Chapter 47 – Debt Unpaid (Ivy’s POV)
I dashed the remaining tears from my cheeks and pulled in a shaky breath. “Elias... please.” I turned to face him, laying everything bare in my expression. “Tell me what you know about my father. About what really happened. I need to know who I am.”
He regarded me for a long moment, conflict warring with compassion in his eyes. Finally, he inclined his head. “Alright, Ivy. You deserve to know the truth.”
My heart lurched. Relief and dread washed through me in equal measure.
Elias motioned for me to sit once more. This time I obeyed immediately, perching on the edge of the armchair. He lowered himself into his own seat with a weary sigh, collecting his thoughts.
When he spoke, his voice was grave. “Your father, Antonio, was indeed one of us.” He met my gaze steadily. “A born werewolf from a powerful bloodline.”
I closed my eyes. Even expecting the confirmation, hearing it made my chest ache. The truth at last.
Elias drew a long breath, sorrow written on his face. “There’s more you need to hear,” he said gently. “It’s a long story, and not an easy one. Are you sure you’re ready?”
I straightened my spine, wiping the last wetness from my lashes. My heart pounded, but I lifted my chin and nodded. “I’m ready.”
I had to be.
“So he hid all of this from me to… what? Spare my feelings?”
“To spare your life,” Elias said gently. “And his own shame.”
“Shame?” My laugh sounded hollow.
He rose, came around the desk, and leaned against it, arms crossed. “Antonio was loyal—until he wasn’t. He broke a sacred line and exposed us to men who should never have known. That breach set loose a storm. Julius Lucenti died in the crosswinds.”
Damian’s father. I felt that name like a stone in the chest. “And because my father sinned, I was a debt to collect.”
“Blood balances blood,” he said. “It’s ugly math. I have spent my life hating it, and enforcing it.”
“Convenient,” I snapped, but the bite faded as fast as it rose. I’d asked for honesty; Elias was giving it without lacquer.
He opened the ledger again, not to read, but as if the book’s weight might anchor us. “Antonio ran because two fires were after him. The Lucenti demanded justice. And Martin Devereaux—Matteo’s father—had his own claim. He died, too, in that same war. Each side believed Antonio owed a life. When his son, Luca, was killed by what the human world would call a forest beast—”
“Don’t,” I cut in, my voice cracking. “Don’t say it like that.”
His eyes softened. “When Luca was taken, Antonio knew the fence he straddled would cut him in two. He hid you. He ferried you from town to town. When he realized our scouts were on his trail, he did the only thing he thought might keep you breathing: he dropped you with people who had no scent of our world and vanished.”
“Left,” I corrected, because it felt different in my mouth. “He left me.”
“He loved you,” Elias said. “And he knew the price of loving in the open.”
I wrapped my arms around myself, fighting the churn in my gut. “So all those years I thought I wasn’t enough for him… it was actually because I was too much.”
“You were everything,” he said, so simply I had to look away. I focused on breathing until my ribs unlocked.
“And me,” I said finally. “What am I?”
“We saw you die,” he murmured, “and then wake up.” He tilted his head. “You are not ordinary. I suspect your mother was human and your father a wolf. Hybrids are rare. Beautifully rare. Dangerous, if untended.”
“Dangerous.” I tasted the word. “Everyone keeps saying that and then holding me like I’ll shatter.”
“I hold you like you matter,” Elias said, not missing a beat. “And because you matter, I’ll say this plain: you need training. There’s power in you that will come whether you welcome it or not. Better to open the door yourself than wait for it to blow off its hinges.”
“I’m not a wolf,” I said on reflex, even as my pulse skipped in a way that made the denial feel thin.
“Then call it an inheritance from your father’s mistakes and your mother’s mercy,” he said. “But learn it.”
I sank into the chair, palms pressed to my knees, and let the truth ripple through me: If I kept pretending I was nothing special, the day would come when my body disproved me in a way I couldn’t control. The memory of waking after that illness shivered through me... The woman I saw…
“Tell me about my mother,” I said, sudden, sharp. “What do you know?”
“Less than you want to hear,” he admitted. “A human woman named Iris. Not one of ours. A nurse once, I think. She loved Antonio when loving him made no sense. And she paid for it. That is all I have.”
I closed my eyes. Iris. A single syllable.
“Elias,” I whispered. “I still blame him. My father. For leaving me.”
“You can blame him,” he said. “You can forgive him. Sometimes you will do both in the same hour. Neither changes what you need now.”
“And what’s that?” I asked.
He smiled like dawn. “A teacher.”
A soft knock broke the moment. The door swung inward and Sierra slid in on quiet feet, black T-shirt, black humour in his eyes.
“Priest,” he drawled, then tipped his chin at me. “Detective.”
“Sierra,” Elias said mildly.
Sierra’s gaze flicked to me, not unkind. “I see I came in just at the right time.”
“Or you’ve been using your wolf senses to listen all along.” Elias fired back.
He shrugged. “Well, I’m to be her teacher.” My head spun on hearing him.
“What? Why?”
He ignored my question. “You should be ready by tomorrow.”
My jaw set. “And if I’m not?”
“Then we’ll spend a week arguing before I still end up correcting your stance,” he said, smirking. “Save us both the drama.”
As Sierra vanished down the hall, Elias reopened the ledger and slid a thin, folded page free from between the entries—old, soft...
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Proof that the ledger remembers what we forget,” he said. “And a name you might need later.”
He placed the page in my palm. In careful, fading ink, a single line, a date, and a signature: Witnessed: Iris M. – oath kept, debt unpaid.
“Elias,” I breathed, feeling the room tilt, “why would my mother have an oath in a werewolf ledger?”
But Elias didn’t answer. His eyes had lifted over my shoulder, the warmth draining like the tide. I turned and saw what had turned him to stone:
Damian stood in the doorway, unreadable, eyes flicking from the page in my hand to my face.
“An oath,” he said, voice soft and dangerous. “That’s exactly what I came to talk about.”