Chapter 5

"Marga, did you eat something you shouldn't have?" he asked gently through the bond. "I told you not to touch anything sharp-spiced while your moon-sickness is upon you. I'll have something else brought to you."

A moment later, the link fell quiet.

I sat there staring at nothing for a very long while.

I had already given up on him. I knew that. So why did it still hurt, as though someone had wrapped a rope around my heart and kept drawing it tighter?

I wanted to weep, but I couldn't. My tears had dried up years ago. So I laughed instead, until my stomach ached, until no sound was left in me at all.

In the end, the one who paid the healer's fee was not my mate. It was my childhood friend, Lyra Whitemoon. She sat beside my pallet, her eyes red, as they always seemed to be these days. Of everyone in my life, she alone had visited through all eight years in the shadow cells. The only one who had never abandoned me.

She lit a twist of dried tabac leaf and pointed it at me. "Tell me, Selene. How are you still standing after everything that bastard did to you? Eight years, and he let the whole territory treat you like carrion while he shielded that woman."

I looked at her quietly.

"That wolf destroyed your life, and you still let him linger in it. Were I you, I'd have clawed both their throats out by now." Fury flashed through her eyes. "Actually, forget clawing them. I would have ended them."

That made me laugh, small and broken. "Do you think I still love him?"

Lyra nearly choked on her tabac. "What else am I meant to think? Most wolves would've lost their minds by now."

I lowered my gaze. Kill them? No. Death was too easy a mercy.

Lucien had unmade my life, set me upon a stage and let the whole territory cast stones at me, turned me into a jest, a monster whispered about in every hall. And still he remained everyone's honored Alpha. Evelyn had fared even better, risen to become a singer of great renown, celebrated in every court, her voice praised in gathering halls across the land. None of them knew she had climbed that height using my own blood as the steps beneath her feet.

One day, I would drag them both down and make them feel everything they had done to me.

"Do you know anyone who keeps the pack's birth records?" I asked calmly. "Someone we can trust."

She blinked. "Aye, a few. Why?"

I turned toward the window, the sunlight beyond it cold and distant, as though it belonged to another world. "Within a month, see that every trace bearing the name Selene is struck from the pack rolls."

The chamber fell silent. Lyra's eyes widened, then pain flickered across her face, though she did not try to stop me.

"I'll see to it," she said quietly. "Just leave it in my hands."

**

A few days later, Lucien learned the truth — that I had truly undergone the surgery, that foreign matter had indeed been lodged within me, that I had not lied. He came rushing to my bedside, and for the first time in years, I saw true panic on his face. He summoned healers from beyond our borders, demanded further examinations, read every report himself, and all but lived in my sickroom until the final judgment came back.

Benign. No threat to my life.

The instant he heard it, his whole body loosened, and he wrapped his arms around me, tightly, almost desperately. I could feel him trembling.

It was so absurd I couldn't help but laugh. "What's wrong? I thought you didn't believe I needed cutting open. Why so frightened now?"

Lucien went rigid. "That isn't how it was," he said quietly. "I found the truth behind the false report. I found the one responsible, and I've already dealt with her."

I said nothing.

He took my hands and pressed them to his lips. "The report was forged by one of Marga's kin-friends. She blamed you for all Marga suffered and thought she was doing right. I made certain she paid for it."

"Did you," I said softly. "What exactly did you do?"

Silence stretched between us. For the first time, he looked uneasy. "She's paid threefold your healer's fees. Covered your recovery and care, and I've warned her kin. They know what she did."

That was all. That was his justice. We both knew it was nothing next to what had been done to me.

After a long silence, he admitted the rest. "She's Marga's dearest friend. If I punish her too severely, Marga won't be able to bear it. She's already suffering enough."

Marga. Always Marga. What of my suffering? Did it count for nothing?

I wanted to scream, to tear the chamber apart with my own claws. But my ruined throat wouldn't let the words come. Instead I dug my nails into my palms until it hurt.

Lucien looked as though he wished to justify it all, but even he could find no words. Then his eyes brightened, as though he'd remembered something urgent. "Selene, trust me. Only three vows left. Once they're fulfilled, this ends, and we'll finally be well again. After that, it will be only us. I'll spend the rest of my life making this right. I promise you won't regret staying."

I closed my eyes. "Lucien, I'm weary. I wish to rest. Please go."

The chamber fell silent. Eventually I heard the door fall shut behind him, and I was alone.

**

The day I was released, Lucien brought the carriage himself and drove me home. I sat quietly, watching the territory pass beyond the window, timbered halls giving way to open fields. Neither of us spoke much.

When we arrived, I stepped down and looked upon the house before me. Eight years had passed since I'd last stood on this ground. Everything looked familiar, yet none of it felt like mine anymore. My gaze drifted toward the garden where I'd once grown tomatoes, peppers, wild strawberries, and fruit trees. Every trace of it was gone, replaced by rows of roses, bred deep red and heavy-headed.

Beautiful. Costly. Entirely useless.

Within the entryway, I searched instinctively for my old worn boots of blue leather. They had vanished, replaced by a delicate pink pair cut in a style that matched Evelyn's tastes exactly. I stopped walking.

Lucien noticed at once. Without a word he kicked the pink pair aside and drew out another from the chest. "Here," he said awkwardly. "I had your old boots thrown out. They'd worn through. I haven't had the chance to have new ones made yet."

I lowered my eyes and said nothing. Old boots, old flowers, old memories. Some things were remarkably easy to replace.

The silence unsettled him. Before he could explain further, my gaze shifted toward the main hall. A woman's garments lay strewn across the settee, an embroidered pouch on the low table beside vials of scent and ribboned hairpins. The signs of another wolf making her home here were impossible to mistake.

Lucien followed my gaze. "Marga suffered another spell a few days past, so a kin-friend brought her here. Don't trouble yourself — she's keeping to the guest chamber."

As if afraid I wouldn't believe him, he led me upstairs and opened the door. "See? She's staying here."

I glanced inside and nodded. No anger, no jealousy, no reaction at all.

For some reason my indifference seemed to unsettle him more than any outburst could have. His brow furrowed before he pulled me into his arms. "Selene, I missed you. You refused every visit while you were in the shadow cells. I couldn't sleep. Every night I dreamed you hated me."

A bitter smile touched my lips. Dreams? Reality had kept me awake for eight years.

I pushed against his chest and stepped back. "I don't wish to speak of the past."

Lucien froze, then let go. "Very well. It's over. All of it belongs to the past now."

I nearly laughed. Over? Truly?