Chapter 2

Mara's POV

The severance chamber smelled like my fertility medicine.

Captain Orsik locked the iron door and refused to meet my eyes. The chamber was older than the packhouse above it, built from black stone and silver-veined mortar. A narrow cot sat against one wall. At the center of the room stood a waist-high ritual table fitted with leather straps.

I had attended two voluntary bond severings as Luna. Neither had involved straps.

"Orsik."

He stopped outside the bars.

"Look at me."

He did. His face looked ten years older than it had that morning.

"Is Gideon planning to use the old severance blade?"

"I don't know."

"You are a terrible liar."

He exhaled through his nose. "Mara, please. Do not make me choose between you and my Alpha."

"He already made you choose. That is why I am behind a locked door."

He looked tense. I stepped closer to the bars. "What happens at midnight?"

"The Concord priest is coming."

"And?"

"They said the bond has become unstable."

"That sounds very official."

"Mara."

"Will they cut my mate's mark?"

Silence answered me. A severance blade did not simply break a bond. Used incorrectly, it could damage the wolf beneath it. That's why the Concord banned forced severings three generations ago. Apparently, rules became flexible when an Alpha needed a pregnant mistress recognized quickly.

"Orsik, open the door."

He looked genuinely pained. "I can't."

"You can. You won't. There is a difference."

His hand tightened around the key ring. Footsteps sounded behind him. Orsik straightened immediately. Vivian appeared at the end of the corridor carrying a ceramic cup. She had changed out of the silver ceremonial dress and into a dark wool gown. My necklace still rested at her throat.

I gripped the bars. "You have remarkable timing."

"Leave us," she told Orsik.

He hesitated. Vivian's smile sharpened. "Do I need to remind you who Luna will be by morning?" He looked at me once, then walked toward the stairs.

"Coward," I said.

"He's practical," Vivian replied. "You used to appreciate that quality."

She stopped in front of the cell and held out the cup. The bitter herbal scent reached me immediately, unmistakably moonroot. I knew it because I had spent six years swallowing it. My stomach turned.

"Drink."

"No."

"It will keep the server from hurting as much."

I laughed. "That is nearly kind."

"You always mistake softness for kindness."

"And I mistook you for a friend. We are both having educational evenings."

Her mouth tightened. I pointed at the cup. "Was that in my fertility medicine?" Vivian did not answer.

"Say it."

"You are in no position to order me."

"Then consider it professional curiosity. You were my healer for six years. What did you make me drink?"

She looked down at the dark liquid.

"Moonroot. Silverbind. A few stabilizers."

My fingers went numb against the bars. Silverbind was not a fertility drug. They used it on violent wolves after uncontrolled shifts because it dulled the connection between human and wolf.

"You suppressed my wolf."

"We protected you from it."

"For six years?"

"Longer."

My chest went hollow. I stared at her. "How long?"

"Your father began the regimen when you were fourteen. It stopped after he died. Six years ago, Gideon found the old notes and restarted it when the fevers returned. I adjusted the dose when your body became resistant."

The corridor seemed to tilt. My father had been dead eight years.

"You're lying."

"I wish I were. It would make tonight less complicated."

"Why?"

Vivian's composure cracked for the first time.

"Because when your wolf wakes, people obey you."

"That is how Alphas work. I am not an Alpha."

"No. You are worse."

She pushed the cup through the narrow slot beneath the bars.

"Drink it, Mara. You were happier when you believed you were ordinary."

I watched the relief wash across her face when I picked up the cup. I instantly smashed it against the wall. Vivian flinched as ceramic shattered on impact and the dark medicine sprayed across the stone.

"I spent years wondering what was wrong with my body," I said. My voice sounded strange even to me, low and steady. "I apologized to Gideon for failing him. I let specialists cut into me because you both told me there was still hope."

"Mara--"

"Did the drugs make me infertile?"

She looked away. That was enough. I moved so fast the bars shook when I hit them. Vivian stumbled backward.

"You let me grieve for children I was never allowed to have."

"You think I wanted this?" she snapped. "Do you think it was easy watching him choose you every year when I could give him what the pack needed?"

There it was. Resentment.

"You could have had any man in Ironwood."

"I wanted the one who mattered."

"Then congratulations. You got him."

Her eyes went to my broken mate chain.

"Not while that bond still exists."

She stepped closer to the bars again.

"Midnight ends it. After that, the Concord recognizes my child, and you become a private citizen with no claim to Ironwood. If you cooperate, Gideon might let you live quietly somewhere south."

