4. The Interrogator

RAEL

The dungeons always smelled the same: a dying mix of iron, damp, and despair.

No matter how many prisoners came and went, the scent lingered, in these stone walls like a memory that refused to die.

My boots echoed down the corridor, each step purposeful for me and dreadful for whoever I intended to visit. William and Liam trailed behind, one too quiet, the other too loud. Order and chaos was their natural rhythm but tonight, even Liam had the decency to keep his mouth shut.

The torches burned low, their light flickering against the bars of the final cell. There she sat, small, trembling, wrists bound, a bruise along her cheekbone from William’s earlier outburst the other day and eyes though swollen, tried to stay alert.

The girl from the peace summit and the one who turned the Moon Stone white.

I’d been replaying that moment in my mind for hours: the chaos, the blood, the impossible light. I had never seen anything like it since the death of the Goddess. But somehow, this scrawny orphan was the cause.

I took a moment to analyze the woman before me, taking note of all her features. Her long dark bouncy hair was frizzing out, probably due to the humidity and poor living conditions here. Her hair color complimented the almond shade of her eyes. Her brows were quivering, either in fear and or her body was shutting down. Her skin was almost as light as skin, that if you took the terrible living conditions away, she really did have great skin. One thing I made sure to take note of were the tear drop shaped scars on her collarbone. Could she have been part of a cult that made their mark on her and sent her to do all this? thinking it through “Leave us,” I said quietly.

She did not meet his eyes not in fear, but restraint. As if she already knew what his attention cost.

William hesitated. Liam looked grateful.

“But Sir, protocol demands that-”

“Do you wish to question my orders?” My tone sliced thickly through the atmosphere.

“No, Alpha,” William muttered, bowing his head. He turned sharply and exited with Liam trailing behind him with a glance that lingered a second too long on the girl. Was that worry or suspicion? I’d ask him later.r

When the door closed, and silence fell.

I leaned against the iron bars. “You’ve been crying.”

She flinched at the sound of my voice. “Wouldn’t you?”

A flicker of defiance, adorable.

I stepped closer, letting the blinking torchlight fall on my face. “Let’s see: you’re accused of attempted murder to an Alpha, disrupting a sacred relic and possibly offending the Goddess herself. So yes, if I were you, I’d be crying.” I counted on my fingers while listing her allegations.

Her lips trembled. “I didn’t do anything. I told you, I just fell.”

“Fell,” I echoed with a chuckle, testing the word. “And by coincidence, the dead stone of the Goddess awakens in your presence?”

Her silence was answer enough.

I unlocked the cell and stepped inside. Her pulse raced, I could hear it. The scent of fear rolled off her small figure, sharp and clean. But there was something else beneath it. Something…brighter. I just couldn’t place what.

I crouched in front of her, carefully keeping my distance. You can never be too safe with these people. “What’s your name?”

“L-Lyra.” Her stutter was faint, but my ears caught it. The name, however, was unfamiliar. There were no Lyras registered under the Shadow Hills pack.

“Lyra,” I repeated, dragging out each syllable. “You wear a silver pendant. Where did you get it?”

She reached for it instinctively, then froze. Meaning there’s value attached to it, interesting.

“I’ve had it since I was a child.”

“An orphan child?”

She gulped a hard “Yes.”

“And you have no wolf?”

Her eyes flickered away, shame flickering like a candle in the dark until she responded in defeat “No. I never shifted.”

A wolf-less girl, the lowest of the low. And yet by some means I'm yet to uncover, she got the Moon Stone: the most sacred artifact of our kind to respond to her.

The contradiction gnawed at me with intent.

“Tell me about the dream,” I said.

Her head snapped up in shock as expected. “What dream?”

“The one you keep having,” I replied calmly. “The one you mumbled about before you fainted.”

Her mouth fell open slightly. “You heard that?”

“Every word.”

She hesitated, torn between fear and disbelief. Probably wondering if she could trust me. “It’s always the same. A woman falling, dying and the sky burns red. Then-” she stopped herself, shaking her head. “It’s nothing.”

“Continue,” I commanded softly.

She shook her head. “It’s just a dream.”

I leaned in, lowering my voice until it was almost a fittin comforting whisper. “Dreams are how the Goddess speaks to us.”

