Semua Bab The Alpha Rejected Me, His Father Claimed Me: Bab 51 - Bab 60

Hollow Court looked exactly the way Aeloria remembered it from the night of the Trial, tall grey walls rising against a pale sky, banners from a dozen packs snapping in the wind above the gates. It felt different arriving this time. Less like a woman walking toward her future, more like a woman walking toward a verdict."Wystan's waiting just inside," Kaelen said, helping Elga down from the horse with careful hands. "He'll have arranged rooms, and I'd imagine he'll want to hear everything himself before we go anywhere near that chamber.""How much time do we have?""The session's tomorrow morning. Voss made sure of that when he called it. Not enough time for us to properly prepare, and exactly enough time for him to look patient instead of rushed." Kaelen's jaw was tight. "It's a clever move. I'd almost admire it, if it weren't aimed at burying you."Wystan met them in the entrance hall, older and greyer than Aeloria remembered from Silver Hollow, worry etched into every line of h

The paper fell from her hands before she'd fully finished reading it, and for one long moment the room seemed to tilt sideways around her."No!" The word came out small, disbelieving. "No, she was safe. Corvin promised she was safe.""Corvin did everything right." Wystan's voice was gentle even through his own visible distress. "The outpost was hidden, guarded, chosen specifically because nobody outside the household should have known its location. Whoever did this knew anyway.""The spy." Kaelen's voice had gone flat and cold. "Bram gave us everything he knew. But if Voss recruited more than one…""We don't have time to solve that riddle tonight." Aeloria was already moving, pulling her boots on with hands that wouldn't stop shaking. "I need to go. Now.""Aeloria!" Kaelen caught her by the shoulders, forcing her to look at him. "The note says come alone. You understand what that means. It means walking directly into whatever Voss has built for you, with no one at your side to pu

The outpost appeared at dusk on the second day, a low cluster of stone buildings half-swallowed by forest, clearly built for a purpose nobody had used it for in years. Valthor reined in at the treeline, studying it with narrowed eyes."This isn't an active Iron Fang position," he said quietly. "It's too far from Draven's actual territory. Whoever's using it isn't doing so with his knowledge, or his permission."Draven had gone very still beside him, staring at the low stone walls like they might rearrange themselves into something less familiar if he looked long enough. "I built that outpost myself, twenty years ago. Abandoned it when the border shifted east. I never imagined anyone would still remember it was there.""You never authorized anyone to use it again?" Aeloria asked."Not a soul. I'd have known." Draven's hands had curled into fists at his sides. "Which means whoever's inside those walls right now put themselves there without my knowledge, using my family's name as cov

Silver Hollow's gates opened to them at dawn, two days later, the household spilling out into the courtyard with a relief so raw it was almost its own kind of grief. Nyra reached Thessaly first, pulling her into an embrace that nearly knocked them both off balance. For a while the courtyard was nothing but noise and tears, everyone counting heads, finding, against every fear of the last week, that the count still held. "Ten silver," Nyra said, laughing and crying at once, still holding on. "You still owe me ten silver, and I have never in my life been so glad to have someone alive to collect it from." "I don't even remember what the bet was for." "Neither do I. Doesn't matter. Pay up eventually." Nyra finally pulled back, wiping her face with the back of one hand, some of her usual sharpness returning even through the tears. "Go rest. You look like you rode through three separate wars to get here, which, I gather, is roughly accurate." Thessaly clung to Nyra a moment longer, q

Valthor left the study within minutes of Aeloria's words, Corvin catching his arm at the door before he could vanish into the dark alone."Talk to her. Don't accuse her outright, not yet. If there's a reasonable explanation, we want to hear it before we've already made her our enemy.""And if there isn't one?""Then we'll deal with that when we have to." Corvin's grip loosened. "Go easy, Valthor. Whatever she's done, remember she's still someone's daughter, and someone's fiancée, and shouting at her in the dark isn't likely to get us anything useful."He told himself, walking the dark paths between the hedgerows, that he was only confirming what Nyra had seen, that there would be some ordinary explanation waiting, a late walk, a restless night, nothing more sinister than that. He didn't believe it by the time he found her.The garden was cold at this hour, mist clinging low over the beds Aeloria had planted during the household's recovery. Valthor's breath fogged before him as he