Chapter 4: The Shattered Oath

The steel handle rattled. My breath caught as the sound of the lock turning echoed in the silence. Every instinct screamed at me to run, to disappear into the shadows before the door opened and swallowed me whole. But my body… refused to move. My legs were frozen, my hand still pressed against the damp stone wall, fingers trembling with the weight of truth that had just poisoned my veins.

My ears rang with the sound of my own blood in that moment. The corridor felt impossibly narrow, even the air seemed to lean away from me, unwilling to carry the confession that had just arrived like a blade. For a second I only existed as reaction—a tightened throat, a fist that would not unclench, a body that refused to obey the simplest command of flight.

He ordered it.

The words settled over me like a verdict. Not rumor. Not a rumor twisted by someone else’s malice—his command. The syllables rearranged the architecture of my life. Every promise he had ever touched became suspect. Images I had stored—his hand on my brow, his breath at my ear—shifted and curdled.

Kaelus—the man I once trusted with my life, my heart, my very soul—was the one who had given the command. The one who had condemned me to pain, blood, and chains.

I wanted to scream, to claw the truth into the walls until they bled, but before I could gather my voice, the door cracked open.

Light fell through the gap like accusation, a thin white blade searching for a wound. I felt exposed, raw as flesh. Every tiny sound—the scrape of a boot, the whisper of cloth, the hitching breath—magnified until the world existed only as the small stage of that corridor. I counted breaths, matched each one to the rhythm of my heartbeat, measured the seconds as if time were a rope I could cut to free myself.

My chest tightened as I pressed myself against the wall, hidden just out of sight. Footsteps followed—the deliberate rhythm of boots against stone.

Kaelus.

And behind him, a softer sound. Bare feet. A woman.

My heart raced, every beat a drum of fury and betrayal. I dared to peek—just enough to see them emerge.

He walked ahead, his broad shoulders casting a long shadow. She followed, her steps light, almost delicate. Her hair was loose down her back, and though her face remained partly hidden, I recognized her immediately.

The scent. The perfume that had haunted my room, my bed, my lungs.

The human.

I gritted my teeth so hard I thought they’d break.

Kaelus murmured something to her, his voice too low to catch. She laughed softly, the sound sweet and poisonous, curling into my ears like venom. And then—I saw it.

Her hand brushed his arm. Casual. Intimate. Like she belonged to him.

Like I never had.

The contact between them was a declaration. Every cell in me registered it as violence. When her fingers touched his sleeve, it was as if she took a map and traced the places I had thought inviolable. I had defended borders, negotiated treaties, bent enemies into submission. No tactic had prepared me for this—a quiet, soft touch that unmade me.

Rage surged through me. My claws itched beneath my skin, my wolf howling inside my chest, begging me to rip them both apart. But my body betrayed me once more.

I had to move. I had to escape before they saw me. Before the illusion of control I clung to shattered completely.

Slowly, silently, I pulled back into the shadows. The corridor curved slightly; if I could reach it before they turned this way, I’d be hidden. My breath was shallow, each inhale scraping my throat like broken glass.

One step. Then another.

But then—

"Elara."

His voice.

My blood froze.

I stopped dead in my tracks, my body rigid as stone. Slowly—too slowly—I turned.

Kaelus stood a few paces away, his face carved into unreadable stone. The woman lingered behind him, her gaze sharp, curious, almost mocking.

"Elara," he said again, softer this time, as if coaxing a wounded animal. "Why are you here?"

There was that old charm—soft, practiced, like a blade wrapped in velvet. I had heard it before, in the early nights when his softness felt like home. Now it felt like calculation. His voice had the uncanny ability to make apology sound like command, it invited me in only to trap me further.

My lips parted, but no words came. My throat burned, strangled by fury and disbelief.

"You shouldn’t be wandering around," he continued, his tone shifting—firm, commanding, the Alpha’s voice. "You’re still weak."

Weak.

The word sliced through me like a blade.

"I should have known," I whispered. My voice shook, but not with fear. With rage. "It was you. It was always you."

Kaelus’ eyes flickered, the faintest crack in his mask. "You don’t know what you’re saying."

He was practiced at deflection. Years of politics and power had taught him how to turn guilt into confusion, to swap the burden of proof so quickly I might lose my footing. But there was a slip—a micro-expression, a blink too slow—that tasted like the truth.

I stepped forward, my fists clenched at my sides. "Don’t lie to me again. I heard her. I heard her say it. You ordered my capture. You let them drag me into that cave. You let them—" My voice broke, raw, splintering with the memory of blood and chains. "You let them destroy me."

Silence. Heavy. Suffocating.

The woman’s lips curled into a small smile. "She’s smarter than you gave her credit for."

"Shut up," Kaelus snapped, but his eyes never left me.

I laughed—a hollow, broken sound. "So it’s true."

"Elara—" He stepped toward me, but I raised a hand, claws half-bared.

"Don’t." My voice was a low growl. "Don’t you dare come closer."

For the first time, he hesitated.

And in that hesitation, I saw the truth laid bare.

He wasn’t sorry. He wasn’t ashamed. He was only afraid—afraid I had finally seen through the web he had spun.

Tears blurred my vision, but they burned as they fell, not from sorrow, but from the fire igniting inside me. "Tell me why," I demanded. My voice cracked, but it carried sharp as steel. "Tell me why you wanted me gone."

Kaelus’ jaw tightened. His silence was louder than any confession.

And then the woman laughed again—soft, cruel, like honey dripping over a knife. "Because you were in the way. You still are."