Her eyes dropped. “But she’s dead.”

“Exactly,” I said, rising to my full height. “So tell me, Lyra, who is speaking to you now?”

I really wished I hadn’t asked that because it shut her up completely. Her fear wasn’t the loud, begging kind anymore. It had become tight, controlled, trembling at the edges.

I studied her in silence for another moment. She looked fragile but not empty. Something inside her was resisting the truth, curling around it protectively.

When I spoke again, my voice was lower, deliberate. “You’ve been given shelter for the night. Tomorrow, you’ll be questioned again. I suggest you think long and hard about your answers.”

I turned to leave.

But just before I reached the door, her voice cracked through the air sounding so fragile. “Why am I still alive?”

I stopped. “What?”

“You could’ve killed me already. After all, everyone thinks I’m a traitor, so why keep me here?”

For a second, I didn’t answer. Then I turned back halfway, meeting her eyes through the dim light.

“Because I don’t believe in coincidences.”

Her expression flickered, and I saw fear, curiosity, maybe even hope.

Then the silence swallowed her whole again.

I stepped out and locked the door. The clang echoed down the hall, final and cold.

William was waiting at the far end of the corridor, arms folded. Liam leaned against the wall, yawning like a bored hound.

“Well?” William asked.

“She’s either the best liar I’ve ever met, or she’s telling the truth.”

“And which do you believe?” Liam asked.

I brushed past them. “Neither.”

“Yet.”

“Sir,” William called after me. “Permission to intensify the interrogation tomorrow? The council will demand progress.”

I paused mid-step. I’m not sure why but I can tell she must have pushed his buttons because all he’s been wanting to do was inflict some form of harm on her. If she were that vocal with me, I would have made immense progress.

“Do what you must, but no more bruises. I want her talking, not broken.”

William looked displeased, but nodded. Liam just smirked, he was more into immune games than physical torture.

As I climbed the staircase back toward the main hall, my thoughts were all over the place.

The Moon Stone had been black for years. Priests, Alphas, mystics, even external mages had all tried to restore it and failed. And yet the light had returned at her touch.

A wolf-less orphan. Why?

I reached my quarters, the heavy oak door closing behind me with a soft thud. The fire in the hearth was still burning low. On the table, spread across a map of the territories, was the sketch of the Moon Stone now white, etched with faint silver veins no one could decipher.

I poured myself a glass of whiskey and stared hard at the map, straining my eyes and opening my mind so maybe something would become visible to me.

If she was lying, it meant someone had found a way to manipulate divine energy. A crime punishable by death.

But if she wasn’t…then the impossible had happened.

My reflection stared back from the glass, pale eyes, tired lines, the mark of command pressing like a scar across my soul. I’d killed for less than this level of uncertainty before, but something about her kept clawing at the back of my mind.

The way she flinched and clung to that pendant like it was her lifeline. I simply can’t get over it!

And the way the light of the Moon Stone mirrored her eyes, for just a heartbeat, before everything went white. What was the connection and why hadn’t I noticed it earlier?

“Still thinking about the girl?” A smooth, amused arose from behind me and I didn’t need to turn to know it was Callen: the wandering Alpha from the Temple, a man who always appeared when the gods stirred.

“She’s dangerous,” I said flatly.

“Or she’s divine,” Callen countered playfully, stepping into the firelight. “The Goddess had many ways of returning. And of course, not all of them are pleasant.”

“She’s a mortal,” I said, more firmly than I felt.

Callen smiled faintly. “And that’s exactly what makes it interesting.”

I turned to face him fully. “What do you know?”

“Only this,” he said, his eyes glinting gold. “The last time the Moon Stone shone white, the world was about to change.”

And before I could press him for more, he was gone. Just like he always does. I let out a sharp exhale while running a hand through my hair.

The palace was quiet now. A little too quiet.

I looked toward the dungeon in the far distance from my window while picturing the girl.

Lyra.

Something in my chest stirred. A faint pulse, foreign and definitely not welcome. “No” I told myself. It wasn’t interest nor was it fate. I was simply carrying out my duty. Still, as I lay in my bed that night, her voice echoed in my mind, afraid, uncertain and trembling “Why am I still alive?”

And for the first time in years, I didn’t have an answer.