I didn’t sleep that night.
Not because of the bond—though it pulsed like a second heartbeat beneath my skin, a constant, insistent reminder of Kaelen’s presence, even through the stone walls separating our chambers.
Not because of the dream—though it came anyway, uninvited, unrelenting: his mouth on my neck, his hands sliding down my spine, the low, rough sound of my name on his lips. Garnet. Like a vow. Like a curse.
No.
I didn’t sleep because I was planning.
The Council’s mandate had changed everything. Ninety days. Ninety days of proximity, of forced compliance, of being tethered to the man I’d sworn to destroy. If I broke the bond, war erupted. If I fled, I died. If I killed him, I died with him.
But they hadn’t said I couldn’t ruin him.
I sat on the edge of the bed, my fingers tracing the sigil on my wrist. It still glowed faintly, a thorned circle etched into my flesh, a brand no amount of scrubbing could remove. I’d tried earlier, with hot water and a rough stone, until my skin was raw and bleeding. The mark hadn’t faded. If anything, it had burned brighter, as if mocking my defiance.
Now, I studied it like a battlefield map.
Kaelen thought he’d won. He’d used the Council’s decree to trap me, to force me into his world, his rules, his proximity. He believed the bond would break me. That desire would erode my resolve. That eventually, I’d surrender—not just to the magic, but to him.
He was wrong.
I wasn’t here to surrender.
I was here to dismantle.
And the best way to destroy an empire?
Start with the alliances.
The Southern Pack had been negotiating a truce with the Northern Clan for months. A fragile peace, brokered through trade agreements, shared patrols, and the promise of mutual defense against Vampire incursions. Kaelen needed that alliance. Without it, the Northern Pack stood alone—vulnerable.
And vulnerable men make mistakes.
I’d spent the last two days gathering information—slipping questions into conversations with servants, eavesdropping on Sentinels in the training yard, watching the comings and goings of couriers. The next supply caravan—loaded with silver-coated weapons, medicinal herbs, and encrypted scrolls detailing troop movements—was set to depart at dawn. It would travel through the Blackfen Pass, a narrow, mist-choked ravine known for bandit attacks and Fae illusions.
Perfect.
If the caravan disappeared, the Southern Pack would accuse the Northern Clan of betrayal. The truce would collapse. Kaelen’s authority would weaken. And in the chaos, I’d find my opening.
I just had to make it look like someone else did it.
At midnight, I slipped from my chamber, dressed in dark wool and soft leather boots, my hair bound tight beneath a hood. The fortress was quiet, the corridors lit only by flickering torches. I moved like a shadow, avoiding the main halls, sticking to servant passages and narrow stairwells. My magic was still bound—Lyra’s dampener had worn off hours ago, and I wasn’t foolish enough to remove the suppression sigil again—but I didn’t need it for this.
I just needed a knife. And a lie.
The stables were at the far end of the lower courtyard, a long stone building with arched doors and the rich, earthy scent of hay and horse. Three wagons stood ready, loaded and covered with oilcloth. Sentinels patrolled the perimeter, their breath visible in the cold night air. I crouched behind a stack of firewood, watching, waiting.
Then I saw him.
Riven.
Kaelen’s Beta. Broad-shouldered, dark-haired, with eyes that missed nothing. He stood near the lead wagon, speaking to the driver—a grizzled werewolf with a scar across his cheek. They were close. Too close. I couldn’t hear the words, but the tension in Riven’s posture told me everything: he was giving orders. Final instructions.
And then he stepped back, nodded once, and turned toward the fortress.
Now.
I waited until he was out of sight, then darted across the courtyard, low and fast. The nearest wagon was already sealed, but the second—one carrying the encrypted scrolls—had a loose strap. I yanked it open, reached inside, and pulled out a single scroll case, carved from black oak and sealed with wax. The Southern Pack’s insignia was stamped into the lid: a coiled serpent beneath a crescent moon.
Perfect.
