Chapter 6: The Procession

"Keep walking, Princess. Don't stop. Don't look back. Whatever you hear behind you, just keep moving forward."

Rowan's voice was low, barely a breath against my ear as he fell into step beside me in the procession. The grand hall doors had opened, and the entire court was streaming out into the pale morning light, heading toward the Ninefold Platform in the courtyard beyond.

"Where's my mother?" I kept my smile fixed, waving to the nobles lining the path. "She should be here. She should be walking beside my father."

"She's not. The Queen is conspicuously absent." Rowan's jaw was tight. "I sent Ivy to check the throne room. If your father's still holding her there—"

"He'll use her." The realization hit like ice water. "If Kael rebels, if the North attacks, my father will use my mother as leverage. He'll say the rebels took her. He'll blame them for whatever happens."

"Then we get to her first." Rowan's hand brushed mine, passing something small and cold into my palm. A key. "Servants' passage behind the throne room tapestry. Ivy knows the route. If the ceremony goes wrong, I'll create a diversion. You find your mother and get her out through the eastern woods."

"And Elias? Victor?"

"Elias is already positioned near the platform with a weapon concealed under his formal cloak. He knows what to do." Rowan paused. "Victor is still unknown. He might help us. He might not. Don't count on him."

The procession slowed as we approached the courtyard. I could see the Ninefold Platform ahead—the ancient stone dais where oaths were sworn and traitors were executed and my father had slaughtered Kael's family twelve years ago. Today it was draped in white flowers and silver ribbons. The executioner's block had been removed. The bloodstains had been scrubbed away.

But the stones remembered. The platform had a presence, a weight, a hunger that even the flowers couldn't disguise.

"There are more guards than usual," I murmured. "Royal guards at every corner. And Blackmane wolves—look, they're spreading out through the crowd. Not sitting in their assigned seats."

"I see them." Rowan's voice was grim. "Forty-three northern wolves, all armed. Against maybe sixty royal guards who aren't expecting an attack."

"Are the guards really not expecting it?"

Rowan didn't answer. We both knew the truth. My father was too calculating, too paranoid, too experienced to be caught off guard. If he was letting the Blackmane wolves position themselves, it was because he wanted them there.

He wanted the rebellion to happen.

"Your Highness." A guard appeared at my elbow, bowing stiffly. "The Alpha King requests you take your place on the platform. The ceremony is about to begin."

I looked at Rowan. He looked at me. Five years of unspoken words passed between us in that single glance.

"Three howls," I whispered.

"Three howls," he agreed. "I'll be listening."

He melted back into the crowd. I climbed the steps to the Ninefold Platform, my wedding gown trailing behind me, my heart hammering so hard I could feel it in my teeth.

Kael was already waiting.

He stood at the platform's center, black-clad and motionless, his eyes fixed on something only he could see. The Elders had arranged themselves in a semicircle behind him. My father stood at the platform's edge, addressing the crowd with his arms spread wide, his voice carrying across the courtyard like a wolf's howl.

"—and so we gather today, under the blessing of the Moon Goddess, to witness the binding of two great bloodlines! The Silver Moon and the Blackmane North, united at last!"

The crowd cheered. The Blackmane wolves didn't.

I took my place beside Kael. The Elder with the frozen-mud eyes stepped forward, a ceremonial cord in his gnarled hands—the binding cord that would be wrapped around our wrists, symbolizing the mate bond. The old rites required the cord to be tied by the male first, then the female. Kael would have to reach for me. He would have to touch me willingly.

He hadn't touched me willingly in six years.

"Lord Kael Blackthorne." The Elder's voice was reedy, ancient. "Do you come before the Moon Goddess of your own free will, prepared to bind yourself to this female for all the days of your life?"

The silence stretched. The crowd shifted. My father's smile didn't waver, but his eyes had gone cold.

"I do," Kael said.

"Do you accept the bond the Goddess has placed between you, acknowledging that her wisdom exceeds mortal understanding?"

Another pause. Longer this time. Kael turned his head and looked at me—really looked, the way he had in the grand hall. His winter-dark eyes held something I couldn't name. Sorrow, maybe. Or apology.

"I accept," he said, "that the Goddess works in ways I do not understand."

The Elder frowned at the wording but continued. "Then take the cord, my lord, and bind yourself to your mate."

Kael reached for the cord. His fingers closed around the woven silk. He stepped toward me, close enough that I could smell him—pine and snow and something sharp and desperate underneath. He raised the cord toward my wrist.

And stopped.

"You know," he said, his voice carrying across the silent courtyard, "twelve years ago, I stood on this exact spot. Not as a groom. As a prisoner. I was eight years old, and I watched my father die right where you're standing, Your Majesty."

My father's smile finally cracked. "Kael. This is neither the time nor the place—"

"It's exactly the time. It's exactly the place." Kael dropped the binding cord. It landed on the stones between us like a dead thing. "You brought me here to bind me. To chain me to your daughter and call it peace. But we both know what this ceremony really is."

The crowd was murmuring now. The royal guards were shifting, their hands moving toward their weapons. The Blackmane wolves were perfectly still, waiting.

"Kael, don't—" I started.

"I'm sorry, Selene." He said it softly, meant only for me. "You were the only one who ever asked about my mother. You were the only one who ever saw me as anything other than a trophy. But I can't do this. I can't bind myself to the daughter of the wolf who murdered my family."

He turned to the crowd, his voice rising to a roar. "I, Kael Blackthorne, Alpha of the North, reject this union! I reject this false peace! And I reject the tyrant who calls himself Alpha King!"

The courtyard exploded.

Blackmane wolves drew their weapons. Royal guards surged forward. My father's face contorted with something that looked terrifyingly like triumph. And Kael—Kael turned back to me, his eyes burning, his hand reaching for mine.

"Come with me," he said. "Right now. Leave this place. Leave your father. We can end this together."

The words hit like a physical blow. After everything—after twelve years of ice and silence and rejection—he was asking me to choose him. In front of the entire court. In the middle of his rebellion.

"Why now?" I heard myself ask. "Why, after all these years, would you ask me now?"

"Because you're not the chain." His voice cracked. "You were never the chain. I just couldn't see it until I was about to lose you."

The battle was closing in around us. Wolves were shifting, snarling, clashing on the courtyard stones. Somewhere in the chaos, I heard Rowan's voice shouting my name. Somewhere closer, my father was laughing—actually laughing, a sound of pure, vindictive victory.

And I stood on the Ninefold Platform, the binding cord at my feet, caught between the mate who'd rejected me and the mate who'd waited for me, with a kingdom falling apart around us all.

"Selene!" Kael's grip tightened on my hand. "Decide. Now."

I looked into his eyes—those winter-dark eyes I'd loved since I was fourteen—and I made my choice.