My vision darkened at the edges. My wolf snarled inside me, clawing, begging to be unleashed. But I forced her down. Not yet. Not here.

I wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of watching me break.

"I should kill you both," I whispered. My claws lengthened, glinting faintly in the dim light. "Right here. Right now."

Kaelus’ gaze sharpened, his aura flaring—the Alpha’s power pressing down like a crushing weight. But I had once been Alpha too. And I refused to bow.

The tension crackled between us, a storm ready to erupt. His hand twitched, as though reaching for me—or preparing to strike.

And then—

"Luna!"

Dareth’s voice.

Relief hit like a blow. Not because I was rescued, but because someone else now had witness to this. I needed that witness. I needed anyone to hold the proof that my world had been dismantled by the man I trusted.

I turned sharply. He stood at the far end of the corridor, his eyes wide, his chest heaving as though he had been running. When his gaze fell on Kaelus and the human woman, his expression darkened, fury etched into every line of his face.

"Step away from her," he growled, his hand resting on the hilt of his blade.

Kaelus’ aura flared brighter, clashing with Dareth’s like two storms colliding. The air itself seemed to shudder, heavy with the threat of violence.

For a moment, none of us moved. The corridor was silent save for the ragged sound of my breathing.

And then Kaelus smiled. Cold. Merciless.

"You’re making a mistake, Elara," he said softly. "Don’t let your anger blind you."

I met his gaze, my voice steady though my body trembled. "No. The mistake was ever trusting you."

His smile faltered. Just for a heartbeat.

And in that heartbeat, I knew—I had struck deeper than any blade.

Kaelus turned away, his cloak swirling as he gestured for the woman to follow. Without another word, they disappeared down the corridor, leaving only the echo of their steps behind.

I watched until their silhouettes dissolved into shadow, until I could no longer draw the outline of betrayal. Then the weight finally hit me—not a sudden collapse, but a long, slow sinking, like a ship taking on water.

My knees buckled, and I sank against the wall, every ounce of strength drained from me. Dareth rushed to my side, steadying me before I collapsed completely.

"Luna," he said softly, his voice rough with concern. "What did he say? What did you hear?"

I swallowed hard, my throat raw. "Enough. I heard enough."

"Then it’s true," Dareth muttered, his jaw clenched. "He betrayed you."

I shook my head slowly, a bitter smile tugging at my lips. "No. He didn’t just betray me, Dareth. He tried to erase me."

Dareth’s eyes darkened. "Then we can’t stay silent. We have to act—"

He wanted to move already. His instincts screamed toward war, toward the righting of wrongs. Yet I cupped his wrist, feeling the heat of his skin and made the choice to pin the fury down. Strategy, not blind vengeance. Proof, not rage.

I grabbed his wrist, my grip trembling but firm. "Not yet. If we move too soon, he’ll crush us. We need proof. We need allies. We need… time."

His gaze searched mine, torn between fury and reason. Finally, he nodded. "Then we’ll find proof. Whatever it takes."

I sighed deeply and nodded in agreement.

Kaelus thought he had broken me. He thought his betrayal would bury me.

But he had only given me a reason to rise.

***

The moon was high when I finally returned to the east wing. The guest room felt colder than before, the silence pressing against me like a shroud. I sat at the edge of the bed, staring at my hands that trembled not with weakness, but with the weight of choices yet to be made.

The bedspread smelled faintly of him, a ghost of perfume that made bile rise in my throat. Even in the guest room—supposedly neutral ground—traces of Kaelus' life leaked into the corners.

Sleep refused to come. Every time I closed my eyes, I heard her voice again.

She doesn’t know, does she? That you ordered her capture yourself.

Her voice had been the needle in the wound. It replayed on a cruel loop, and no matter how I tried to drown it with tasks or plans, it threaded itself back into every thought.

The words played like a curse, echoing until they carved themselves into my bones.

Kaelus had betrayed me in the worst way. And the human woman—the one who dared to smile in the shadows of my ruin—stood beside him, complicit in it all.

I clenched my fists until my nails bit into my skin.

This wasn’t just betrayal. It was war.

He had sown a quiet campaign to remove me piece by piece. And if Kaelus thought I would bow… he had forgotten who I truly was.

I was Elara. Once Alpha. Still Luna. And I would not fall quietly.

Knock knock 

It startled me from my thoughts.

"Luna?" Dareth’s voice. "May I come in?"

"Yes," I answered softly.

He entered, carrying a parchment in his hand. His face was grim. "The scouts brought this from the northern border."

The parchment felt heavier than its weight suggested. Dareth handed it over carefully. Each line of his face told me what the paper would say even before I read it.

I took it, my hands shaking as I unfolded the letter. My eyes scanned the words, and my stomach turned.

Rogue activity. Increased numbers. And a human name.

The human woman’s name.

Chloe.

My blood ran cold.

It was her. She wasn’t just Kaelus’ lover. She was their ally.

I looked at Dareth, my voice a whisper of steel. "This changes everything."

He nodded. "Then what will you do?"

I raised my gaze to the window, the moonlight painting the room in silver and shadow.

"I’ll do what Kaelus never expected," I said. My voice was steady now, unshakable. "I’ll take back what’s mine. And when I’m done, there won’t be a single place for them to hide."

But even as the words left my lips, the sound of a horn split the night—sharp, urgent, echoing through the halls.

Dareth’s eyes widened. "The horn."

I stood, my cloak falling around me like a shadow.

The palace was under attack.

And this time… I would not be the victim. Again.