CHAPTER TWELVE

Broken Seals

Silas’s POV

The Royal seal pressed into the black wax carries the sharp crest of the Sovereign Crescent Pack.

I stare down at the envelope resting on my desk. The ink practically bleeds with Cassius Blackwood's arrogant authority. It is a formal summons, a mandatory Continental summit called by the self-proclaimed Regent, demanding every Alpha presents themselves at the Sovereign pack grounds within the next few days.

“He's establishing a baseline,” Matthias says, leaning his fist against the opposite edge of the desk, his knuckles turning white.

“Cassius knows we've been evading his orders to submit and ignoring his regional decrees for the last few years. If we don't attend this summit, he’ll use it as a formal declaration of treason and march his entire Vanguard directly onto the Silver Moon soil.”  

“Let him march.” I reply softly, my voice flat, not a trace of warmth or fear. 

“I don't care about his war. I don't care about his crown.”

“Silas, look at me,” Matthais demands, slamming his hand down onto the desk.

“The pack cannot survive a war alone. The other Alphas are going to that citadel. If we are there, when we can form a coalition, we can stand against his expansion. But if you stay here in this office drowning in misery like you have been the past five years, Cassius will burn everything you're supposed to protect.”

I close my eyes feeling the familiar deep ache in my chest where my bond with Emery used to burn. 

Five years. Five endless years of breathing, walking and running a pack while my soul remains buried at the bottom of The Black Ridge.  Political maneuvering means nothing to me. The title of Alpha feels like a lead weight chained around my neck.

Yet, Matthias is right about one thing. 

The people living in these lands didn't ask for my grief. They need a leader, even if that leader is nothing more than an empty husk of bones.

“Prepare a few of our best warriors and meet with the enforcers to secure our borders,” I say, opening my eyes, running a hand through the hair that had fallen into my face.  

“We leave for the Stronghold in three days.”

Matthias lets out a slow, relieved breath, nodding before turning towards the door.

“I'll notify the Elders.”

He barely leaves the threshold, when the heavy frantic pounding of boots echo down the hallway.

A young guard bursts into the room, his face is drained of color, his chest heaving as if he had run up the deepest catacombs without stopping. He doesn't even offer a proper bow.

“Alpha…” the guard gasps, clutching the door frame to steady himself.

“The cells… the-cell four…”

The air in my office drops in an instant.

Before the guard could finish his sentence I’m already walking past him, my boots striking the floor in rapid heavy strides as I head for the dungeon stairs. Matthias is right behind me, his hand already sporting retracted claws. 

We descend into the freezing dark of the lower level. The spelled-bound silver torches along the corridor flicker violently casting shadows across the wet walls.

When I reach the heavy iron door of cell four, it is standing wide open.

I step into the narrow room.

Kade had been in charge of Noelle’s section of the dungeons. Now, he lays against the wall, his head twisted at an unnatural angle. His face is contorted in a frozen expression of glassy-eyed trance. The iron ring of keys that usually hung securely from his thick leather belt is gone.

On the stone bench, the heavy silver-infused chains hung unlocked and discarded in a messy pile. The leather gag that had kept Noelle silent for all these years lays torn on the floor, its buckle snapped.

“Goddess above,” Matthias breathes, stepping up beside me and looking down at the dead guard. 

“How? The silver seals were reinforced every single morning.”

I kneel beside Kade's body, my thumb brushing over the faint blue bruise spreading across his throat.

“Carelessness,” I retort, my wolf growling deep within my ribs. 

“Five years in total darkness. She must have watched him, learned every single habit, every step, every second his slipped. The gag was leather, it stretches over time. She didn't need a full howl, just a muffled strain of her powers through her teeth to pull him close enough to touch.”

If I hadn’t spent so much time wallowing like a baby…

“She snapped his neck and took the keys," Matthias says, stepping back into the corridor looking toward the dark escape tunnel that leads out of the eastern river bank.

“She's been gone for at least an hour.” 

“She won't stay in the Silver Moon territory," I say standing up and wiping the dust from my knees. The cold deadness in my chest suddenly shifts into a sharp dangerous clarity.

“She knows I will hunt her down and tear her limb from limb the moment she crosses my path. She has no pack and no protection here.”

“Where will we go?” Mathias asks.

“Where every desperate snake goes when they need power," I reply, my eyes narrowing as I remember the summons sitting on my desk.

“She'll head straight for the Sovereign Crescent. Cassius is just as conniving as she is and now that he's gathering enemies of the regional Alphas. She’ll trade everything she knows about our defenses and about me in exchange for his protection.”

“If she reaches before we do-” 

“She won't,” I cut him off, my voice turning icy.  

I walk out of the cell, my mind racing through the tactical routes north. Noelle is a venomous parasite and if she aligns her siren powers with Cassius, the war coming to our borders will be ten times deadlier.  

“Assemble the pack warriors,” I command Matthias as we reach the top of the dungeon steps.

“Ten warriors, the fastest and the best. We aren't waiting three days.”

“Silas the summit doesn't open until-”

“We leave tonight," I say turning to face him. “We hunt her down on the road and then we take our place at Cassius’s gates.”

An hour later, the front yard of the packhouse is filled with the heavy growls of wolves in different colors. Ten of the pack's most vicious warriors stand ready, teeth bared, under the pale moonlight.

I shift, letting the black fur burst free and land on my paws. I had sent someone earlier with a few clothes for all of us and the small wooden wolf hat has been my solace and comfort.

I give the commands down the pack link making sure everyone is ready.

With a collective surge of paws and claws, we thunder out of the Silver Moon gates, tearing into the dark forest, racing hard towards the Sovereign Crescent Stronghold.