I tucked it into my belt, then reached for the vial in my pocket—Dr. Vale’s concoction, a blend of iron dust and nightshade that would corrode the silver coating on the weapons, rendering them useless. One drop on each blade would be enough.
But as I lifted the oilcloth, a hand closed around my wrist.
I froze.
“Going somewhere?”
Lyra.
She stood behind me, pale as moonlight, her violet eyes sharp in the dark. She wore a simple gray dress, her white-blond hair loose around her shoulders. No weapons. No glamour. Just that quiet, knowing look.
“I could ask you the same,” I said, pulling my wrist free.
“I was looking for you,” she said. “Kaelen’s been asking.”
“Let him ask.”
She stepped closer, her voice dropping. “You’re sabotaging the caravan.”
It wasn’t a question.
I didn’t answer.
She sighed. “Garnet, if you’re caught—”
“I won’t be.”
“And if you are? If they trace it back to you? The Council mandate is already hanging over your head. One misstep, and Kaelen won’t be able to protect you.”
“He’s not protecting me,” I snapped. “He’s imprisoning me.”
“Is that what you think?” She tilted her head. “Because from where I’m standing, he’s the only thing standing between you and a death sentence.”
I turned back to the wagon, my fingers tightening around the vial. “Then I’ll die fighting. Better than living on my knees.”
She was silent for a long moment. Then: “The Southern Pack won’t believe an attack. Not without proof. You need to make it look like a Crimson Court operation.”
I stilled. “What?”
She reached into her sleeve and pulled out a small, blood-red pendant—shaped like a fang, set in black silver. A Vampire sigil. “Leave this at the scene. Plant it near the wreckage. And smear a few drops of Crimson blood on the wheels—there’s a storage barrel in the east cellar. Take only what you need.”
I stared at her. “Why are you helping me?”
“Because I want to see what happens when Kaelen Thorne finally meets someone he can’t control,” she said, a faint smile touching her lips. “And because… I think you’re more than just a weapon.”
I didn’t know what to say.
So I took the pendant.
“Be careful,” she whispered. “And Garnet?”
“Yes?”
“Don’t forget who you’re really fighting.”
Then she was gone, melting into the shadows like mist.
I finished the sabotage quickly—drizzling the nightshade solution over the weapons, planting the pendant, smearing a few drops of stolen Vampire blood on the wagon’s iron wheel. Then I slipped back into the fortress, heart pounding, hands steady.
By dawn, the caravan was gone.
And by midday, the news arrived.
Attacked in the Blackfen Pass. Wiped out. No survivors. The wreckage showed signs of Vampire involvement—blood on the wheels, the fang pendant found near the lead wagon. The Southern Pack’s Alpha sent a furious message: “If this is how the Northern Clan honors truce, then we have no peace.”
I watched from the balcony as Kaelen received the scroll.
He stood in the courtyard, Riven at his side, the morning sun glinting off his black leather. His expression didn’t change—no rage, no shock, just a slow, dangerous stillness, like a storm gathering behind his eyes. He read the message once. Then again. Then he crumpled it in his fist.
Riven said something—low, urgent.
Kaelen looked up.
And his gaze locked onto mine.
Not suspicion.
Knowledge.
He knew.
And for the first time since I’d walked into this fortress, I felt a flicker of fear.
Not of him.
Of what I’d just done.
The consequences.
The Southern Pack would retaliate. Patrols would clash. Blood would be spilled. And all of it—on my hands.
But I didn’t look away.
I held his stare, unflinching, my chin lifted, my heart pounding not with guilt, but with defiance.
Let him come.
Let him punish me.
Because this was war.
And I wasn’t going to win it on my knees.
That night, I sat by the fire in my chamber, a book open in my lap—Historical Blood Pacts of the Northern Clans—though I wasn’t reading. My mind was still on the caravan. On the Southern Alpha’s message. On the way Kaelen had looked at me.
The door opened.
I didn’t turn.
“You’re not fooling anyone,” I said. “I know why you’re here.”
