Jade’s POV
The fortress was too quiet again.
Not the peaceful kind of quiet. The kind of quiet that comes after a storm,but before you realize the eye of it is still circling.
Everyone said Arthur was gone.
Exiled.
Dealt with.
Wrapped in formal council language and dropped into the diplomatic abyss like that was enough to erase him.
But I knew better.
So did Brielle.
And I didn’t need to be psychic,or mated,to see what she was carrying in the silence. She walked differently now. Not lighter. Just straighter. Shoulders locked, head high, the way people do when they’ve survived something they’re still not sure they’re done surviving.
Jake was glued to her side lately.
And not in that
controlling-alpha-posturing way he used to fall into when things got tense. No, this was differen
