Chapter 4

Chapter 4 CALLIE "You're here because rogues attacked you," I said. She laughed, soft and humorless. "I'm here because I let them get close enough to attack me. It wasn't hard to arrange something that looked convincing. Lucas has always had a weakness for guilt, Callie, surely you've noticed that by now. Guilt makes him generous. Guilt makes him forget himself and makes him very easy to manipulate, especially with the history we once shared, the history you took away." I felt something cold settle into my chest, but I kept my face still, kept my voice level. "What do you want, Vanessa." "What I've always wanted," she said, stepping a little closer, her voice dropping lower, just for me, her tone threatening as she continued speaking. "Lucas loved me first. He loved me before this pack forced him into a marriage with a murderer like you, one who killed his sister nonetheless and trapped him in a marriage with pups he never wanted." Her eyes flicked over me, almost pitying. "Do you know how easy it is to move in this pack when everyone sees me as the one who was wronged and deserves to be Luna? I don't even have to work that hard. All I have to do is exist near him, and let him remember what he lost." "You're speaking to the Luna of this pack," I said, though even as I said it, the words felt hollow, even to my own ears. "For now," she said, smiling again, sweet and sharp all at once. "But titles change, Callie. Especially when the person holding one is as unwanted as you've always been here. Lucas is so guilty right now, so tender about what happened on that road, that he would agree to almost anything I asked of him. And I intend to ask for quite a lot." She glanced toward the training grounds, where her son was laughing with some of the pack's young wolves, easy, welcomed, like he already belonged. "My son is strong. Healthy. The kind of heir this pack actually needs. It won't take much for people to start comparing him to your children, especially once they see how much time Lucas is willing to spend with him." My hands curled into fists at my sides, my nails biting into my palms. "Get to the point." "The point," she said, leaning in just slightly, "is that soon enough, I'll be recognized as Luna, and my son as heir. It's only a matter of time. You should get used to that idea now, so it hurts a little less later." She straightened up, as she shifted her mask into place, the innocent facade she put on whenever Lucas was around, and when Lucas came back into view a moment later, she turned toward him with that same warm, easy smile, like she hadn't just threatened to take everything from me in the space of a few sentences. "Everything alright?" Lucas asked, looking between us. "Of course," Vanessa said smoothly. "Callie and I were just catching up." I said nothing. I watched him offer her his arm to walk her back inside, watch her hold on to it, so easily like she had done it a thousand times. I stood and watched her son come jogging back from the training grounds, cheerful, welcomed, by even the guards, in the same place, my children had to fight for scraps of attention. I stood alone in the courtyard long after they'd gone, the cold settling deep into my bones, and knew that something was going to give out very soon and I needed to make sure that my kids and I were not caught in the crossfire. Mia got worse three days after Vanessa arrived. It started small, but luckily due to me watching her like a hawk, I was able to spot the minor changes in her. She stopped finishing her meals. She slept longer than usual, and woke up looking more tired than when she'd gone to bed. Her hands, when I held them, felt colder than they should have, even wrapped in wool. I told myself it was a relapse, the kind Petra had warned me could happen if Lucas's touch wasn't given regularly enough. But there was something else in this, something that seemed to be actively pulling the strength from her body. I noticed the pattern on the fourth day. Vanessa had taken to visiting the east wing in the afternoons, always coming with some kind of excuse, bringing her son to play with mine, saying she wanted the children to grow close since they'd all be raised together now. She'd sit with Mia sometimes, stroke her hair, coo over how sweet and fragile she was, and every single time she left, Mia would go quiet and pale within the hour, her small body curling in on itself, like it had been attacked and was trying to shield itself the only way she knew how to. I couldn't prove anything. I had no evidence, nothing but my maternal instinct screaming at me that Vanessa visits were making her worse with every passing day. On the fifth day, I stopped her at the nursery door, refusing to let her inside. "I think Mia needs to rest without visitors today," I said, keeping my voice as even as I could manage, without trying to sound like I was actively barring her from seeing my daughter, knowing fully well Vanessa would manipulate it as a weapon to make the rest see me in a bad light. Vanessa's eyebrows lifted, all wounded surprise. "I only wanted to check on her. She seemed so unwell yesterday, I was worried." "She was fine before you started visiting so often," I said, and I heard how thin my own voice sounded, how close to breaking. "That's a strange thing to say," Vanessa said softly, glancing past me toward the nursery like she was more concerned about being overheard than about my accusation. I didn't back down from my position as I continued speaking. "I'm asking you to stay away from her for a while. Please." She left without another word, and I thought that was the end of it. It wasn't. By dinner, Lucas found me in the hallway outside our room, his jaw tight, his eyes carrying that disappointed look he so often wore around me now. "Vanessa tells me you asked her to leave the east wing and she was banned from seeing the children," he said. "That you were rude to her. She's a guest in this pack house, Callie, and she's been through enough already without you treating her like an enemy." "I didn't ask her to leave, I asked her to stay away from Mia," I said. "Lucas, listen to me. Mia gets worse every time Vanessa visits her. I know how that sounds, but I've watched it happen five times now." He looked at me like I'd said something absurd, something almost embarrassing. "You think Vanessa is hurting our daughter." "I think something is wrong when Vanessa is near her," I said, choosing my words carefully, even though it sounded to my own ears, what a jealous wife would say to cause strife. "That sounds ridiculous, Callie. She lost her home once already, she's trying to be kind to your children, and you're accusing her of some kind of, what, some kind of harm? Be reasonable." I wanted to scream that I was being reasonable, that it was not a coincidence that Mia was worse after each visit. But I'd learned by then that arguing with Lucas when his mind was already made up was futile. "Will you at least see her," I said instead, swallowing everything else down. "Mia. Just for a few minutes. Like before." He sighed, but he came. I'll give him that much, he came, and when he lifted Mia into his arms that evening, I watched the same thing happen as before, the tension leaving her small shoulders, her breathing evening out, color creeping back into her lips. It worked, and every time it worked, But even that evening didn't last long. Halfway through, one of Vanessa's maids came rushing in, breathless, saying Vanessa had taken a dizzy spell, that she'd nearly fainted in the garden, that she was asking for Lucas. He set Mia down so fast I barely had time to catch her properly, and he was gone before I could say a word, off to tend to a woman who never seemed to actually need tending until the moment she needed him pulled away from his daughter. I held Mia that night and rocked her back to sleep myself, and I didn't sleep at all. The incident with Lake happened two days later. I was in the kitchen going over supply lists with the steward when a guard came to find me, his face grim. "Luna, your son struck the young master. Lady Vanessa's boy. He's been sent to the cold corridor for discipline." I didn't even understand the words at first. "Struck him? Lake wouldn't—" "He did, Luna. Several witnesses saw it." The guard's tone made it clear he'd already decided whose son to believe. I found Lake sitting on the stone bench in the cold corridor, the punishment spot reserved for pups who misbehaved badly enough to need a lesson in discomfort. He was shivering, his small face streaked with dried tears, more confused than guilty. "I didn't hit him first," he said when I knelt in front of him. "He pushed Mia. She fell down and hit her head on the step and he laughed, and I told him to stop, and he wouldn't, so I pushed him back. I didn't mean to push him that hard."