Chapter 5: The Silver Tray

**Sera**

The silver tray was so heavy my forearms burned before I even stepped past the pantry door.

On it sat the ornate Riverfang tea service: a polished silver kettle steaming with boiling mint water, three fine porcelain cups painted with delicate blue forget-me-nots, and a small crystal bowl of honey. The porcelain rattled against the silver rim with every breath I took.

"Steady your hands, idiot," the head cook hissed from beside the hearth, shoving an embroidered linen cloth under my arm. "If you spill boiling water on the Duke, Tyler won't just skin you—he’ll hang the whole kitchen staff from the gateposts."

Behind me, Kael reached out and pinched the back of my shoulder, hard enough to leave a bruise through the coarse wool.

"Remember what I said," he whispered into the crown of my head. "Eyes on the flagstones. Walk to the high table, set the tray down by the Duke’s right hand, pour until the cup is three-quarters full, and step backward into the alcove. Don't look at his face. Don't make a sound."

He gave me a sharp shove between my shoulder blades.

I stumbled through the arched doorway and into the Great Hall.

The change in temperature was like walking into an oven. The great hearth was roaring with dry pine logs, sending waves of perfumed heat rolling across the room. The scent of roasted venison, spiced cider, and Beatrice’s lavender potpourri hung thick in the air, but beneath all of it lay a heavy, suffocating silence.

No one was laughing. No one was boasting about the winter hunt.

Along the perimeter of the hall stood fifty Lycan cataphracts. They were massive males, clad head-to-toe in black iron armor, their cloaks cut from dark wolf fur. They did not slouch. They did not chatter. They stood like carved monuments of dark stone, their hand-and-a-half broadswords resting pommel-up against their armored thighs. The air around them smelled of cold steel, mountain ozone, and ancient frost.

Every Riverfang warrior in the room sat frozen at the lower benches, looking down at their wooden trenchers like whipped dogs waiting for a beating.

I kept my head down, just as Kael had ordered.

Step. Slide. Step.

My bare feet made no sound against the polished gray flagstones, but the skin on the soles of my feet was cracked from the morning frost, sending sharp needles of pain up my calves with every stride.

At the head of the raised dais sat Alpha Tyler, his smile stretched so tight across his pale face that his graying beard looked crooked. Beside him, Beatrice sat with her back ramrod straight, one hand resting possessively on Camilla’s shoulder.

Camilla looked breathtaking. She wore an emerald velvet gown trimmed with white ermine, her golden curls pinned up with silver combs. Her cheeks were flushed with a delicate, healthy rose tint—a rosy color I had paid for in pure blood only an hour ago in the cold attic. She was smiling, tilting her chin in the elegant, practiced manner of a high-born lady, her blue eyes fixed with desperate charm on the male seated in the center chair.

And then I saw him.

Sitting in Tyler’s carved oak throne was Lord Cassian, Regent of the North.

Even seated, he looked enormous. His shoulders were broader than any warrior in Riverfang, draped in a massive mantle of midnight-black bear fur. He wore a high-collared tunic of black leather clasped with dull iron buckles, showing the hard, corded muscle of his throat. A jagged pale scar slashed down from his right temple, cutting across his cheekbone and ending at the corner of his jaw, giving his harsh, angular face the look of a ruined god.

His presence in the room wasn't just physical; it was an invisible, crushing weight. The air around him felt thin, cold, and charged with thunder.

*Don't look up,* I screamed at myself. *Look at the floor.*

I reached the edge of the high table.

My arms were shaking so violently that the silver kettle began to slide toward the edge of the platter. I dropped down onto one knee, the rough wool of my dress scraping against the cold stone, and raised the heavy tray toward the polished dark wood of the table.

"Ah, the tea," Tyler stammered, his voice unnaturally loud in the dead quiet of the room. "The wild mountain mint from our southern slopes, Lord Cassian. A soothing brew after your long ride through the snow."

I set the tray down. The silver legs clicked against the oak.

I reached out with my right hand, grasping the warm ivory handle of the kettle. My sleeve slid back two inches. The dark gray wool parted, exposing my wrist—the fresh, dark purple needle punctures from Beatrice’s brass syringe, and the faint, jagged black lines of Tyler’s suppression runes etched into the flesh beneath.

A sudden, sharp drop in the air made the hair on my arms stand straight up.

The warmth of the hearth fire seemed to vanish in an instant. A thin layer of white frost began to crawl across the polished surface of the table, spreading outward from where the Duke’s large, scarred hands rested on the wood.

I froze.

Slowly, against every survival instinct I possessed, my chin lifted.

My eyes met his.

They were not human eyes. They were not even the amber eyes of a normal wolf. They were molten gold—bright, fierce, and flecked with chips of pure obsidian.

And they were staring directly into mine.

The look wasn't cold. It wasn't bored. It was a terrifying, violent shock of pure recognition that hit me so hard the breath ripped completely from my lungs.