Her Father's Blood

Chapter 3

“Get up, Garrick. You're terrifying the girl.”

A woman ducked into the tent.

She was scarred across one side of her face, with the hard, watchful look of someone who had spent years surviving fights rather than avoiding them.

Her gaze moved over Elena from head to toe.

“I'm Sera. Second in Command.”

She glanced at Garrick, still on one knee.

“Enough with the kneeling. She doesn't even know who she is yet.”

Garrick rose and tucked the wooden crest back beneath his jacket.

“She knows what Silvercrest told her,” he said. “Which means she knows nothing.”

Elena pulled the fur blanket tighter around herself.

Her eyes narrowed.

“I know my father was exiled for treason and died alone past the ridge.”

Her voice hardened.

“That is what I was told.”

Sera's expression didn't change.

“That's the lie Kane's pack fed you.”

Elena stared at her.

“Aldric Voss wasn't a traitor. He was Silvercrest's top commander.”

Garrick remained silent, watching Elena carefully.

Sera continued.

“Then he started investigating the former Alpha's murder.”

Elena frowned.

“Kane's father?”

“Yes.”

Elena shook her head.

“Kane said his father died in a rogue raid.”

“It wasn't a rogue raid.”

Garrick's voice is quieter now.

“It was an inside assassination.”

Elena looked at him.

“Your father found the trail,” he continued. “He got too close to whoever was responsible. Before he could expose the truth, someone planted forged evidence, blamed him for treason, and had him banished overnight.”

Elena's stomach twisted.

“He was set up.”

“Yes.”

The word came from Sera.

“And whoever did it is still sitting high in Silvercrest.”

Elena stared at the floor.

For years, she'd believed her father had betrayed his pack.

She had accepted the story because there had been nothing else to believe.

Now she wasn't sure what part of her childhood had been true.

Sera folded her arms.

“Which brings us to you.”

Elena looked up.

“And those three heartbeats you're carrying.”

Her hand immediately covered her abdomen.

“What does my pregnancy have to do with my father being framed?”

Garrick exchanged a glance with Sera.

Then he looked back at Elena.

“Because your father wasn't just a soldier.”

There was something different in his voice now.

Respect.

Almost reverence.

“He was the last surviving male of the Nightfall Line.”

Elena frowned.

“Nightfall?”

“An ancient, forbidden bloodline,” Sera said.

She pulled a chair closer to the bed and sat.

“The high Alphas feared them enough to try to wipe them out a century ago.”

Elena listened without speaking.

“What made them so dangerous?”

Sera held her gaze.

“Nightfall wolves can sense pack bonds.”

Elena's fingers tightened around the blanket.

“They can sever them, too.”

A pause.

“And if pushed far enough, they can steal them.”

Elena's breath caught.

The bond.

The thing that connected mates and packs.

The very thing Kane had just broken between them.

Was that what her blood could do?

Garrick stepped closer.

“They thought the Nightfall bloodline died with your father.”

His eyes dropped briefly to Elena's abdomen.

“They were wrong.”

Elena's hand remained over her stomach.

“If Kane or the council discovers what you are—and learns that you're carrying three Alpha-blooded heirs—they won't simply send you into exile.”

“What will they do?”

Sera answered this time.

“They'll come for you.”

Elena's jaw tightened.

“How many?”

“Enough.”

Sera's voice was matter-of-fact.

“Silvercrest won't risk letting Nightfall blood survive, especially not in three Alpha-blooded children.”

Elena sat quietly for a moment.

She had spent the last few hours thinking she was simply the woman Kane had thrown away.

Now she was being told that her blood alone could threaten the people who ruled Silvercrest.

She looked down at her burned wrist.

Then at the blanket covering her stomach.

“So what do we do?”

Her voice was steadier now.

“Hide in the woods forever?”

“No.”

Sera leaned back.

“We train you.”

Elena looked at her.

“We teach you how to control the Nightfall power your father kept hidden from you. We build an army.”

Her expression hardened.

“And when the time is right, we take back what was stolen from your family.”

Elena stared at the bare skin where her Silvercrest mark had been.

Then she felt the three small, stubborn pulses inside her.

She had spent years believing she was weak because Kane's pack told her she was.

Maybe they had been afraid of something else.

Elena raised her eyes.

“I don't want to hide.”

Something shifted in her gaze.

“Teach me how to make them bleed.”

Sera's mouth curved into a smile.

“Now that sounds like Aldric's daughter.”

She stood.

“Get some rest, Commander.”

Sera turned toward the tent entrance.

“Tomorrow, your real training begins.”