Chapter 15 – The Seven-Day Sentence

Rain hadn’t washed away the dirt.

It hadn’t cleaned the night’s grime or made anything better. Instead, it turned the ground into a slick, muddy mess, the kind that clings to your boots and pulls at your ankles. It was a mirror of my mind, chaotic, broken, soaked in despair.

After my father’s words, I’d spent the hours pacing the tight space of my study in the packhouse, the once-precious ledgers now just useless piles of paper. Who cared about numbers and budgets when your body was a countdown, ticking toward some inevitable end?

Listen, despair isn’t loud; it’s cold and patient, convincing you all the exits are sealed. My father’s voice still echoed in the silence: ‘The bond will kill you to make room for her’.

I stood in front of the full-length mirror, staring at the mark Vance had branded on my neck at our mating ceremony. It looked permanent, something carved deep into flesh, into bone. Yet my father spoke of it like a parasite, a leech feeding off my life. I ran my thumb over the scar, wondering how something that had felt so much like a part of me could turn into the very thing draining my strength, my wolf, my soul.

I needed a Plan B.

Not a plan to beat him or take Vance back, I’d already erased him from my future. Just a plan to keep breathing. If I couldn’t find some mythical Lycan to burn this mark out of me, if I couldn’t break it myself, then I had to figure out how to survive within this triangle without letting it swallow me whole.

The answer? I had to become invisible.

For six days straight, I practiced the art of vanishing. I watched.

I watched Vance visit Zebub, pathetic, really, the way he preened when he spoke to her, like a proud father showing off his favorite. I watched Zebub, too, the way she played him like a fine-tuned instrument, never begging for her freedom but letting him offer it, whispering poison about me into his ear with every word.

Every night, I sat at the long mahogany table, picking at food that tasted like dust and regret. The game unfolded before me, Vance’s focus entirely on her, ignoring me as if I wasn’t even there. His eyes avoided mine, and I knew his wolf was already drifting toward her, sedated by her charm, her lies.

“The Council’s meeting is tomorrow,” Vance said during our last dinner of the week.

His voice was flat, cold, devoid of the usual warmth when he spoke to me.

“They haven’t found a single shred of evidence connecting Zebub to the border raids. Not a scent, not a witness, nothing.”

“Of course they haven’t,” I replied, despite the twist inside me. “She’s a rogue. She’s good at hiding. Better than your pampered sentries ever were.”

Vance slammed his fist onto the table, rattling the silverware.

“Enough with the jealousy. She’s been vetted. She’s cleared.”

“Yeah,” I shot back, leaning in. “She’s a threat. And you’re inviting her into our home like she’s some kind of gift.”

“It’s my home,” he snapped, the Alpha power in his voice making the mark on my neck flare with a sharp, burning pain. “And she’s my fated. You will show her respect or you’ll find yourself on the other side of that border.”

I didn’t flinch. I couldn’t. Not anymore.

Instead, I just stared at him, this man I’d built a territory with, who had once been my partner, who was now a stranger, a puppet on Zebub’s strings. She was the puppet master. He was just the puppet.

The seventh day arrived beneath a sky bruised dark and heavy.

I stood at the top of the grand staircase, fingers clenched around the railing so tightly my knuckles turned white. Pack members shuffled past, faces grim but resolute.

My father was the last to leave. He looked up at me, and in that brief moment, I saw the truth. There was no miracle, no miracle coming. Just the cold certainty, that this was it.

Vance stepped into the center of the hall, chest puffed, eyes shining with triumph that made my stomach churn. He pointed toward the iron door leading down.

“Bring her up,” Vance commanded, voice booming, authoritative.

The silence was oppressive. Then, the iron door groaned open, sounding like a death knell.

Zebub appeared.

She wasn’t the disheveled prisoner I’d seen a week ago. Someone had cleaned her up, dressed her in clothes that looked suspiciously like they’d come from my wardrobe. She moved with slow, predatory grace, eyes locked onto Vance with a hunger that made my skin crawl.

But as she reached the bottom of the stairs, she paused.

Her gaze flickered up to me, a cruel, slow smile spreading across her face, the look of a wolf that had just found the weak spot in the fence.

Vance stepped forward, taking her hand, staking his claim.

“By order of the Council,” he announced proud and unwavering, “the rogue girl is cleared of all charges. As of this moment, she’s a free member of the Eclipse Star. And by the end of the month, she’ll take her place beside me.”

Whispers ripple through the hall, shifting loyalties, uneasy glances.

I felt the familiar ache of the mark on my neck again, pulsing like a heartbeat, a reminder that the countdown had begun.

The triangle had started. Time was running out.

Zebub leaned in, whispering something into Vance’s ear.

I couldn’t hear her words, but he chuckled, a low, satisfied sound. Then she looked back up at me, her victory clear in her eyes.

No words needed, her expression said it all. She was in.