When The Shadows Darken.

Keon’s POV:

The corridors feel lighter than usual tonight, yet the stone walls still manage to press in on me.

Torches flicker along the length of the hall, their glow shifting like restless spirits. Every step I take echoes far louder than it should, the scent of cedar lingering in the air, an unwanted reminder that Derrick has returned.

The fact irritates me in ways I do not care to examine. My mind refuses to settle around his presence, refuses to accept that he is once again under this roof, breathing the same air, walking the same halls as though nothing has changed.

As though the last day has not happened.

My jaw tightens.

He arrived without warning. No mindlink. No courtesy. He simply walked through the gates as though nothing in this territory required acknowledgment, as though explanations were for lesser wolves.

As though I had not spent the last day scouring the forest with blood still fresh on my hands.

Two guards stood outside the lower chamber. They straightened at once when they saw me, shoulders squared, faces carefully blank. No one spoke. No one ever did when my temper was this close to the surface.

Inside, the air was cool and heavy. Silence clung to the room, broken only by uneven breathing and the thick, sour stench of fear.

The guard knelt where he had been left, wrists bound, head lowered. He had not moved since morning. Sweat darkened his collar despite the chill of the stone floor.

He looked smaller now.

It is always fascinating how quickly authority drains from a man once consequences become real.

I stopped a few feet from him and said nothing.

The silence was deliberate. Punishment rarely begins with force. Silence unsettles far more effectively. It gives fear room to grow.

“Look at me.”

My voice cut cleanly through the room.

He hesitated.

The delay sparked something sharp and hot beneath my ribs. I stepped forward and struck his jaw with enough force to snap his head sideways. The crack of impact echoed off the walls. He cried out, eyes wide as he finally looked at me.

“You abandoned your post.”

“N-no my lord,” he stammered, panic spilling through his words. “I only stepped away for a moment. I heard something outside and I thought”

“You thought.”

The words tasted bitter.

Guards are not paid to think. They are paid to remain. To ensure that nothing moves through my territory unseen.

Because of moments like his, Winter had been found broken on those same grounds.

A low growl stirred in my chest before I forced it down.

“For a moment,” I repeated quietly, my grip tightening in his collar. “Do you understand how many things can happen in a moment?”

Images flash unbidden through my mind. Winter curled against the earth. Blood. Stillness.

His breathing turned ragged. “Please. I meant no harm.”

Meaning is irrelevant. Failure does not soften simply because intention was harmless.

I released him with a sharp shove. He stumbled, barely catching himself against the wall. Good. Let him feel the instability he created.

Behind me, the chamber door opened.

I did not need to turn.

The shift in the air was unmistakable.

Derrick.

He walked in without hesitation, his presence calm yet intrusive, like still water hiding unfathomable depth. For a brief moment no one spoke. Even the guard’s fear sharpened, his gaze flicking between us.

“You are interrogating him now?” Derrick asked.

His tone was mild. Neutral.

It grated against my nerves.

“I am deciding what to do with him.”

Derrick’s gaze moved to the kneeling guard, then back to me. His expression revealed nothing, which somehow made his presence more irritating.

“He made a mistake,” he said.

“A mistake that left the grounds unprotected.”

“The grounds were not unprotected.”

The certainty in his voice snapped my full attention onto him.

I stilled.

“What?”

“There were guards.”

Nothing more. No elaboration. No attempt to justify the claim.

Memory surged with unwelcome clarity. The gardens. Winter’s scream. The empty space where protection should have been.

I took a slow step toward him, my gaze narrowing. “There were no guards on sight that day.”

Derrick did not move. Not closer. Not back. He simply watched me, his composure untouched.

“Winter was alone,” he replied calmly.

The words landed with quiet weight.

I felt my irritation sharpen.

“I walked those grounds myself.”

“Then you must have missed them.”

He said it lightly. Casually.

As though he had not just questioned the perception of an Alpha inside his own territory.

The air in the chamber seemed to tighten.

I studied him, a slow burn of disbelief creeping into my chest. “You are claiming that multiple guards were active around the area she was attacked.”

“Yes.”

“Who assigned them?”

A pause.

Brief. Almost unnoticeable.

“They were already posted.”

Wrong.

I knew the schedules. I approved them personally. Nothing had been altered. Nothing had been added.

And Derrick was not even here when the attack occurred.

Fatigue scraped at my patience.

Without another word I turned to the guard, mindlinking the wolves outside. They entered swiftly, cutting his restraints. He swayed as they dragged him from the room, terror still radiating from him.

Only Derrick and I remained.

“You are tense,” he observed.

“You are contradicting observable reality,” I replied coldly. “Questioning my authority. And offering nothing useful in finding who hurt her.”

His expression did not change.

“You are not going to find her attacker like that, Keon.”

My eyes narrowed.

“If someone could harm her inside your territory,” he continued, his voice steady, “Then you are not dealing with a guard level threat.

His words settled uneasily in my mind.

Because they touched a truth I did not wish to consider.

My head ached. Pressure built behind my eyes.

When word spreads that she was attacked, enemies will circle. Weakness invites disaster. The witches will not remain silent either.

I exhaled slowly, forcing control back into my voice. “And what exactly do you suggest we do?”

Derrick’s gaze held mine.

For the first time, something in his demeanor shifted. Something faint and unreadable.

“Before you say anything,” he said quietly, “I have an idea.”

The torches crackled softly, their light dancing across the stone.

Then Derrick smiled.

Not kindly.

Not the type he gives Winter.

But with the unsettling calm of someone who has already decided how events will unfold.