Chapter 2
767 Words
The pack nursery smells like milk and cedar and something that will always make me want to stop existing all over again.
Don't, I tell myself. Keep moving.
Kalen walks the path to the nursery wing faster than I've ever seen him move on two legs. His wolf is bleeding through—gold at the edges of his eyes, every wolf we pass dropping their head without being told. He's broadcasting emotion whether he means to or not.
He's afraid.
In five years of haunting him, I've watched Kalen furious, cold, ruthlessly controlled. I've never watched him afraid.
Late, as always.
The nursery keeper barely gets out of his chair before Kalen's voice cracks through the room like an Alpha command.
"Five years ago. Luna Ella's pup. Pull the birth record."
The keeper scrambles. The filing cabinet rattles.
"Alpha."
The voice comes from the doorway.
Roger.
I'd forgotten he was stationed here. After my death, Kalen had stripped him of his position as head guard and reassigned him to the nursery—exile with a polite name. A punishment for the crime of being loyal to the wrong person.
He leans against the doorframe, arms crossed, and looks at Kalen the way I always wanted to. With absolute, unhidden contempt.
"Didn't expect to see you in this wing," Roger says. "Ever."
Kalen's eyes narrow. "My movements aren't your business."
"No." Roger doesn't move. "I'm just curious what kind of father waits five years to look up his child's records."
Roger. I drift toward him—the closest thing I have left to an embrace. You loyal, stubborn wolf.
"She was dying." Roger's voice drops, controlled but tight. "The silver toxin was spreading. Ethan opened the mind link and begged you to come—to use your Alpha bond to anchor her wolf. You were with Lilith." A muscle jumps in his jaw. "You closed the link."
"I wasn't told it was critical—"
"You were told she was dying."
The word lands in the cedar-and-milk air and doesn't move.
"She lost the pup that night." Roger's voice goes quieter. "Alone. On that floor. With no Alpha, no mate—nothing but me and Ethan holding her while her wolf tore itself apart trying to save something it couldn't save."
Every keeper in the room has found something fascinating to stare at on the floor.
I'm staring at Kalen.
The hand at his side has gone white-knuckled.
"Alpha?" The young keeper's voice is barely above a whisper. He holds out a folder. "I found the record. But—" He hesitates. "There's no birth record. There's only a death registration."
Kalen takes it.
I can read over his shoulder. One of the few perks of being incorporeal.
Pup: unregistered. Date of birth: none. Date of death: Red Moon night, five years prior. Cause: maternal silver toxicity, wolf spirit collapse in utero. Attending healer: Ethan Graves.
Kalen's hand starts shaking.
He doesn't notice until the folder rattles and he has to grip it harder to make it stop.
There it is. The moment it goes from abstract to real. From "Ethan says" to this document exists and it has a date.
"These records—" He stops. His throat works. "Pack law. They can't be altered."
"No," Roger says. "They can't."
Kalen looks up from the folder. For one fractured second his composure cracks—clean down the middle—and underneath it there's something raw and wrecked and too late.
Then the Alpha mask slides back into place.
"Who had access to Ella's medical supplies?"
Roger's mouth curves. Not a smile. Something colder.
"Why don't you ask Lilith that question?"
Kalen goes very still.
That's right. I whisper to the air between them, knowing no one can hear me. Ask her. You won't like the answer. But ask.
Roger turns and walks back out into the hall.
Kalen stands there with the folder pressed against his chest, one hand flat over the page like he can push the words back in.
The cedar smell is overwhelming.
I used to come here before I died—just to walk through, just to imagine. I'd count the cradles. I'd watch the pups sleep, small and twitching with dreams. I'd think: ours will sleep like that. Peaceful. Safe.
She never got the chance.
I feel it hit me then—something I'd kept numb for five years. A small, sharp grief with no name. A pup who never drew breath. A cradle that was never filled.
Kalen walks out of the nursery without looking back.
I follow.
I always follow.
- Writer
