Chapter 3

Chapter 3 CALLIE The news reached me before Lucas did, the way bad news always seemed to travel faster than good in that pack house. I was in the nursery with Mia and Lake, helping Lake stack wooden blocks into a wall he kept knocking down on purpose just to hear me laugh, when one of the kitchen maids knocked on the door, out of breath, her hands twisting the edge of her apron. "Luna," she said, "there's been an attack. Rogues, near the eastern road. Lady Vanessa and her son were caught in it, returning for their visit. The Alpha... the Alpha went out himself and brought them back." I felt my whole body go still, the way water goes still right before it freezes. "Is he hurt?" I asked, because some part of me still cared, even after everything, even after all the ways he'd taught me not to. "No, Luna. He's fine. It's Lady Vanessa who took a wound to the arm, and the boy is shaken but unharmed." I nodded and told her I understood, and she left, and I sat back down on the nursery floor next to Lake, who was still waiting for me to help him with his blocks, completely unaware that something worse was slowly developing and it was going to affect us badly. I already knew what this meant. I didn't need anyone to spell it out for me. Lucas had ridden out himself, put his own body between rogues and Vanessa, carried her home like she was something precious, something worth risking an Alpha's life for. He hadn't ridden out like that for me, not once, not even when I'd been sick with the twins, not even when the hatred of the pack was so heavy that I could barely leave my room, he had never defended me, like the way he did for Vanessa. This was going to be his excuse now. Guilt has a strange power over people, and I understood that better than anyone as Lucas would feel responsible for what happened on that road, would decide it was somehow his failing that rogues got close enough to hurt her, and he'd spend the coming weeks trying to make up for it. By evening, the pack house had transformed. I stood in the hallway and watched servants carrying linens and furniture into one of the finer guest rooms, the one with the wide window that looked out over the training grounds, the one usually reserved for visiting dignitaries. They were turning it into a room for Vanessa. Not a guest room dressed up for a short stay, but something like permeance, and the adjourning room as well, being built for her son. "How long is she staying," I asked one of the servants, a young man named Corin who had always been kind to me, and had not treated me like the rest. He wouldn't meet my eyes. "The Alpha didn't say, Luna. Just that she and the young master should be made comfortable. For as long as they need." I didn't see Vanessa until the next morning. I'd been walking Mia to the healer for a follow-up, my hand wrapped around hers, when we passed the east sitting room and I heard her laugh, at something that she found funny. Lucas's voice answered, low, warm, warmer than I'd heard it in longer than I could remember, which rooted me to the spot. Because the warmth in his tone was something I have never heard directed to myself, maybe the twins if he was on a good mood, but never me. I paused outside the door, just for a second, long enough to hear him say something about how relieved he was that she and the boy were safe, that he never should have let them travel with so few guards, that it was his failing. His failing. As if he hadn't left his own daughter shivering and blue-lipped for weeks because a border report seemed more urgent than being with her. I suppressed the anger that built up in me, knowing interfering would make me look like the villain. I didn't go in. I took Mia the rest of the way to the healer, to see if there were any changes to her health and if she was stable enough without the alpha touch and it wasn't until later that afternoon, when I was crossing the courtyard, that I finally came face to face with Vanessa herself. She was walking with Lucas, her arm still bandaged, her son trailing a step behind them, a boy who looked to be around Lake's age, his father's parentage, strongly concealed, I had no idea if he was the actual son she had with Lucas or if I was reaching too blindly now, trying to put a story that was not there. Vanessa saw me first. She stopped walking and put on a smile so smooth it looked practiced, the kind of smile that had probably worked on every person she'd ever aimed it at. "Callie," she said, warm, gracious, every inch the picture of a woman with nothing to hide. "It's been so long. You look well." "Vanessa," I said, keeping my voice even. "I'm glad you and your son are safe." Lucas stood there between us, and I watched him carefully, watched the way his shoulders relaxed just being near her, the way tension, I never realized that he carried around me seem to drain away in her presence. "Thank you," Vanessa said. "It was terrifying, truly. I don't know what would have happened if Lucas hadn't come himself." She reached out and touched his arm lightly, like she had every right to do so, like she belonged there. I made myself smile, made sure to say the right words, a hostess should say, welcoming both her and her son and informing her she could meet me if she needed anything. Lucas excused himself a few minutes later, called away by some matter with the guards, and for a moment it was just Vanessa and me standing in the courtyard, her son having wandered off toward the training grounds to watch the young wolves practice their forms, already bored from watching adults talk about things that did not seem important in his mind. The moment Lucas was out of earshot, her whole face changed.Her smile going more colder, and a smirk on her face, like she was seeing something amusing. "You know why I'm really here," she said, quiet, conversational, like she was commenting on the weather.