Chapter Twelve: What the Dead Don't Get to Say
1049 Words
I woke up to lamplight and the sharp bite of cedar in the air. My head throbbed, like something inside me wanted out and didn’t care how.
"Don't sit up too fast," Mira's voice said, somewhere to my left. "You compelled a truth out of someone who's spent her whole life burying one. That kind of pull leaves a mark."
I sat up anyway. Too fast. The room spun, then steadied. Rhys was by the window, elbows on his knees, eyes locked on something only he could see. Kaelan stood guard at the door, arms crossed, looking like sleep was a rumor and he’d fight the world before he let himself rest.
The memories crashed in, jagged and out of order. Serrin’s confession. Blood everywhere. Kaelan’s voice, steady and cold with command. And then
"Your mother," I said, looking at Rhys. "You said your mother hid a Seer. That the throne killed her for it."
Rhys’s jaw clenched. For a second, I waited for him to dodge like always, to talk about plans and safety and anything except himself.
He didn't.
"I was eleven," he said instead, quiet and even, like he'd rehearsed keeping his voice steady around this exact memory for years. "We lived on the border of Ashford territory then, a small pack, nothing important. My mother took in a woman who showed up half-starved one winter, wouldn't say where she'd come from. I didn't know until years later that the woman was a Seer running from a purge nobody was supposed to know was still happening."
"What happened to her?" I asked. "The woman."
"She died anyway," Rhys said. "Royal guard found the pack six months later. My mother refused to give her up, refused to even confirm what she was." His hands had gone very still in his lap. "They killed them both. Called it an accident. A wolf uprising gone wrong, contained quietly, no records kept."
"You were there," I said softly. It wasn't a question. His expression told me everything.
"I watched from the tree line," Rhys said. "I was eleven, and I was fast, and my father told me to run and not look back, and I did. I've spent every year since telling myself that was the smart choice. The only choice." His gray eyes finally lifted to mine, raw in a way I'd never seen from him. "When I heard whispers, years later, that a Seer bloodline might have survived through the Hart family through your grandmother, I relocated my entire pack to Hartwell territory to find out. Not for politics. Not for advantage." His voice cracked, just slightly. "Because I couldn't save the last one. I told myself if I ever got the chance again, I wouldn't just run."
Silence pressed in, heavy and sharp.
"That's why you offered me a place," I said. "Not because you saw something in me. Because of her."
"At first," Rhys admitted. "That's true, and I won't pretend otherwise, because you deserve honesty more than anyone I've ever met." He held my gaze, steady despite the vulnerability written across every line of his face. "But it stopped being about her a long time before tonight, Ivy. Somewhere between the training yard and the way you talk about your gift like it's a burden instead of a gift, it became about you. Just you."
Kaelan stood frozen by the door, watching us. Not jealous. Something deeper. Like he was measuring the cost of everything.
Before I could say a word, the door slammed open. One of Rhys’s scouts stood there, breathless and wild-eyed.
"Alpha Prince." The scout's eyes found Kaelan, wide with urgency. "Riders from the capital. Your father's personal guard. They're already at the border."
Kaelan’s face went blank, every muscle locked down. He looked like someone who’d been waiting for this moment since the second he said Crown Protection out loud.
"That was fast," he said quietly.
"What does it mean?" I asked, but cold dread was already curling in my stomach.
"It means Serrin didn't waste any time reporting what I did," Kaelan said. "Invoking Crown Protection without royal authorization is grounds for immediate review of succession standing. My father won't have sent riders this fast for a conversation." His eyes met mine, steady despite everything. "He's sent them to strip me formally, in front of witnesses, before I have the chance to explain myself."
"Then don't go out there," I said, panic rising sharp and sudden in my chest. "Let Rhys's people"
"They won't stop at the border if I hide," Kaelan said gently. "You know that. This was always going to cost something, Ivy. I told you that in the study, the night the letter came." He managed something that was almost a smile, sad and certain all at once. "I just didn't expect the bill to come due quite this fast."
"Kaelan"
"I'm not asking you to stop me," he said. "I'm asking you to let me do the one thing in this whole mess I actually get to choose freely." His eyes held mine, gold and unflinching. "I'd rather lose the crown standing here having chosen you, than keep it having chosen the way I did at that ceremony."
He turned away before I could answer, following the scout into the gray dawn that felt like it could swallow us whole.
Rhys was at my side as the door closed, steadying me before I even realized I’d tried to get up.
"Let him go," he said quietly. "Whatever's about to happen out there, he needs to face it as the man who invoked Crown Protection to save you, not as someone who ran back inside to hide behind your skirts."
"And if they take everything from him?" I asked. "His title, his succession, all of it?"
Rhys's expression was unreadable in the pale morning light.
"Then we'll find out," he said, "exactly what kind of man he is once the crown isn't propping him up anymore."
Outside, through the walls, I heard horses pulling up, too many to count. Then a voice cut through the courtyard, cold and formal, and my stomach dropped.
"Prince Kaelan Ashford," the voice announced, "by order of His Majesty King Aldric, you are hereby summoned to answer for treason against the Crown."
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