All Chapters of My Husband’s Brother Is My Mate?!: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

"No."My father's voice was flat and firm. He sat propped on pillows in a small stone cottage at the edge of the outer village, a blanket over his legs."Father, please. Mother Maren asked me to...""I do not care what a Priestess asked.""She said to ask about the last silver wolf of Ashford."A flicker crossed his face. Pain, sharp and old. He turned toward the window."That is not a story for today.""Then when?""When I am dead.""Father!""Selene." His voice cracked into a cough. It went on and on, rattling in his chest, and I rushed to hold his shoulders until it passed. When it finally eased, he lay back, gray and sweating."Do not ask me again," he whispered. "Please. I cannot."I wanted to scream. Instead, I nodded and tucked the blanket around him.He was worse here than in the caves. I could see it. The cough had grown deeper. His skin looked thin as paper. The healer came twice a day, but nothing helped."Rest," I said.He closed his eyes.I stood in the doorway for a long

"Three hundred and forty-two herb orders," Mara groaned. "In six months. Who needs this many herbs?""A kitchen with two hundred mouths," I said."I need a nap.""We have been here for two hours.""I need a nap that lasts two hours."We sat in the steward's office, a long, narrow room lined with ledgers. A single window let in a stripe of gray afternoon light. Mara slouched over a desk piled high with scrolls. Rhys leaned against a shelf near the door, still pale, his arm in a sling.He had not looked at me since we sat down.It was a quiet kind of agony. Standing in the same room, three feet away, not touching, not speaking. The bond hummed between us like a plucked string.He is trying, Thea whispered. So are you.I know."May I help, Luna?"A thin man stepped out from behind a tall cabinet. He was perhaps fifty, with gray hair slicked back from a narrow forehead. He wore a black vest and a silver chain of office around his neck. His smile was pleasant and a little too wide."Stewar

"Hello, dungeon," Mara said brightly. "You are damp and smell of regret."The guard who held her elbow glared at her. "Quiet.""I am being quiet. This is my quiet voice."I walked alongside them down the dark stairs, my nails digging into my palms. The guards had refused to let go of Mara. They had refused to let me speak to her. They had refused every plea until I threatened to shift and tear the door off its hinges.They locked her in the cell at the end of the corridor, three doors down from where the rogue had died.Mara stood in the middle of her new home and turned in a slow circle. Stone walls. A cot. A bucket."Well," she said. "It is cozier than my first apartment.""Mara, stop." My voice cracked.She stopped. She looked at me through the bars, and her bright face slipped. Underneath it, she was pale. Terrified."Selene," she whispered. "I did not do it.""I know.""I have never even touched silver. I faint when I stab myself with a sewing needle.""I know. I know that.""The

"A mint," I breathed.Rhys stood motionless beside the machine, the torch trembling in his hand."Not just a mint," he said. "A real one. Look at the die."He lifted the torch higher. The steel stamp at the top of the press shone in the light. It was perfect. Every line of the wolf's head. Every tiny star. A miniature crest cut by a master's hand."The official treasury die is kept in my brother's office," he said slowly. "Under lock and key. This is either a flawless copy or...""Or the original.""I did not say that.""You thought it."He was silent.I knelt beside the nearest crate and picked up a coin. It was warm from the cellar air, heavy in my palm. On the rim, almost invisible, was a tiny mark. A notch, cut in the shape of a thorn."What is this?"Rhys crouched beside me. He turned the coin in the torchlight, and his face went tight."A treasury mark," he said. "Only coins struck in the steward's office have it. It proves they are real.""Real Blackthorne silver.""Yes.""Whic

The paper curled and blackened.Cain watched it burn without blinking. The fire ate its way up the page, and ash drifted to the floor like dark snow. When the flame reached his fingers, he let go.He stood very still for a moment, staring at the last glowing scrap.Then he crushed it under his boot."Forgive me," he whispered.I almost did not hear it.He turned. His lamp swung across the shelves. Rhys's arm tightened around me, and I stopped breathing completely.Cain walked to the door. His footsteps echoed up the stairs. The iron door shut behind him with a long, hollow groan.Silence.I let out a breath that shook my whole body."Go," Rhys said hoarsely. "Quickly. Before he comes back."We slipped out from our hiding place. The air still smelled of smoke. On the floor beneath the lamp, a gray smear of ash lay scattered across the stone.I dropped to my knees and sifted through it with trembling fingers."Selene, we cannot...""Wait."My hand closed on something stiff. A corner of