Fated to the Wrong Alpha

Chapter 13 – The Name We Don’t Say

We don’t say his name in front of the elders.

In the old stories, that kind of thing summons monsters.

In our stories, it summons something worse: accountability.

The war room smells like coffee gone bitter and too many tired wolves. Screens flicker with patrol routes, border reports, grainy stills of the elevator shaft. On one wall, someone has taped up a floor plan of the tower, circles in red where the power failed and the sigils bloomed.

Corren stands at the head of the table. I take the spot at his right because that’s where the empty chair is, not because of what it looks like.

Maelor sits opposite us. Taren is a solid presence near the corner. Orrik has claimed the far end, like a vulture politely joining a family dinner. Dael leans against the wall. Jarek stands behind my shoulder, a silent guardrail.

Lyssa is supposed to be observing quietly.

She is, predictably, not.

“So we agree this wasn’t random,” she says, drumming her fingers on the table. “Someone didn’t just get bored and decide to etch high-level bond sigils under the alpha’s elevator for funsies.”

“Lyssa,” Taren sighs.

“What?” She lifts a shoulder. “I’m summarizing.”

Riya slides a folder onto the table. Photos spill out: close-ups of the burned markings, overlaid with faint green where her scans lit up residual magic.

“These weren’t improvised,” she says. “There’s a core structure I’ve only seen in one place before.”

Her gaze flicks to me. I know what she’s thinking. The circle from my youth. The patterns I personally bled into.

“Ritualists with that level of training are rare,” Orrik says smoothly. “Most are under Council oversight, bound by oaths.”

“Like the ones who oversaw Aeryn’s coming-of-age ritual?” Lyssa asks, sugar over glass. “And Elira’s binding circle?”

Orrik’s smile tightens. “Mistakes were made in that era. We’ve already—”

“Name him,” I cut in.

Silence drops like a stone.

Orrik’s gaze slides to me, cool and assessing. “Pardon?”

“The ritualist,” I say. My heart is hammering, but my voice stays level. “The one both our packs paid to ‘adjust’ bonds when it was convenient. The one you used as a specialist when other people’s wolves didn’t fit your plans. You know who I mean.”

Maelor’s fingers curl on the tabletop. Taren’s expression doesn’t change, but I see the flinch in his eyes.

“We are not in the habit of sharing sensitive contractor identities—” Orrik starts.

“It’s not a contractor,” Dael says flatly. “It’s a weapon.”

Corren’s hand closes around the edge of the table. Wood groans. “You know his name,” he says to Orrik. Not a question.

“And you know what happens when certain names are spoken aloud,” Orrik replies. “Panic. Witch hunts. Uncontrolled reprisals. We are trying to avoid more chaos, not—”

“Chaos found us in our own elevator,” I snap. “Someone used the same structure on me twice. On him. On Elira. Maybe on others. I don’t care about your contractor’s privacy, I care about the knife he’s holding.”

Maelor exhales slowly. “Aeryn—”

“Don’t.” I turn on him. “Did you hire him? Back then?”

His eyes flick briefly to Selene’s empty chair. She’s not here—not officially. But she’s in the building. She’s always in the building, in the ways that matter.

“Yes,” he says finally. No excuses. “On the Council’s recommendation. As did many alphas. The understanding was that he could…guide difficult bonds into safer channels.”

“Safer for who?” Jarek mutters.

“For everyone,” Maelor says, but it sounds hollow.

Taren clears his throat. When he speaks, his voice is low and rough. “His name is Vaelis Crow.”

The room inhales.

Orrik’s gaze snaps to him, sharp. “Taren—”

“We are beyond pretending,” Taren says, not looking away from me and Corren. “They deserve to know the face behind the blade.”

Vaelis.

The name sits in the air like an old, bitter taste. My mark throbs, as if recognizing the shape of it.

“Vaelis was…is…a bond specialist,” Orrik says tightly. “He works—worked—for the Council under strict constraints. His knowledge is…unrivaled.”

“Unrivaled,” Lyssa repeats. “Such a nice word for ‘capable of turning mates into trade goods.’”

“Enough,” Corren says softly, and the room quiets. “Where is he?”

Orrik’s expression goes carefully blank. “He is no longer under Council employ.”

“Which means?” Dael presses. “You lost track of your pet ritualist?”

Orrik folds his hands. “It means that after the unfortunate events surrounding Alpha Lyall’s previous engagement”—a euphemism so sharp it cuts—“Vaelis chose to…step away. We have not been able to locate him since.”

My skin crawls. “You lost the man who knows exactly how to do whatever was just done to us.”

“Or he ran,” Jarek says. “Because he knows you’d rather bury the evidence than expose yourselves.”

Orrik’s gaze chills. “Careful, Beta Voss.”

“No,” Corren says. “He’s right to be careful. We all should be.”

He turns to me. The bond between us pulses, raw and insistent.

“Whoever was in that elevator shaft knew us,” he says. “Knew what had been done. Knew enough to use the same architecture. That means Vaelis, or someone he trained, or someone who stole his work.”

“And if we don’t find him,” I add, “none of this stops. It just gets smarter.”

Riya taps one of the photos, drawing our attention. “There’s something else. See this sigil? The one partially burned out?” She traces it with a pen. “It’s not standard Council patterning. It’s older. I’ve only ever seen it in one place.”

“Where?” Corren asks.

Riya looks at me. Her eyes are apologetic, but steady.

“In the records from your ritual,” she says. “The private notes I wasn’t supposed to see.”

My breath catches.

“So he was there,” I whisper. “Vaelis Crow was in my circle. In Elira’s. And under our feet tonight.”

“And maybe,” Taren says quietly, “he’s the only one who can tell you how to untangle what he did.”

Orrik stiffens. “You cannot seriously be suggesting—”

“That we find the monster you pointed at our hearts,” Corren says, ice and iron over old hurt. “Oh, I am absolutely suggesting it.”

I meet his gaze. The jagged thread between us thrums in agreement.

They already wrote us into his ledger.

It’s time we found the man holding the pen.