Chapter 7

"Maya, get back inside."

Lane’s voice was barely louder than a whisper, but it carried the weight of an iron anchor, instantly freezing the trembling maid in her tracks. Maya stepped backward into the bedchambers, her chest heaving with suppressed fury, though she kept her defiant eyes locked on the hallway.

Down the corridor, Ethan stopped pacing. He turned his head slowly, a dark, dangerous chuckle escaping his lips as he looked back at the open doorway. His expression was a volatile mix of offense and absolute mockery.

"An Alpha?" Ethan scoffed, turning around completely and taking a few slow, heavy steps back toward Lane's room. He adjusted the leather cuffs of his uniform, looking down at them as if he had just heard a particularly amusing joke. "An Alpha or an Alpha's sister... it doesn't change reality, maid. Dead heroes don't inherit titles, and bloodlines don't fight wars."

He stepped right up to the threshold, his gaze bypassing Maya entirely to settle on Lane, who stood perfectly still in the center of the room.

"Lane, you are a mature woman," Ethan said, his tone shifting into that deeply patronizing, lecture-like cadence he always used to dismiss her. "You need to stop letting your servants fill your head with delusions. Stop wishing for things that are never going to happen. The Silvermoon Pack is gone. Your family's glorious legacy is a memory. This is the Blackwood Pack now."

He leaned against the doorframe, crossing his arms. "I am going to give you one last piece of advice: behave yourself. Keep your mouth shut, control your staff, and accept the arrangement so you can keep your Luna title. Or, if you want to be stubborn and arrogant, you can pack your bags and leave. The choice is yours, but do not think for a second that your tantrums will stop my wedding to Maris."

Without waiting for a response, Ethan turned sharply on his heel, his heavy boots clicking rhythmically against the stone floor as he walked away, leaving a suffocating silence in his wake.

The moment his footsteps vanished down the stairs, Maya’s defiance completely crumbled. A choked sob broke from her throat, and she dropped to her knees right by the doorway, burying her face in her hands as tears finally spilled over.

"Milady..." Maya cried, her shoulders shaking violently. "Why do you let him treat you like that? Why do you let him look down on you and talk to you as if you are nothing? Doesn't it hurt? Doesn't it break your heart to hear your fated mate say those awful things?"

Lane closed her eyes for a brief second, letting out a slow, heavy sigh. The phantom warmth of the fresh mark on her neck felt like a branding iron, a physical tie to a man who didn't deserve a single drop of her devotion.

"Of course it hurts, Maya," Lane said softly, walking over to her maid and placing a gentle, steady hand on her trembling shoulder. "It hurts to know that a year of my life, my loyalty, and my family's wealth were given to a parasite. But there is absolutely no point in crying over it. Tears won't rebuild our home, and they won't make him regret his choices. We are leaving soon. Save your energy for the journey."

Maya sniffled, using the edge of her apron to fiercely wipe the tears from her red cheeks. She looked up into Lane’s calm, diamond-hard eyes and nodded, a newfound resolve tightening her features.

"Yes, milady," Maya whispered, pushing herself back to her feet. "I won't cry anymore. They don't deserve our tears. We are going to take everything back—every single coin, every ledger, and every bit of respect. And besides, everyone we came here with is leaving too. They won't stay in this ungrateful house for another day."

Lane looked toward the adjacent servants' quarters. When she had married into the Blackwood Pack a year ago, her mother had been so desperate to ensure her happiness. Fearful that Lane would feel lonely or out of place away from the grand, cultured halls of Silvermoon, her mother had sent a massive retinue of trusted maids, cooks, and artisans with her. She had wanted Lane to live a beautiful, luxurious life—the exact same high-born life she had always known at home. Her mother had prepared for every comfort, but she had never prepared for Ethan Blackwood's sudden, treacherous change of heart.

Later that night, the castle grew completely still, but peace eluded Lane.

