Tous les chapitres de : Chapitre 31 - Chapitre 40

Tahlia's POV"I was there."Nadia said it before I could speak, before the cell door had even finished closing behind the guard. She stood on the other side of the narrow table with her hands clenched so tight the knuckles had gone white. No polished smile. No careful performance. No soft tilt of the head that used to make people side with her before I finished a sentence. Just fear, raw and poorly hidden, sitting openly on a face that had spent years learning how to hide everything that mattered.I stayed standing. The cell was cold enough to bite through cloth. My wrists still ached from the earlier restraints. Somewhere beyond the door a guard shifted his weight, armor soft against stone. "Say that again.""I was at the palace that night." Her voice shook, but she forced it steady, as if steadiness alone could make the words survivable. "The recording is real. I carried a tray through that corridor. I went toward the Alpha King's private rooms. But I didn't poison him. I swear it o

Tahlia's POV"Who was he?"The question left my mouth before my mother could retreat from her last confession. The sitting room still held the weight of her words, your father isn't your biological father, like a third person standing between us. I gave her no room to soften it, explain it away, or turn it into another story about protection.She closed her eyes briefly. When she opened them, the performance was gone."His name was Kael Draven," she said. "Alpha of the old Northridge line. Powerful. Respected. Feared by the right people. During the last royal conflict, before the alliance fully stabilized, he vanished. Officially he died in the border purges. Unofficially, he was hunted for what his bloodline carried. The same bloodline you carry."I stared at her. "Say that again. Slowly.""Kael Draven. Northridge. He was your biological father.""And the man who raised me? The one who sat at our table for twenty-five years and looked through me like I was furniture?""He knew. Not a

Tahlia's POV"She doesn't belong in this room."I heard it before I saw who'd said it. General Kastor, pitched just low enough to pretend it wasn't for me. I set my ledger down, squared it against the war table, and let the silence stretch.Ronan filled it. "She has more insight into this kingdom's resources than anyone here. She stays.""With respect, Alpha Prince, this is war, not ledgers.""War runs on ledgers, General." I looked up. "Every battalion your scouts counted needs to eat. If the supply lines behind them collapse in six days, it won't matter how clever your formations were." I let that land. "I'm not asking for your respect. I'm asking for a seat at this table until the war is won."Kastor didn't answer. Ronan's silence beside me had already decided it for him."Get her the requisition ledgers," Ronan said. "Everything. If she says we have a supply problem in six days, I want to know today."The war room became my world for three days."We have grain reserves for eleven

Ronan's POV"You're her father." My voice came out steadier than I felt, blade still raised, the circle of warriors still closed tight around me. "Kael Draven.""I am." He stepped fully into the torchlight, and for one disorienting moment I searched his face for Tahlia's: the sharp intelligence in his eyes, the same unhurried patience she wore when she was three steps ahead of everyone in a room. "And I imagine you have questions. Later, there will be time. Right now, there's someone who's waited far longer than I have to stand in front of you."He didn't lower his hand. He raised it, a small gesture, and the circle of warriors parted.A single figure walked through the gap, unarmed, unhurried, dressed not in battle leathers but in the deep gray robes of the royal court. My stomach dropped before my mind caught up to what my eyes were telling me."Adviser Corwin."He'd sat two seats down from my father at council for eleven years. Trade routes, treaty language, the tedious machinery o

Tahlia's POV"Explain," I said again, when he didn't answer fast enough. "You're standing over an unconscious king with your hand at his throat. Give me a reason not to assume the worst."Kael straightened slowly, hands lifting away from the King in a gesture meant to look harmless. It didn't. Nothing about him looked harmless: not the calm in his voice, not the ease with which he'd stepped between two guards without either managing to stop him."I was checking whether he still breathes," he said. "He does. Barely. Whatever Corwin used to poison him was designed to weaken, not kill outright. A slow unraveling instead of a clean end. I imagine that was intentional. A king too weak to rule but too alive to replace keeps a throne conveniently unstable for a very long time.""And you just happened to be standing over him when I arrived.""I arrived because Corwin's men came for him first, and I got here before they finished the job." His eyes didn't waver from mine. "Believe that or don't