Chapter 2

I didn't leave.

They had specifically requested me to serve the entire evening. If I left early, my wages for the whole month would be docked.

My brother Theo's monthly supply of healing herbs cost a small fortune. I couldn't afford to lose that money, and I couldn't risk it.

So I swallowed the humiliation, wiped the blood from my fingertips, and brought a fresh glass.

After several rounds of drinks, the pack members at the feast had shed all pretense of composure.

They traded flattery and banter, and the conversation inevitably circled back to the long-buried history between Atticus and me.

Someone, emboldened by the wine, teased Atticus about how devoted he'd been back then, only to be cruelly betrayed by the girl he loved, making him the laughingstock of the entire pack.

Everyone believed I was the cold, faithless one who had walked away from the engagement and abandoned the boy who'd given me his whole heart.

Christine nestled against Atticus, basking in the envious glances, looking more pleased with herself by the minute.

Then someone asked the question almost offhandedly.

"Christine, what's the best thing you've ever done in your life?"

The question silenced the room in an instant.

All eyes turned to her, eager for some romantic declaration.

But Christine swayed in her seat, vanity and malice glittering in her eyes, and looked past the crowd, straight at me standing silently in the corner.

The alcohol had torn down every last wall. The secret she'd kept buried for years spilled out before she could stop it.

"Why, the massacre seven years ago, of course."

She let out a laugh, her voice carrying shameless pride.

"Alice's pack was under attack, and she came running here in a blind panic, knelt outside our gates, and begged for help. I intercepted every single message.

"I told them she'd had a change of heart, that she looked down on the Alpha because he was nobody back then, that she'd already gone over to the enemy pack and wanted nothing more to do with him."

Those airy, careless words crashed through the room like thunder.

My hand jerked hard on the tray. Ice flooded through me.

Seven years of buried anguish, ripped open by a few offhand sentences.

The lazy ease vanished from Atticus in an instant, and the air around him shifted.

The glass in his hand cracked apart. Jagged shards bit into his palm, and blood seeped between his fingers, dripping steadily, but he didn't seem to notice.

Those cold, hate-filled eyes were now shot through with crimson.

Seven years of obsession, seven years of resentment, seven years of grinding self-torment, all of it collapsed in a single moment.

He surged to his feet and slammed the heavy stone table over with a deafening crash.

The sound silenced every person in the room. No one dared even breathe.

"What did you just say?"

Atticus's voice shook. He stared at Christine, who still hadn't grasped what she'd done, unable to believe what he'd heard.

Christine sobered in an instant. She went white and scrambled to take it back, but the words were already out. There was no calling them home.

Every pair of eyes swung to me again.

Atticus walked toward me, one step at a time, his presence bearing down like a wall.

He stopped in front of me. In his eyes churned shock, anguish, disbelief, and a raw, desperate kind of pain.

"Is it true? What she said, is it true?"

I kept my eyes lowered, my expression utterly still.

I just bent down in silence and began cleaning up the wreckage, as if everything happening around me had nothing to do with me.

It had been too long.

All the grief, all the despair, and the agony that had once torn me apart had long since rotted in the past, alongside the deaths of my kin and the crippling of my brother.

He was asking for the truth now. It was too late.