She woke up with a sudden, searing ache blooming right where Ethan had bitten her. The skin around the mark throbbed violently, radiating a blinding heat that made her gasp into the darkness. She clutched her neck, her vision blurring as a strange, supernatural pull seized her consciousness.

The women of the Conlay generation possessed a rare, ancient power—a spiritual gift tied to their high-Alpha bloodline. Once marked by a fated mate, their souls could occasionally catch glimpses of the other side of the bond, seeing exactly what their counterpart was doing in moments of intense emotional or physical vulnerability.

Suddenly, Lane’s surroundings dissolved.

She wasn't in her bed anymore. She was looking through a hazy, ethereal veil into a lavishly decorated bedchamber in the western wing. Ethan was there. He was naked, his muscular back glistening in the low candlelight as he loomed over a naked woman tangled in the sheets beneath him.

It was Maris Duffy.

Unlike the other she-wolves of the pack, Maris was known for her wild, undisciplined nature, always displaying her half-shifted form to assert her dominant warrior status. Thick, dark wolf ears twitched atop her head, and a long, furred tail brushed against the mattress as she wrapped her arms around Ethan’s neck.

"What if Lane refuses to share you?" Maris murmured, her voice laced with a sharp, manipulative edge as she ran her fingers through his hair. "What if she makes a scene before the high court and tries to block my coronation as Luna?"

Ethan let out a low, dismissing grunt, his hands gripping Maris’s hips. "She has no choice, Maris. Lane is only a weak Omega. She is fragile, dependent, and incredibly easy to control. If she throws a tantrum or refuses to accept you, I'll just let her go. She has nowhere else to run anyway."

Maris purred, but her eyes glinted with naked greed. "And what about her pack lands? The population of the Blackwood Pack is increasing rapidly, Ethan. We need the Silvermoon territory's silver mines and fertile valleys to feed our expansion."

"I will introduce that topic to her later," Ethan whispered, his voice dripping with casual arrogance. "Once the wedding is over and she realizes she has no options left, she will sign the territorial deeds over to me. Now is not the time to worry about her."

As the vision shifted, Lane’s spiritual gaze dropped to the bed beneath them.

The moment she saw what they were lying on, a wave of liquid fire erupted in her veins.

It wasn't a standard bedsheet. It was a massive, ceremonial silk flag—the ancestral banner of the Silvermoon Pack. Lane’s mother had sewn that flag with her own hands, spending months intricately embroidering the silver wolf crest to mark the sacred union of their two packs. The night before he left for the war, Ethan had knelt before that very flag and promised to always honor it, to protect it as a symbol of their eternal alliance.

And now, he was using her mother's sacred handiwork as a vulgar shroud for his infidelity.

Pure, unadulterated fury shattered Lane’s calm restraint. The sleeping dragon within her violently snapped awake. Deep within her soul, her Alpha-ranked wolf reared her head, letting out a deafening, spiritual roar that shook the very foundation of the bond.

*‘Kill them,’* her wolf snarled, her massive, ethereal form surging forward through the spiritual veil like a tidal wave of white fire, tearing into the connection with a vicious, phantom bite.

On the other side of the castle, in the western wing, Ethan suddenly stifled a gasp.

A sharp, agonizing pain shot straight through his chest, as if a silver blade had been driven directly into his heart. His breathing hitched, and he stumbled slightly against the mattress, clutching his chest as a cold sweat broke out across his skin.

Maris blinked, her wolf ears perking up in alarm as she felt his sudden tremor. "Ethan? What's wrong?"

Ethan shook his head, his jaw clenching as the phantom agony slowly receded into a dull, throbbing ache. He looked around the dimly lit room, but saw nothing out of the ordinary.

"Nothing," Ethan muttered, swallowing hard as he dismissed the feeling, attributing it to the lingering exhaustion of the war campaigns. "Just an old battlefield cramp. It's nothing."

He leaned back down, completely unaware that the phantom pain wasn't a wound from his past, but a lethal warning from the storm brewing in the eastern wing.