Chapter 68: Chapter Sixty-eight

Chapter 68

Brie’s POV

Age sharpens the eyes in ways youth can never imagine. You learn, with time, to notice the smallest cracks in a façade, how a hand trembles when lifting a cup, how a voice softens when it shouldn’t, how footsteps pause in hesitation where once they were sure.

It was these cracks that betrayed Lia Mason to me.

The girl thought herself careful. She hid her whispers with Elena, cloaked her exhaustion behind determination, masked her trembling with defiance. But nothing is hidden from me, not truly. I have lived too long, and I have watched too many wolves bleed out their secrets beneath the thin veil of composure.

And now, as I sat in the council chamber after Edgar’s most recent defiance, my suspicions turned from faint curiosity to near certainty.

The girl was with child.

I studied her at Edgar’s side, the way she hovered closer than usual, not merely out of devotion but out of protection. Her eyes flicked constantly to the cups, the plates, the very air around him, as though her body already believed itself guardian of more than one life.

A mother senses these things before her own mind dares admit them. I saw that in her.

And Edgar, that stubborn, cursed man, either did not know or pretended ignorance. Perhaps he was too blinded by his own weakness to notice the signs. Perhaps she had not told him, fearing the burden it would place upon him now, when the council pressed harder with each day.

But I saw.

As the meeting ended and Edgar left the chamber supported by her hand, I remained behind. The other councilors murmured and drifted away, leaving me alone with my thoughts. My fingers rested on the goblet still half-full of untouched wine, and I smiled faintly to myself.

A child.

Fate always chose strange timings. In the hour of Edgar’s decay, life had taken root in his mate. Was it irony? Or was it the goddess’s cruelest joke?

A child would change everything.

The council might have tolerated Lia as Edgar’s chosen partner while his strength waned, waiting for his inevitable fall. But a child? That altered the line of succession, created a new claimant, a new bloodline tied to his name. No matter how frail Edgar became, no matter how close to death, the existence of an heir would bind loyalties and stir unrest.

And that meant I had to decide, was this secret to be weaponized, or destroyed?

Later that evening, I walked the corridors of the keep, slow enough that none would question my lingering. I passed the quarters where Lia stayed with Edgar. I paused outside, though I did not dare too near. Through the heavy oak, faint murmurs carried, muffled words of reassurance, of stubborn pride, of her urging him to rest.

I closed my eyes, and for a moment I remembered my own youth, how I once whispered the same words to a man who had already chosen another. A bitter smile creased my face. How quickly time punished women, stripping us of beauty, of softness, leaving only steel and shadows.

The girl would soon learn.

Pregnancy was no blessing in this house. It was weakness. It slowed the limbs, fogged the mind, left a woman vulnerable. Worse, it was a shackle. A child tied her fate irrevocably to Edgar’s, and when he finally fell—as all men fall—she would bear the weight of his enemies as well as his legacy.

Perhaps she knew this. Perhaps that was why she kept it secret.

But secrets rot quickly in these halls.

Two days later, I summoned Malrick privately. The man was ambitious but cautious, always sniffing the air before striking. When he entered my chamber, I gestured him closer, lowering my voice.

“There is more at play than the council realizes,” I told him.

His brows lifted. “You’ve uncovered something?”

“Not uncovered,” I corrected, “observed. The girl, Lia. Have you not noticed her pallor? Her fatigue?”

He frowned, uncertain. “Grief, surely. We all see it.”

“Grief does not swell the belly, Councilor,” I said, letting the words cut.

His eyes widened, then narrowed as calculation replaced doubt. “You believe”

“I know enough to suspect. And suspicion is often the first thread that unravels a cloak.”

He sank into the chair across from me, tapping his fingers against the armrest. “If she carries his heir, then Edgar’s influence will extend beyond his death. The pack will rally around the child.”

I inclined my head. “Exactly. Which means our time is shorter than we thought. Strike too late, and we will not be battling one man, but the myth of his bloodline.”

He leaned forward. “Do you propose exposing her?”

“Not yet,” I murmured. “Exposing without proof makes us fools. No, we wait. Watch. Let her betray herself with her own body. Then, when the signs can no longer be hidden, we choose how best to act.”

His lips curved in a thin smile. “Patience, then.”

“Patience,” I echoed. “The young are reckless. But we, Malrick, have mastered the art of waiting.”

After he left, I sat alone for hours, the candle burning low beside me. My mind wandered through paths of possibility, each darker than the last.

If Lia bore a son, he would be raised as the next Alpha. The council would fracture, torn between loyalty to the child and hunger for power. Chaos would spill blood in these halls.

If she bore a daughter, the danger was no less, for Edgar’s blood would still run through her veins. The pack would see her as chosen, no matter what lies we spun.

In either case, the child was a threat.

Unless, the child never drew breath.

The thought came to me coldly, without hesitation. I had long ago lost the softness that recoiled at such conclusions. Survival requires sacrifices, and wolves who forget this truth die in their sleep. If it came to it, Lia’s womb could be silenced before it bore fruit. And none would know it was I who orchestrated the stillness.

But I would not rush. No, not yet. The goddess delights in irony, perhaps the child would not survive nature’s own cruelty. Perhaps Lia herself would falter under the strain. Time, once again, was my ally.

That night, I dreamed of blood.

I saw Edgar on his knees, gasping, his hands reaching not for his mate, but for a small figure cloaked in shadows. A child’s laugh echoed, soft and cruel. And behind it, I heard my own voice whispering, Patience, patience, patience.

I woke with a start, my sheets damp with sweat, and for the first time in years, I felt the faint curl of unease in my chest. Dreams are not to be trusted, but they linger, poisoning the waking mind.

When I rose to dress, I resolved one thing: whether by my hand, or fate’s, Lia’s secret would not remain hers for long.

I would watch. I would wait. And when the moment came, I would act.

Because no woman, not even the mate of an Alpha, carries a child in my house without answering to me.