Semua Bab My Mate's Father Claimed Me: Bab 161 - Bab 170

 POV: JakePeace never arrives quietly, It kicks in doors and demands structure.“This silence is wrong,” Ryker says under his breath. “Rooms like this only go quiet when people are sharpening ideas.”“They’re already sharpening knives,” I reply. “Ideas come later.”Across the council table, chairs scrape softly, papers shift. Nobody meets anyone else’s eyes for too long. The air in the chamber feels thick, heavy with the scent of old parchment and fresh sweat. These people aren't just leaders; they are survivors who have suddenly realized they are no longer the apex predators of their own narrative.An elder clears his throat, the sound grating like sandpaper on stone. “We should begin.”“Begin what,” I ask, leaning back. “The pretending or the claiming.”A few heads lift, guilt flickers in some eyes;

 POV: Darius“He did not choose to be absent, he chose defiance.”That was the mistake everyone else made.They thought refusal was the end of the story.I felt it the moment the boy spoke, not the sound of his voice but the shape of it. The way the world bent slightly to listen and then did not bend back. Power usually announces itself with pressure. This did not. It settled like something deciding it would stay.Interesting.Hope rippled outward like a dropped stone in deep water, Not the kind people sing about. This was quieter, disorganizing and dangerous.Hope makes structures nervous.I leaned against the fractured edge of what remained of my sanctuary, letting the aftershock wash through me. My body was still knitting itself together. Power leaked unevenly through old scars, I could feel every place I had been broken.Still standing.That alone

 POV: Lyra“The story didn’t end. It learned how to breathe.”The land is quiet in the way a held breath is quiet.Not empty, not calm. Just waiting.I stand at the edge of the terrace with my hands resting lightly against the stone railing, feeling the faint vibration beneath my palms. It is not healing, not breaking, It is adjusting, like a spine settling into a new posture.Behind me, Miranda clears her throat.“You’re standing too still,” she says.I don’t turn. “You taught me that stillness is not the same as surrender.”She steps closer, her staff tapping once against the stone. “I taught you that stillness is how you listen when movement would lie to you.”I finally looked at her. “Then what do you hear?”Miranda studies the horizon before answering. “Momentum.”“That’s not

 POV: JakeI have always been good at standing still while everything else moved.That is what being Beta teaches you. You anchor, You absorb and You make space for louder men and call it balance.Tonight, the land hums beneath my boots, restless in a way it never was before the boy spoke to the crowd. Power shifted, everyone felt it but some of us just pretended we didn’t.I walk past the training grounds without stopping. Past the hall where Kael’s voice still echoes in the beams. Past the rooms where Lyra’s presence seems to soften the walls themselves.I do not go inside.If I do, I might remember why I stayed loyal this long.I stop at the boundary where the wards thin, where the land doesn’t guard so much as observe. This is where Darius said he would be.“You came,” his voice says, smooth as a blade drawn slowly.“I didn’t come for you,” I answered

 POV: Kael The medallion against my chest didn’t just pulse; it screamed.  It was a jagged, rhythmic heat that seared through my leather vest, a silent alarm tied to the house's foundation and to Lyra’s life.  I had been lured five miles out by a ghost trail of scent and shadow, a classic misdirection I’d been too arrogant to see through. “Father!” a voice barked from the brush.Aiden emerged, his face pale and his breathing ragged. He was supposed to be at the northern outpost. “The perimeter is empty,” he gasped. “The guards... they didn't leave. They were dismissed by Jake.” The ice in my veins turned to liquid fire. I didn't wait for the rest of his report.  We ran back to the house, the air felt like it was made of broken glass. I skidded into the clearing and stoppe