"How generous."

"If you do not cooperate, the priest will use force."

I looked past her toward the stairs.

"How many guards?"

Suspicion narrowed her eyes. "What?"

"At midnight. How many guards are coming?"

"Enough."

I nodded. "Good to know." Vivian stared at me for another second, then turned away.

"You should drink water. The drugs are leaving your system faster than expected."

"Is that why Gideon's command failed?"

Vivian hesitated before she answered.

"Yes."

My pulse quickened at the implication.

"And what happens when they are completely gone?"

Vivian looked back over her shoulder.

"That is what everyone is afraid to find out."

When she left, I sat on the cot for three minutes. The oath chambers had been rebuilt after the flood six winters ago. I knew that because I had supervised the repairs while Gideon negotiated with southern packs.

The masons had complained about an old service conduit behind the western wall. I remembered approving a false stone panel so workers could access the drainage channel without tearing up the floor. Lunas were apparently useful until somebody needed them helplessly. I stood up and dragged the cot across the room and examined the mortar.

The panel was still there. It took me twenty minutes to loosen it with the metal edge of the washbasin. By the time it shifted, my palms were bleeding. Voices sounded on the stairs.

"The priest is early," someone said.

I shoved the panel inward. A narrow black gap opened behind it. The cell door rattled.

"Mara?"

Orsik. I squeezed into the passage.

"Mara!"

The iron door opened behind me.

"She's gone!"

I crawled through dust and frozen mud while boots thundered into the chamber. The passage narrowed until stone scraped both shoulders. I kept moving. Behind me, someone found the opening and shouted.

"East conduit! Cut her off outside!"

I moved faster. The tunnel ended above an old drainage channel beyond the inner wall. I dropped six feet into the snow and landed badly on one knee. Pain flashed up my leg. I got up anyway. The eastern gate was already closing. I ran north. A command cracked through the pack link. MARA, STOP.

Gideon's voice hit every wolf in Ironwood. I felt the force of it. I felt the expectation inside my bones, the place where obedience should have lived. Nothing happened. I kept running. His shock came through the link before he cut it.

"Find her!" someone shouted behind me.

Wolves shifted in the courtyard. I reached the frozen river as paws pounded through the trees. The bridge was too far west. The ice below me was thin and black, moving over deep water. I had two choices.

Go back to the men carrying a severance blade, or trust a river that had killed three hunters last winter.

"This is a terrible decision," I told myself.

Then I jumped. The ice broke under my second step, and the cold swallowed me whole. For one second, I could not tell which way was up. My dress dragged around my legs while the current pulled me beneath the ice. A voice that was not mine growled inside my head. Swim.

My eyes flew open underwater. The voice came again, furious and female. SWIM, MARA. I kicked toward the pale blur above me. My hand broke through ice, then my shoulder. I dragged myself onto the bank and lay there coughing until voices carried from the other side of the river.

"She crossed!"

"Alpha said north. Move!"

I forced myself up. The trees changed after another hour. Ironwood pine gave way to steep black fir, and the air smelled colder, cleaner. A stone marker rose beside the trail. BLACK HOLLOW TERRITORY.

Black Hollow did not answer to Gideon. Its Warden enforced northern treaty law and had publicly threatened three Alphas in the last year. He might arrest me, or return me. At least Gideon would have to ask first. I crossed the marker. A metal cable snapped around my ankle, and I hit the ground.

The ward trap tightened, dragging my leg out from under me. I rolled onto my back as a huge black wolf stepped between the trees. His eyes were silver. The moment he caught my scent, his head snapped toward me. A low growl rolled through his chest, but instead of lunging, he moved over me, planting himself between my body and the dark forest as if anything coming through those trees would have to go through him first. A man emerged behind him carrying a crossbow.

He was tall and broad-shouldered, with dark hair and no royal jewelry or ceremonial coat, only black winter leather and the expression of a man who had been interrupted during something important.

"Do not move," he said.

"Wasn't planning to. Your trap has opinions."

His gaze dropped to my bleeding feet and torn dress, then to the broken mate chain around my wrist.

"Mara Voss-Thorne?"

My stomach tightened. "Who is asking?"

"Ronan Vale. Warden of Black Hollow."

Of course he was. He lowered the crossbow slightly.

"Ironwood sent a warrant twenty minutes ago."

I swallowed. "For what?" His silver eyes met mine.

"Attempted murder of a pregnant Luna."