards. But not cleanly Blood smeared the edges, drops, then streaks. One of his limbs had been caught by my brothers steel. He was running, but not far. I let Ram and Edrick hunt him through the tunnels. My task was here. On his desk sat his leather journal, still warm from his trembling hands. I opened it, slow reverent, as though peeling back the hide of his mind. Inside sprawled madness. Names half-scratched out, ramblings of jealousy and obsession passages about my father, not as enemy, but as though Mark longed to crawl into his skin, stea his throne, his blood, his legacy. He thought a crown could be stolen like meat from a carcass. He thought wolves could be tamed by scraps. I closed the journal, lips curling. Mark had already written his own eulogy. We found Alpha Shawn later, in Istanbul, hidden beneath white sheets and tubes in a private hospital. No guards, no throne. Just the stench of old age and fear. A nurse paid in diamonds betrayed him. I did not want Alpha Shawn dead. Not yet. Death was too merciful. I wanted him to witness. To feel. So we touched his car instead, whispered ruin into the brake lines, tampered with the airbag until Chapter 24 2/3 44.7% it betrayed him. When the crash came, it was brutal. Steel crushed into earth, glass ripped into flesh. He lived, but broken, paralyzed, trapped in useless flesh. The doctors called it a miracle. I called it justice. Three days later, I stepped into his hospital room. No flowers, no guards. Just antiseptic and helplessness. His eyes widened. He could not move, could not speak, only blink. I pulled a chair to his bedside, calm as though visiting an old friend. "You always said the world belonged to men who could take it," I whispered, peeling off my gloves finger by finger. "But here you are, bound to a bed, while your kingdom devours itself like a starving wolf." His eyes twitched, raged, impotent and caged. "You built your throne on stolen blood. On my mother's. On my kin's. You propped up Mark like some heir, but he was never more than a scavenger, a crow dressed in wolf's skin." I leaned closer, my growl dropping soft and lethal. "You will live, Alpha Shawn. Live long, watching your pack rot before your eyes, unable to lift a finger. Every day will be like drowning in glass." I stood, smoothed my coat, and left him blinking, breathing, trapped. Still alive. Still aware. But never again in control. 312 15.3 6:53 pm