My Alpha Lost Me the Day Our Daughter Died

Damon's face darkened. For one second I saw something crack behind his eyes.

Then it sealed over, smooth and hard, like ice over a well.

He stepped close and lowered his voice. "Sera. Not here. We have guests."

"Guests."

"Half the northern packs are watching you." His jaw worked. "Whatever you're feeling, we'll handle it in private."

"Whatever I'm feeling," I repeated.

"Elowen's death was an accident. A terrible one. But Vivienne has carried this pack for twelve years. She fed the sick wolves through two famines. She kept the elders from tearing each other apart." He glanced at the woman trembling behind him. "Don't punish her because you're jealous."

Jealous.

I almost laughed again. It sat right there in my throat.

Twelve years ago, this same man had held my face in both hands on our mating night. *You're my only Luna, Sera. There will never be another.*

Now I stood in front of him with our child's body, and he thought I'd come back for him.

Vivienne dropped to her knees on the stone.

"Seraphina, please." Tears slid down her cheeks, perfect and silver in the candlelight. "I loved her like my own. I swear it. But she was so wild. She kept hurting Lyra. Pushing her. Biting her during lessons. I didn't know what else to do."

"She bit her," I said.

"I tried everything—"

"Elowen cried when she stepped on a beetle."

Vivienne's mouth opened. Nothing came out.

Footsteps cut through the crowd. Kieran shouldered his way to the front, goblet still in hand.

He saw me.

His grip on the cup loosened. For a heartbeat he was eight again, standing at the tomb gate with his fists balled at his sides, refusing to cry.

Then Vivienne's fingers brushed his sleeve.

Just a touch. Light as a moth.

His face shut.

"Mother," he said coldly, "you disappeared for twelve years. You have no right to come back and blame the people who raised me."

I studied him. He was taller than Damon now. Broad through the shoulders. A young Alpha with my mouth and his father's eyes.

He hadn't glanced at his sister once.

"Kieran," I said. "Do you remember what Elowen was most afraid of when she was little?"

He scoffed. "What does that have to do with anything?"

I lowered my gaze to her wrists. To the raw grooves the chains had chewed into her skin.

"She was afraid of the dark," I said softly. "She used to sleep with the lights on."

I raised my head.

"And you locked her in the cells for three months."

A muscle jumped in his cheek. The goblet tipped, and wine splashed his boots.

"She earned that," he said. "She lost control during her shift. She could have killed someone."

"She was eleven."

"She was dangerous!"

"She was your sister."

He opened his mouth, then closed it. His knuckles went white around the cup.

Vivienne rose, wiping her eyes. "I'll go." Her voice shook beautifully. "I'll leave Silverthorn tonight. Only please, Seraphina, don't hurt my daughter. She's just a baby. She's done nothing to you."

Damon moved before she finished. He swept her behind him, one arm out like a shield.

"Enough." His Alpha voice rolled across the hall. Wolves along the walls lowered their heads. "Apologize to her, Seraphina."

The room held its breath.

I remembered a different winter. A storm so thick you couldn't see your own hand. Damon kneeling in the snow outside the temple for three days and three nights, lips cracked and bleeding, begging the Moon Goddess for the right to take me as his mate.

*I will never let her shed a single tear. I swear it on my blood.*

The same man. The same voice.

Ordering me to bow.

I opened my mouth.

"Seraphina?"

The voice came from the back of the crowd. Rough. Familiar. I knew it before I turned.

Gareth Hale.

My old captain of the guard. Elowen's godfather. The man who once knelt at her cradle and pressed his sword hilt to her tiny palm. *Nothing touches her while I breathe, my Luna.*

He stood at Vivienne's side now. A brooch glittered on his chest. Her family's crest, a twisted vine of gold.

His eyes went to the body in my arms. Panic flickered across his face. He swallowed it down.

"Elowen's death is a tragedy," he said stiffly. "No one denies that. But you can't tear the pack apart over a child who's already gone."

I looked at him for a long moment.

Fifteen years ago, a silver arrow had come out of the trees at the southern border. Aimed straight at his heart. I'd stepped in front of it. The scar still puckered under my left collarbone.

"Gareth," I said quietly. "Do you remember what you promised me?"

He said nothing.

The silence stretched. Somebody coughed.

I smiled.

Then I ripped the crest off his chest and drove my boot into his knee.

He hit the floor hard. The gold brooch skidded across the stone and spun to a stop at Vivienne's feet.

"You swore to protect my daughter," I said. "Instead, you helped bury her."

"*Seraphina!*" Damon roared. "Stop this!"

Kieran lunged between us, arms spread over Gareth. "Are you insane? He's been loyal to this family for twenty years!"

"To this family," I echoed.

The crowd erupted.

"She's lost her mind—"

"The tomb broke her—"

"Did you see what she did at the gate? The captain's dead!"

"Monster. She's a monster."

Every voice in that hall had something to say about me.

Not one of them asked what Elowen had suffered.

Vivienne stepped up beside Damon. She leaned in, so close only I could hear her, her breath warm and sweet with wine.

"Seraphina. Even if you kill every one of us, what then?" Her lips curved, just barely. "Elowen still won't come back."

I turned my head slowly.

Something shifted behind my eyes. The candlelight sharpened. Every heartbeat in the room grew loud and wet and close.

Vivienne staggered back a step.

I knew what she saw. My pupils had narrowed into slits. Moon-wolf eyes. Eyes no one in Silverthorn had ever seen on me.

"You're right," I said. "She won't."

I lifted my bloody hand and pointed. Damon. Kieran. Vivienne.

"But neither will the protection I gave this pack."

For one breath, nobody understood.

Then the high windows went red.

Light poured through the glass, thick and crimson. Outside, the moon hung swollen over the towers, dripping color like an open wound.

Damon grunted. He clutched his chest. Under his shirt, the Alpha mark glowed, then split with a sound like ice breaking on a river.

Kieran dropped to his knees with a strangled cry, nails scraping the stone.

The doors banged open. A priest stumbled in, robes torn, face gray.

"The Luna bond is breaking!" he screamed. "If she leaves, the entire bloodline will fall!"

Panic tore through the hall. Wolves bolted for the doors. Tables overturned.

Damon's hand shot out and clamped around my wrist.

His fingers were shaking.

"Sera." For the first time all night, his voice sounded small. "Don't do this. Please. We can talk."

I looked down at his hand on my skin. The same hand that had fixed Vivienne's shawl so tenderly ten minutes ago.

"Damon," I said. "When Elowen begged you to save her, did you listen?"

He froze.

His lips parted. No sound came.

I slid my wrist free of his grip and gave him a smile with nothing behind it.

"Then why should I listen to you?"

The red moon pulsed. Somewhere deep under the castle, stone began to groan.

And inside me, the ancient thing whispered, almost fond:

*Good. Now let them see what they buried you to keep asleep.*