Chapter Six: Ravenwood

"Everyone move. Now."

Griffin's voice cracked through the room like a whip, and the pack member who'd delivered the news bolted back out the door without another word. 

Sloane stood frozen, still catching up to what she'd just heard, watching Griffin transform in front of her from careful and controlled into something sharper, harder, an alpha giving orders that people didn't question.

"What's happening," she demanded, grabbing Cassian's sleeve as he moved past her toward the door. "Who is Silas Cross."

Cassian hesitated, jaw tight, then seemed to decide she'd earned at least this much.

"Alpha of Ravenwood," he said. "A pack that used to be strong but not anymore."

"What happened to them."

"Their bloodline is dying," he said, already walking, forcing her to keep pace beside him down the hall as pack members rushed past in both directions, voices low and urgent. "Same kind of weakness as ours, but worse. Further along. They've lost members to it for years now, and nothing they've tried has slowed it down."

"So they're desperate."

"Desperate doesn't cover it," Cassian said grimly. "A dying bloodline with nothing left to lose is the most dangerous thing you can put on your border. People who believe they're already dead don't worry about consequences."

Sloane's stomach turned cold. "And they think I can fix it. Like you said I might fix yours."

Cassian's silence was answer enough.

"That's why he sent someone to grab me," she said, the pieces clicking together faster than she wanted them to. "He's not just looking for me. He needs me."

"We don't know everything Silas wants," Cassian said carefully. "But yes. It's likely you represent something to him too. Possibly something he'd take by force if given the chance."

They reached the main hall, where the tension had thickened into something almost physical. Dozens of pack members stood clustered near the windows, weapons in hand, some already shifted partially, eyes glowing faint gold in the low light. 

Dax appeared at Sloane's side, his easy energy from earlier completely gone, replaced with sharp focus that made him look older than she'd first assumed.

"Border team caught movement," he told Cassian quickly. "They're bringing someone in now."

"Alive?"

"Barely. He didn't go quietly."

Sloane's pulse spiked. "Someone from Ravenwood is here. On this land."

"Was," Dax corrected. "He's contained now."

Griffin strode back into the hall, blood on his knuckles again, expression carved from stone. Behind him, two pack members dragged a third man between them, hands bound, face bloodied, dark eyes burning with open hatred as they forced him to his knees in the center of the room.

The stranger said nothing. He didn't struggle either, just knelt there glaring up at Griffin with an expression that made Sloane's skin crawl, somewhere between contempt and something almost like relief, like being caught didn't scare him at all.

"Name," Griffin demanded.

Silence.

"You were on our border. Watching. I want to know why, and I want to know what Silas is planning."

Still nothing. The prisoner's gaze slid past Griffin, past Cassian, and landed directly on Sloane, lingering there long enough that she felt it like a physical touch. Something flickered across his bloodied face, recognition maybe, or satisfaction, and her stomach dropped straight through the floor.

"He knows who I am," she said quietly.

"Of course he does," the prisoner rasped, speaking for the first time, voice rough and mocking. "Everyone will know soon enough."

Griffin crouched down to his level, voice dangerously low. "What does that mean."

The prisoner smiled, slow and humorless, blood staining his teeth. "It means you're already too late."

"Too late for what," Sloane demanded, stepping forward despite Dax's hand catching her arm to hold her back.

The prisoner's eyes cut to her again, and this time his smile widened, sharp and knowing, before he turned his face away entirely and said nothing more, no matter how Griffin pressed, no matter how the room around them crackled with barely restrained tension. 

He simply knelt there, silent, smug, radiating the certainty of a man who believed the worst had already been set into motion and there was nothing left that anyone in that room could do to stop it.