Semua Bab The Alpha’s Rejected Luna and Her Five Daughters: Bab 91 - Bab 100

The months passed with the same uneasy rhythm — quiet stretches of ordinary life interrupted by small reminders that danger, however distant it felt some days, hadn’t actually gone anywhere. Bonita’s pregnancy entered its final stretch, Freya visiting more frequently now, monitoring both boys with careful attention given the added strain twins placed on a body that had already survived so much in recent years. “Strong heartbeats, both of them,” Freya reported during one visit, her weathered hands moving with practiced ease. “You’re carrying them well, Luna, though I’d expect them early, given how crowded things have gotten in there.” “Early meaning how early,” Bonita asked. “A few weeks, perhaps,” Freya said. “Twins rarely wait for their full time. Best to have everything prepared sooner rather than later.” The household threw itself into preparation with enthusiasm, the girls helping Bonita ready a nursery large enough for two, Rosa insisting on painting small designs along one

The rider arrived at dusk, exhausted from hard travel, carrying news that spread through Kael’s household almost as quickly as it had apparently spread through Blackthorn itself. “Selene gave birth two days ago,” the rider reported, catching his breath before Kael and Bonita both. “A girl.” Bonita felt a complicated tangle of emotions at the news — old wariness about Selene’s true loyalties warring with something that still, despite everything, resembled sympathy for a woman facing the same cruel disappointment Bonita herself had once endured. “How did Drogo receive it,” Kael asked, though something in his tone suggested he already suspected the answer wouldn’t be good. The rider’s expression turned grim. “Badly, Alpha. Our contact says he flew into a rage the moment the healer confirmed the child’s sex — worse than anyone expected, given everything else weighing on him these past months. He’s cursed her publicly, apparently. Called her worthless, said she’d failed him exactly the

The weeks that followed carried a careful, watchful quality that gradually, despite everyone’s best efforts, began to soften into something closer to ordinary household rhythm. Selene proved quiet and unassuming in those early days, keeping mostly to herself and her daughter, appearing for meals but rarely lingering afterward, as though acutely aware of the scrutiny she remained under despite no one saying so directly. Freya — the infant, not the healer, which caused no small amount of gentle confusion among the household in those first weeks — grew steadily, and Bonita found herself, despite everything, softening toward the small girl in ways she hadn’t fully anticipated. “She has her mother’s eyes,” Bonita observed one afternoon, watching Selene feed her daughter in the garden while Bonita nursed her own sons nearby. “She does,” Selene agreed quietly. “I find myself hoping she doesn’t inherit much else from either of her parents, given how poorly that combination has served anyon

The evening started ordinarily enough — dinner finished, the younger children being settled for the night, Mira, now twelve and increasingly independent, off with Torin for her evening training session that had become as routine as meals themselves. Bonita spent the last hour before bedtime the way she usually did, moving between rooms, checking on each child in turn before finally settling into the nursery with Kaden and Soren. She hummed softly while she worked, an old, half-remembered tune from her own childhood, tucking blankets around each twin with the same careful attention she gave every night. Kael sat nearby, a stack of border reports balanced on his knee, though his attention drifted more toward watching Bonita with the boys than toward the papers themselves. “You hum that same song every night,” he observed. “I don’t think I’ve ever asked you what it is.” “I don’t fully remember,” Bonita admitted, smoothing Soren’s dark hair back from his forehead. “Something my mother

The following days blurred into a relentless, exhausting search that yielded nothing but growing despair. Kael’s scouts covered every mile of territory within reach, questioning travelers, checking every road and hidden path they could think to search. Corin and Ilsa poured over the journal again, searching desperately for anything that might explain how someone had bypassed the household’s defenses so completely, but found nothing that offered clear answers. “Whoever took him understood exactly what they were doing,” Corin admitted, exhaustion evident in every line of his face after the third sleepless night. “No trace, no evidence, nothing beyond the open window itself. That level of precision doesn’t happen by accident.” “Meaning what,” Kael asked, his own patience worn thin by days of fruitless searching. “Meaning I believe, more than ever, that Aldric’s warning was accurate,” Corin said grimly. “Someone close to this household was involved. I don’t see how an outside attacker