Kaelen stepped inside, closing the door behind him. He wore no armor tonight—just dark trousers and a fitted shirt, his sleeves rolled to the elbows, revealing the sigil on his wrist. He didn’t speak. Just walked to the hearth, crouched beside the flames, and stoked the fire with a poker.
The silence stretched.
Then: “You think this weakens me.”
His voice was low. Calm. Too calm.
“Doesn’t it?” I asked, turning a page I hadn’t read.
“It makes me look weak,” he said. “To the outside. To the Southern Pack. To the Council.”
“And?”
He turned his head, gold eyes catching the firelight. “And I don’t care.”
I looked up. “You don’t care that your alliance is crumbling?”
“Alliances crumble every day,” he said. “What matters is whether the Alpha stands.”
“And do you?”
“I do,” he said, standing. “Because I know who did this.”
My breath caught.
“You think I don’t?” he continued. “You think I didn’t smell the nightshade on the weapons? The Vampire blood—too fresh, too convenient? And that pendant?” He reached into his pocket and pulled it out—the fang sigil, glinting in the firelight. “You left it. But you didn’t count on Lyra telling me where it came from.”
I stood, my pulse roaring. “So what? You’ll punish me? Lock me up? Kill me?”
“No,” he said, stepping closer. “I’ll let you keep playing.”
“What?”
“You want to sabotage me?” he asked, voice dropping. “Go ahead. Try. Burn my caravans. Poison my alliances. Turn my enemies against me.”
He was inches from me now, his heat pressing against my skin, the bond flaring between us like a live wire.
“But know this,” he whispered. “Every move you make, I’ll be watching. Every lie you tell, I’ll see through. And every time you try to destroy me—”
His hand rose, slow, deliberate, and brushed my cheek.
“—you’ll only prove how much you feel me.”
I slapped his hand away. “I feel nothing.”
“Liar,” he said, not flinching. “You feel the bond. You feel my touch. You feel the way your pulse jumps when I’m near.”
“That’s not desire,” I spat. “That’s revulsion.”
“Then why,” he murmured, leaning in, “does your body still burn for me?”
His breath was hot against my ear. My fangs ached. My skin flushed. The sigil on my wrist glowed, warm and insistent.
I wanted to push him. To draw my blade. To make him pay for the way my body betrayed me.
But I didn’t.
Because he was right.
And the worst part?
I didn’t hate him for it.
He stepped back, his expression unreadable. “Sleep well, Garnet. Tomorrow, we have a funeral to attend.”
“A funeral?”
“For the caravan guards,” he said. “We honor our dead. Even the ones who died because of your choices.”
Then he was gone.
I stood there, trembling, not from cold, but from the fire in my veins.
I had come here to destroy him.
But with every move I made, I was only binding myself tighter.
And the worst part?
I wasn’t sure I wanted to stop.
The funeral was at dusk.
A pyre stood in the center of the courtyard, stacked with pine and sage, the bodies of the six guards wrapped in white linen. The pack gathered in silence, heads bowed, eyes solemn. Kaelen stood at the front, torch in hand, his expression carved from stone.
I stood at the back, apart, watching.
He lit the pyre.
The flames roared to life, casting long shadows across the stone. He spoke—low, steady, words of honor, of loyalty, of loss. He didn’t mention the sabotage. Didn’t accuse. Didn’t rage.
He just mourned.
And in that moment, I saw it—the weight he carried. Not just as Alpha, but as a man. The burden of command. The cost of survival. The loneliness of power.
My mother had died by his father’s hand.
But this man?
He wasn’t his father.
And I wasn’t sure I wanted him to be.
As the flames burned, I felt it—the bond, pulsing, not with desire this time, but with something deeper.
Sorrow.
And for the first time, I wondered—
What if the real enemy wasn’t him?
What if it was the curse?
What if it was me?
The pyre burned late into the night.
I stayed until the last ember faded.
And when I finally turned to go, I didn’t look back.
But I felt his gaze on me.
Heavy.
Knowing.
And for the first time, I didn’t fight it.