Chapter 8: Marcus's Conspiracy

The moon hung low, its silver light bleeding through the carved lattice of the sanctuary’s stone windows. Kai and I crouched beside a table cluttered with enchanted scrolls, glowing rune-slates, and scraps of parchment bearing sigils and blood-bound seals. Around us, the chamber walls bore an intricate tapestry of fate threads of crimson yarn we’d tied between pins and glyphs, creating a web of treachery we’d unraveled for moons.

But tonight, the threads told a different story.

“These trade markers,” Kai muttered, his fingers tracing the glowing ink on a rune-slate that pulsed with ancient magic, “they all trace back to the Silver Moon Pack’s sacred vaults.”

My breath caught. “That’s Marcus’s domain.”

Kai’s expression darkened. “And these transfers they weren’t barter or tribute. They were exchanged under moonless nights, routed through shadow clans and marked with the blood crest of the Crimson Order.”

“The vampire courts…” My voice trembled. “Are you saying Marcus has been trafficking secrets to them?”

“Or forging pacts in the dark. Possibly both.”

It was a spear to the heart. Rejection was pain enough. But betrayal on this scale,  treason against our kind was something else entirely.

I sank back, barely breathing. Marcus the male who once held me like I was the stars in his sky had turned puppet or master in a game that endangered our world.

Kai placed his hand on mine. “We cannot confront him until we have solid proof"

“I want to believe he was trapped,” or something... I whispered.

“Even so, he made his choice,” Kai said, voice like steel on stone.

I nodded, the grief hardening into resolve. He may have rejected and cast me aside, but I would not let him destroy the remain of our world.

Later that night, we gathered around the water mirror a still basin enchanted by seer’s dust and moonlight. It shimmered, then revealed the image captured by one of our spirit-bound familiars an owl we had sent to watch the ruins of an old hideout where rumors whispered of rogue meetings.

The vision flickered there, beneath the branches, stepped a figure cloaked in twilight.

“Victoria,” I mumured.

She looked… changed. Her golden curls were now threaded with silver strands, her eyes glowing faintly with something unholy. She moved with a predator’s grace, pausing only to speak with a hooded figure whose aura reeked of decay and foreign magic.

“That is no wolf,” Kai said, leaning in. “Nor vampire. Something older, strong”

We whispered softly, coaxing more clarity from the vision. The water rippled as Victoria’s voice surfaced.

“The girl still lives,” she said, her voice like frost. “But not for long. We need her hidden for a long more time. The royal blood must remain scattered. Unclaimed.

My pulse quickened.

“She speaks of me,” I murmured.

Kai’s jaw clenched. “She knew. All this time.”

“She sat beside me, braided my hair, held my secrets…” I couldn’t finish. The pain of her betrayal ran deeper than any blade. “She wasn't just complicit she was orchestrating it.”

“And look at her arm,” Kai said, pointing as Victoria raised her hand in the vision. Her skin shimmered with a dull, unnatural gleam, as if metal ran beneath. “She’s been enhanced. No longer fully wolf.”

“By what?”

“I can’t say. But it’s an old magic. Forbidden.”

My thoughts fumed. None of this was by chance. My fall. The dissapointment. The pain.

“They called me a threat,” I said, voice hollow. “Because of my bloodline.”

Kai’s eyes met mine. “You were never meant to remain hidden.” "They fear what you might become"

We stayed up through the twilight hours, assembling what we knew. Each clue, each betrayal, pointed to something older than petty jealousy or shattered love.

“See this,” Kai said, tapping the prophecy cloth pinned to the far wall. “The attacks began the night Marcus rejected you. Look at the alignment of moons. The eclipse. The shifting seats in the High Circle. It’s all deliberate.”

I studied the  threads. “They wanted me broken. Powerless.”

“Because if you rose…” His gaze burned with certainty. “You could lead them.” and they dont want that happening.

Silence stretched between us, thick as the mist outside. I wasn’t just a discarded mate or a fallen girl.

I am a survivor. A force that is too much for them to erase.

“They fear you,” Kai said softly. “As they should.”

I met his gaze. “Then let them tremble.”

He smiled. “We strike not with rage, but with purpose. We gather the scattered. Build the alliances. Keep your awakening hidden until it’s too late for them to stop you.”

I looked again at the  web. Threads of pain. Loss. Lies. But in the center of it all, I saw one truth.

Hope.

In the days that followed, we discover names of elders, exiled spell-weavers, corrupted pack lords all linked to Marcus’s treachery. Each night, Kai and I strategized, and dreamed. And as we pieced the war together, he watched me with quiet awe.

“You are not who they claimed,” he said one night, voice barely above the wind. “You are far more.”

We traced Victoria to the Verdant Borderlands, where she conferred with a Fae emissary an ancient diplomat whose kind had not mingled with wolves in a thousand years unless paid in blood or gold.

“This isn’t just about your exile,” Kai murmured. “It’s about control. The balance of power among all the ancient bloods.”

“And if I’m the key to restoring that balance…”

“They will burn the world to keep you buried.”

The weight of destiny pressed heavy on my shoulders. But Kai never let me bear it alone. In his strength, I found my own.

On the eve of the blood moon, a courier hawk brought a sealed rune-note from one of Kai’s scouts. Its message chilled me:

Marcus. A meeting. The Crimson Warlord. Midnight. Neutral ground.

The war was no longer hidden. It breathed. It lived.

As Kai laid out our response on the carved battle table, I stood by the window, the full moon a silent witness to my vow.

“They wanted to bury me,” I whispered.

Kai turned and whisper. “They forgot you are a seed.”

And soon… you would rise.