Chapter 110 Disloyalty

Chapter 110 Disloyalty
Jacob's Pov

My parents were in the garden at seven in the morning when I came down.

They were sitting at the far end near the old stone bench. My father had a cup in his hand. My mother was looking at the flowerbeds. They looked like what they were. Two people removed from the center of things, working out where the edges were.

I watched them from the kitchen doorway for a moment.

Then I went out.

My father looked up when he heard me coming. My mother turned her head.

"Good morning," I said.

"Jacob." My father set down the cup. "Sit with us."

I sat on the bench across from them.

"How was the meeting yesterday?" my father asked.

"Productive," I said.

"Reth said you changed the reporting structure," he said.

I looked at him. "You spoke to Reth."

"He came to find me afterward," my father said. "He was concerned."

"About what specifically?"

"The directness of the new approach," my father said. "He feels it bypasses the experience of the senior members."

"It bypasses the senior members having information before I do," I said. "That is what I said in the meeting."

"Jacob." My father leaned forward. "Reth has been in this pack for forty years. His concerns deserve——"

"His concerns can come to me directly," I said. "In the meeting. Like I asked. They should not come to you first."

My father was quiet.

"When they feel the change, they come to the Alpha," I said. "Not to the retired Alpha."

"I wasn't interfering," my father said.

"You were receiving information from senior pack members that was intended to come to me," I said. "That's the beginning of interference."

My mother put her hand on my father's arm briefly.

He sat back.

"We're not trying to undermine you," my mother said.

"I know," I said. "Habits are difficult. People who have known you for twenty years are going to come to you automatically. You need to redirect them."

"Every time?" my father said.

"Every time," I said. "That is what the agreement means. The authority goes with the title. The title went with the ceremony."

My father looked at the garden.

"All right," he said.

I went back inside.

Darius was waiting in the corridor near the study.

"There was a meeting last night," he said. "After the pack assembly."

I stopped walking. "What meeting?"

"Four of the senior twelve. Reth. Aldus. The two Carrow brothers."

"Where?"

"Reth's house. My contact confirmed it this morning."

"What did he hear?"

"The phrase new direction ' has been used more than once. A question about whether the transition had been done properly. Whether the protocol was fully followed."

"The protocol," I said. "Which protocol?"

"The charter requires a cooling period of seven days between a formal challenge and the confirmation of a new title. We moved in two days."

I looked at him.

"A technical gap," he said. "Probably not actionable. But if someone wanted to use it……"

"Reth would know about the cooling period," I said.

"Yes. He's been here for forty years. He knows the charter."

I sat down in the study chair. "Is this genuine concern about protocol or something my father set in motion?"

"I don't know," Darius said. "My contact confirmed Reth spoke to your father before the meeting."

"This morning he told me Reth came to him with concerns about the reporting structure," I said.

"That was likely not the only conversation," Darius said.

"Pull the charter," I said. "The succession section in full."

He went to find it.

The charter was on the desk twenty minutes later. I read the succession section three times.

The cooling period requirement was there. But the section below it was also clear. The cooling period applies to contested successions. A transition confirmed unanimously by the senior twelve without a formal challenge was not contested.

No one had filed a challenge.

"Darius," I said.

He came to the door.

"The cooling period doesn't apply," I said. "Unanimous confirmation, no formal challenge. The charter is clear."

"Then Reth's concern doesn't have a legal foundation," he said.

"No," I said. "Which tells me it's not actually about protocol." I put the charter down. "It's about whether I'll be manageable. Reth is used to having influence. The new reporting structure removes a layer of that."

"What do we do?"

"Bring Reth to me," I said. "Informally. Ask him to come for a conversation this afternoon. I want it handled before it becomes a pattern."

Darius went to arrange it.

I sat in the study and thought about Violet's vision from the day before. The room with the stone walls. Regional council architecture.

If something was moving at that level, the last thing I needed was a faction forming inside the pack at the same time.

Violet appeared in the study doorway.

She had Eli in the wrap. She was carrying two cups of tea.

"You've been in here an hour," she said.

"Yes," I said.

She came in and set one cup in front of me and sat across the desk. "Tell me."

"How did you know something was wrong?"

"Because you went to the garden this morning and came back moving differently. Darius has been in and out with his serious face on."

"His face is always serious," I said.

"It has degrees. Today it's at an eight."

I told her about Reth and the meeting and the charter and my father.

She listened with both hands around her cup and Eli sleeping in the wrap.

"Your father talked to Reth before the meeting," she said when I finished.

"Yes."

"Was it intentional?" she asked. "Deliberately starting something? Or was it your father not understanding where the line is yet?"

"I don't know," I said.

"Which matters for how you respond," she said.

"Yes," I said. "It does."

She was quiet. "Talk to your father again after you talk to Reth. Not formally. Just the two of you. Tell him exactly what Darius found."

"And if he knew what he was doing?"

"Then you'll know from how he responds," she said. "You handle it from there."

I looked at her across the desk for a moment.

"You're very practical about this," I said.

"Someone has to be," she said. "You're too close to it."

"He's my father," I said.

"I know," she said. "That's why you're too close to it."

"I looked at the regional council documentation this morning," she said. "While you were in the garden."

"And?"

"I was right. The stone in the vision matches the council archive building. Where evidence from major cases is stored."

"Eric's case," I said.

"Eric's case," she said. "All the documentation Caius compiled. My testimony. The letters. Everything that establishes what he did."

"Someone has access to the archive," I said.

"Someone is in it. Or will be. The vision was still distant. But it is pointing there."

"Whoever wants Eric's documentation wants leverage," I said. "Either to protect him or to use what's in there for something else entirely."

"Yes," she said. "Eli was in the vision."

"Which means whatever is in that archive connects to him specifically."

"His parentage," she said. "The paternity documentation. If someone has it and wants to use it, they could challenge his legitimacy as your heir. As the future Alpha of this pack."

I sat back.

"Reth, my father, something moving at the regional archive level," I said.

"I don't know that they're connected. Not yet. I need more from the vision before I can say that."

"But they might be."

"Yes," she said. "They might."

I picked up the tea she had brought. It was the right temperature. It always was with her.

"I found a letter," Darius said from the doorway. He was holding something. "In Reth's house. My contact retrieved it this morning when Reth went to the meeting."

I held my hand out. He brought it across and placed it in my palm.

I opened it.

The handwriting was not Reth's. I didn't recognize it immediately. But the content was clear.

The transition was premature. The documentation can be challenged. Wait for the council hearing outcome before moving. We have people positioned.

I looked at the bottom of the letter.

No signature. Just a mark. A specific seal was pressed into the bottom right corner.

I recognized the seal.

Regional council.