The Blade Behind Me

“Claude!” I screamed from the balcony, my voice breaking.

His head snapped up.

“Rayna!”

“Don’t move!” Zayne shouted. He raised his sword higher.

“One more step and this ends!”

“Zayne,” Claude said, breathing hard.

“Put the blade down.”

“You lost the right to command me!” Zayne yelled. “The moment you chose her over blood!”

“She is not your enemy,” Claude said.

“Look around you. This chaos,this war,this is not because of her!”

Zayne laughed, sharp and bitter.

“You still protect her.”

I ran down the stairs. A guard reached for me.

“Let her pass!” Claude roared.

The guard froze.

I stood between them, shaking, the small dagger tight in my hand.

“Zayne,” I said. “Please. Listen to me.”

His eyes snapped to mine. They were wild.

“You should be dead,” he said. “You ruined everything.”

“No,” I said. “You were lied to.”

“Enough!” he snapped. “I’m tired of lies!”

“Elder Thomas framed my parents,” I said quickly. “He sold the pack’s secrets to Ironclaw. He used you. He used Zack. He used Mia.”

Zayne hesitated.

“What are you saying?” he demanded.

“I was held under the pack house,” I said. “In a hidden cellar. Thomas confessed everything.”

“That’s not true,” Zayne said. “It can’t be.”

“It is,” another voice said.

Zack staggered into the hall. Blood stained his arms and chest.

Zayne turned sharply. “Zack?”

“He told Mia,” Zack said, breathing hard. “He admitted it. He said we were distractions. He never planned to give us real power.”

Zayne stared at his brother. “You’re lying.”

“I’m not,” Zack said. “He used us to weaken Claude.”

Claude straightened slowly, pain clear on his face.

“Zayne,” Claude said. “Look at me.”

Zayne’s hand shook around the sword.

“I loved your mother,” Claude said quietly. “Everything I did was for this pack. Even when I was wrong.”

“You let them mock us,” Zayne shouted. “You let them call us weak!”

“I was protecting you,” Claude said. “From becoming like Thomas.”

Zayne screamed and slammed the sword into a pillar.

“I hate you!” he shouted.

A deep horn echoed through the hall.

Everyone froze.

Another horn answered.

Then another.

“Ironclaw,” someone whispered.

The massive doors burst open.

The Ironclaw Alpha stepped inside, arrows still in his body, blood running down his side.

His eyes locked on me.

“Rayna,” he said roughly.

Claude moved in front of me. “Stay back.”

“I didn’t come for your throne,” the Ironclaw Alpha said. “I came for the truth.”

Zayne pointed his sword at him. “You started this war!”

“No,” the Alpha replied. “Your Elder did.”

He looked around the hall. “Thomas sold me your patrol routes ten years ago. In return, I took his prisoners.”

Claude stiffened. “Prisoners?”

“A man and a woman,” the Alpha said. “Your former servants.”

My heart stopped.

“My parents,” I whispered.

The Ironclaw Alpha nodded. “Your mother was my sister.”

The room spun.

“You’re lying,” I said weakly.

“She lived,” he said. “For a time.”

Claude turned sharply. “For a time?”

“She died last winter,” the Alpha said.

“She never stopped asking about you.”

Something inside me cracked.

“No,” I whispered. “No…”

Claude reached for me. “Rayna”

Zayne laughed suddenly. Loud. Empty.

“So it’s all true,” he said. “Every lie.”

He lifted his sword again.

But not at Claude.

He aimed it at the Ironclaw Alpha.

“You used us,” Zayne said. “All of you.”

The Alpha sighed. “You were boys playing a game far older than you.”

“Zayne, stop!” Zack shouted.

Too late.

Zayne lunged.

The Ironclaw Alpha shifted fast. Claws flashed.

Claude roared and shifted too.

The hall exploded.

Wolves. Steel. Screams.

I backed away, my heart pounding.

Then I felt it.

A sharp, burning pain.

I looked down.

Silver.

A blade buried in my side.

I gasped and lifted my head.

Mia stood behind me.

Her hands were shaking.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “He said this was the only way.”

My knees gave out.

The world tilted.

Claude’s roar ripped through the hall as he turned toward me.

“RAYNA!”

I hit the floor.

The last thing I saw was Claude tearing through the chaos toward me

and Zayne turning back, his face frozen in shock and horror.

Then everything went black.