Chapter 4

Cedric can't move.

He'd stepped forward to help, to check the wound, to apologize for grabbing her, and instead he's frozen, staring at her exposed arm.

Goddess, those scars. Ugly, mean, twisted scars. They cover every visible inch of her arm.

She'd been the old Alpha's daughter. His sister. That should have meant something - protection, at minimum. And Iris had always been so strong, her wolf powerful even at fifteen. That's why he'd thought she could handle it. Why he'd convinced himself three years would teach her humility, help her grow up, cure that increasingly surly, angry, acting out teen.

She'd been pampered, he'd told himself. And that was the problem - why Iris couldn’t adjust when Viola came home, and suddenly she was not the only little sister, the only one doted on.

She’d never had to lift a finger, never faced real consequences. Unlike Viola, who'd spent years wandering, half-starved, developing that weak wolf condition that still hasn't healed. Iris needed to learn the world didn't revolve around her.

Good, he’d thought at the time, as terrible as the situation was. It will teach her humility. She’ll be all the better for it.

What a fool he’d been.

His hands are shaking at his sides.

For fifteen years, he'd cherished this girl. Knelt over every skinned knee.

And they’d hurt her.

Anger rolls through him, so much anger. His vision sharpens, Alpha instincts surging. Someone hurt his sister. Claws and canines project. Someone scarred her like an animal, and he's going to find them and -

Wait. He's not just staring at old wounds. There’s pain streaking across her face. Fresh blood wells from the gash on her arm where he'd grabbed her, running down her scarred arm. The sight triggers something primal: injured pack member, his responsibility, his sister.

Too rattled to even think of mindlink, he spins toward the hall. "You!" he barks at an Omega hurrying past with an armload of bedsheets. The woman nearly drops everything. "Get a healer. Now."

"Goddess," Viola gasps. It comes out breathy, faint. Her pupils swim as she stares at the scars and the gaping wound on Iris's arm. Her face goes white as snow and she sways on her feet.

Cursing, Cedric catches her before Viola crumbles, his arm around her waist.

"I'm alright," she says weakly, but she’s clearly not. Her weak wolf condition means she can’t handle stress, can’t regulate her nervous system. "Cedric, help Iris. She's bleeding."

Even now, dizzy and about to faint, she thinks of Iris first. The selflessness of it catches him off-guard.

Iris stands utterly still, her expression unreadable as blood continues to drip slowly down her arm. He wants to go to her, to help somehow -

But Viola’s breathing is shallow and rapid. She just got over being sick and he’s afraid what this shock to her system will mean.

"Says a lot about you, Vi, that you'd try to help your sister when you’re literally about to pass out.” He gives her a half smile, keeping his voice gentle, as he guides her toward the nearby settee. “But I need to make sure you don’t collapse and crack your head open first.”

It's the practical choice. Logical. Iris is standing, conscious, and her wolf will start healing that wound any minute now, Cedric thinks.

Because of course he’d choose Viola first, Iris thinks. He’ll always choose Viola first.

Cedric’s jaw tightens. The contrast between his sisters couldn’t be sharper. Viola wanted him to look after their Iris - in the middle of fainting, for fuck’s sake. And Iris. Look at her. At the way she’s looking at him. Nothing but coldness, nothing but ice.

"I need to get Viola to the healer. Use your wolf to heal that," he barks, voice coming out rougher than he meant. "We can’t have you bleeding all over the place during the Queen’s welcome dinner.”

Iris doesn’t clock any of the flustered, conflicted guilt buried beneath the Alpha command. She watches him help Viola to her feet, supporting her weight as they disappear to find the healer. The one he’d called for Iris.

Iris is used to this by now. But that doesn’t stop the hurt that slams into her while she cradles her throbbing arm, alone, blood dripping onto the polished wood floor.

Use your wolf, he'd said. He was so focused on rescuing Viola. He hadn’t given her a chance, just a few moments, to tell him. Not about that, or about anything else she’d been through.

The first time they'd locked her in that cramped, pitch black room - the one they called "reformation class" with such casual cruelty - she'd shifted, trying to use her wolf to break free.

The silver cuffs came after that. They shackled her wrists with them every “lesson.” Cold metal burned into her wrists until her wolf grew weaker. Until one day, she simply stopped answering.

Iris doesn't know if her wolf is dead or just hiding so deep she'll never find her again.

She suspects, sometimes, that the brutality was targeted. That obliterating that primal part of her had been the point. But that’s a problem for later, when she has the energy to care about - anything at all, really. Right now, she needs to stop bleeding and get cleaned up for dinner.

She descends the stairs . She could probably find an empty guest room on her own, but after three years away, she has no idea what's occupied, what's been repurposed, or what will cause another incident with Cedric.

The first floor is bustling again in preparation for dinner. Hungry-sick, but none of the Omegas she knew are in sight.

“Can someone just tell me what guest rooms are open?” she calls to no one in particular.

A burly, grey-haired omega shakes her head, muttering to another Omega who nods in approval, "Just a nobody who causes trouble."

Heat flashes through Iris. They don't even know her. Guess her so-called family's done a great job filling everyone in.

Word gets around fast, she's about to retort sarcastically, heart pounding, but the world tilts sideways.Iris hardly registers it. Her stomach lurches. Sound rushes from her ears. Her vision tunnels.

Strong arms catch her. His familiar scent hits her before her vision clears. As the room comes back into view, she sees Silas - tall, slim, devil-may-care Silas, the second-born triplet - with the strangest look in his eyes.

She’s trying to read it and starts to mumble something to him, when a sharp voice cuts from behind.

“You weren’t so helpless when you pushed Viola.”

Cassian. The youngest triplet and built like a warrior - all hard angles.

He appears at Silas’s shoulder, with barely controlled fury, the dimples that soften his face on the rare occasions when he smiles nowhere in sight, “So what are you pretending for now?"