Chapter 3

Fenris had already rushed over to scoop Selene up. "I'm taking you to the clinic," he snapped.

Before leaving, he shot me a look of pure loathing and disappointment. I was left alone in the living room, staring at my bloody, mangled palms. I felt nothing. The pain, the rage, the despair—it had all been ground out of me during those two years in a cell.

This wasn't my home anymore. Fenris and Caspian had found a better mate and a better sister. If that's what they wanted, I was done fighting for a place here.

I dragged my broken body upstairs, every step sending a jolt of agony through my hands. I needed the silver-neutralizing serum. When I first got poisoned three years ago, Caspian and Fenris had stocked my room with it.

But when I pushed open the door, I froze.

It wasn't my room anymore. Pink curtains hung where mine used to be, the vanity was covered in expensive makeup, and the closet was bursting with designer gowns. This was Selene’s room now.

I turned away with a bitter laugh and found a dark, cramped space at the end of the hall. I pushed open the door to find a few of my old, battered crates piled inside. This was my place now—a servant’s quarters.

I knelt on the floor and rifled through the boxes.

The pain in my hands intensified as the silver began to track through my veins, making my head spin.

Just before I passed out, I finally found a dried moonflower, which could alleviate the silver poisoning, and I quickly ate it.

"Emma! Emma!" I heard Fenris calling out, but my vision was already blurring. My body gave out, and I hit the floor.

When I came to, I was lying on the living room sofa. Fenris and Caspian were standing over me, their expressions a messy mix of guilt and unease.

"Emma, I’m sorry," Fenris said, his voice sounding uncharacteristically raspy. "We didn't realize you were so weak that you couldn't even hold a gift box. We shouldn't have snapped at you."

Caspian nodded in agreement. "We overreacted. You just got out of prison; of course your body is failing you."

I stared at them, confused, until I followed their gaze down. My sleeves had slid up while I was out, revealing the horrific lash marks covering my arms. They were scars from the prison guards—some still raw and unhealed.

I felt a cold irony wash over me. It was too late. I didn't want their apologies.

"Oh my god, Emma!" Selene’s voice piped up from the doorway. She rushed over, her face a mask of shock and outrage. "What happened to you? Did the guards do this? You're Fenris’s future Luna and Caspian’s sister! How could they lay a finger on you?"

At her words, Fenris and Caspian’s guilt instantly shifted into rage. Right—I was their mate and sister. Even if they threw me in a hole, no low-level guard should have dared to touch me.

"Bring me the guard in charge of Emma’s block!" Fenris barked. "I want answers, now!"

Moments later, the guard who had spent two years tormenting me was dragged in. He was the one who made me wash the entire pack's laundry on an empty stomach and whipped me whenever I slowed down. Under Fenris and Caspian’s lethal glares, he started shaking.

"Explain the marks on Emma," Fenris demanded.

The guard stammered, "Alpha, I... Miss Emma told me to do it."

"What?" Caspian narrowed his eyes.

"She paid me off," the guard lied, gaining confidence. "A few days before her release, she told me to hit her so the scars would look bad. I barely touched her, really. They look nasty, but it was all a show."

Selene immediately gasped, covering her mouth. "Emma, I know you want Fenris and Caspian to feel sorry for you, but how could you do this to yourself? This kind of manipulation is just... it's scary."

I watched the guard and Selene play their parts. It was a setup. She had bought him off long ago.

"I didn't do it," I said flatly.

"Still lying!" Caspian exploded. "I thought you’d spent two years reflecting, but you’ve just become more calculating. You're actually using self-harm to get attention?"

"Emma, I really overestimated you," Fenris said, his eyes dripping with disgust. "Have you really sunk this low? Risking your own life just for a little sympathy?"

I looked at their furious faces and realized explanations were useless. To them, I was a monster who would do anything to play the victim.

"Take her out," Fenris ordered coldly. " Lock her in a dark room. No one is allowed to let her out without my order."

"Fenris!" I looked at him in disbelief.

He knew perfectly well that I was terrified of the dark.

When my parents died when I was little, they hid me in a box, and I watched helplessly as they were torn apart by wolves in the pitch black.

From then on, I even had to sleep with the lights on.

Fenris and Caspian were heartbroken when he found out and vowed never to let me be alone in the dark again.