Chapter 3

The stone floor at the Moon Goddess altar was bitterly cold.

By the third hour of kneeling, my shoulder was bleeding again. The Beta who'd brought me wanted to go get a healer. Before I could tell him I was fine, I pitched forward and went down.

Sometime in the night, I was burning up with fever.

Half-conscious, I found myself 13 again.

Kane stood in front of me with the wolves of Moonbridge at his back, like my savior.

He held his hand out to me. "Don't be scared. Nobody will dare push you around again. As long as I'm alive, I'll always protect you."

In the dream I reached for his hand, but all my fingers found was cold stone.

"Liar..."

My teeth were chattering from the fever, but I still mumbled in a small, wounded voice, "Uncle Kane, you said you'd always protect me. You're not allowed to break your promise..."

Someone wiped my tears away. The fingers lingered for a moment, then slowly pulled away.

When I woke up again, two days had passed.

My shoulder had been rebandaged, and someone had changed my bloody clothes. When Mae saw my eyes open, she hurried over with a glass of warm water.

The floating text was even more frantic than she was.

[Baby's awake! Kane's been by your side for two days. He called the healer in himself to treat your wound again, and at night he wiped the sweat off you to bring your fever down.]

[His eyes went red when he saw the blood on your shoulder. Can't you trust him one more time?]

I heard a car pull into the courtyard below.

[Kane heard you were awake. He left in the middle of a major deal and rushed straight back to Moonbridge!]

Still holding the glass, I couldn't stop myself from getting out of bed.

Kane had barely pushed the door open when I went to meet him.

"Unc—" The name I'd clung to for seven years almost slipped out, but I forced it back down. "What are you doing here?"

His face was thunderous. Before I could even reach him, he grabbed my arm.

"Did you use the Moonbridge Alpha's name to threaten the Alliance hospital into getting rid of Vivian?"

I stared at him. "What?"

"She finally landed a good job as a nurse at the Alliance hospital, and you made them fire her. She went to see the director today and broke her leg on the way."

So he'd walked out on his deal and rushed back just to get justice for Vivian.

"I never contacted the hospital."

Kane scoffed. "Her coworkers heard you threaten the director. In all of Moonbridge, no, in the whole North, who but you would have the nerve to threaten people in my name? And who else would want her gone just because I brought her home?"

His grip pulled at my arrow wound, but the words "who but you" hurt even more.

The moonstone, the dress, the fake tail. I didn't even know who ran the hospital. And every time, he'd decided I was guilty without checking the facts.

Anger shot through me. I lifted my chin, and my claws slid out of my fingertips.

"With my temper? If I really wanted her gone, I'd have thrown her out of Moonbridge on her first day. Why would I hide behind a phone call?

"When I say I didn't do it, I didn't do it. If you want proof, I'll go dig it up with you. And if it turns out you blamed me for nothing, you're apologizing to me in front of the whole pack!"

Kane stared at me, and his grip loosened a little.

Just then, his phone rang. Vivian's weak voice came through the speaker.

"Kane, don't blame Sandra... She told me in private once that I shouldn't work at the hospital. If I'd just listened sooner, none of this would've happened."

She paused, then added softly, "It's only one broken leg. The healer says it'll heal. Please don't fight with her over me anymore."

Every word she said was a plea on my behalf, and every word pinned the blame more firmly on me.

I was so angry I laughed. "Vivian, when did I ever talk to you in private?"

The line went quiet.

But Kane's eyes had gone cold again.

"She's hurt, and she's still standing up for you. And you? You can't even do the bare minimum and admit you were wrong. You're hopeless."

"I didn't do it. Why should I apologize?"

"Since you still won't own up to it," Kane said, letting go of me, "you can find out how it feels to have something you love taken away."

He signaled to Brody, one of the guards by the door.

Brody went upstairs and soon came back down carrying an old wooden chest.

It held everything my parents had left me.

My mother's cloak, my father's obsidian arrowheads, the letters they wrote me before they went off to war for the last time. All of it was in there.

The color drained from my face. I couldn't even feel the wound in my shoulder anymore.

"Kane, don't touch that."

He gave me one cold look. Then, without the slightest hesitation, he gave Brody his order.

"Burn it."