Chapter 156 Revelation
❀ Maeve ❀
The war room was exactly as I remembered it. But this time, there were six chairs arranged around the grand stone table etched with the map of the kingdoms.
A hearth burned behind the largest chair at the head of the table.
Alpha Mordane sat in it.
He looked nothing like the feral that had been imprisoned for months in the iron cell, and more like the alpha I’d seen on that first night—the night of the mating ceremony where I’d met Bastian.
Regal. Intimidating.
My eyes dropped to his chest.
The amulet was gone.
My heart raced.
He’d taken it off—but what had befallen it? Had it been destroyed? Or kept for later use?
I wouldn’t be safe until it had been ground to dust.
The doors clanked closed, startling me. I looked back to see that Yara had left me to my fate.
Around the table sat four men, all with their gazes locked on me.
I put one foot in front of the other, my confidence rising as I neared the last free seat.
Sorin and Leif sat to the right of the alpha. Bastian sat to the left—the seat I took right beside him.
Only the soft crackle of the fire punctuated the room. The mood was somber and tense at the same time.
And I just knew whatever decisions or revelations were made today would change everything.
Once I sat, I avoided Bastian’s gaze.
I didn’t want to see the revulsion, or ice in his eyes—
Bastian took my hand under the table, squeezing softly.
My heart fluttered. I glanced at him… and saw utter devotion.
My bearings slipped. What was happening?
It felt like the world had shifted without me. Like I was missing a crucial piece of information.
I forced my gaze to slide to the alpha.
“I am relieved to see you well, Alpha. We’ve long been without your guiding presence.”
Alpha Mordane’s face remained blank, with an undercurrent of sorrow. Imagined?
His ice-blue irises gleamed in the warm light.
Then he began;
“I would like to share a story. It will help you all understand the nuance behind the succession of events so far. Beginning from the Crimson War twenty years ago.” His voice was strong, but deceptively calm. So deep it grazed my bones.
The others at the table were silent as death.
Alpha Mordane clasped his hands, staring at his claws as if about to recount a particularly painful experience.
“For hundreds of years, the vampire and wolf kingdoms maintained unofficial peace and trade. Many have forgotten the days of severe unrest and violence.”
I was at the edge of my seat, even though I already knew this story. He just had this way of telling it…
“Twenty years ago, a Crimson royal was killed in a tavern clash in Blackbridge. I understand that the victim was a hedonist—a pleasure seeker—straying from the boundaries of Veilmoor to explore the middle ground of Blackbridge’s vice quarters.” The alpha’s eyes flashed with annoyance. “The vampires took it as a provocation, especially as wolves were involved.”
His voice resonated in the room.
“They declared war, their newly crowned queen at the lead.” His voice softened, almost tender.
“Queen Lyssa, the Crimson Wraith of Veilmoor, had her sword through my ribs. Was about to carve my body, taking my head in the same swing… when we both felt it.”
Felt what? I hung on his last word, my heart racing in my chest.
“She was my mate.”
Bastian’s head snapped toward the alpha.
Leif and Sorin looked unsurprised.
“W-what?” I blinked, my ears roaring with shock.
Alpha Mordane continued like he hadn’t just dropped that wild statement.
“In the heat of the ongoing war, we recognized it. Confirmed it. Then she begged me to take her from there. She begged me to capture her, stating it was better than returning to her queendom—victorious or otherwise.”
My shock broke into anger. “What are you saying? You did capture her. You tortured her!”
He silenced me with a stare. Bastian squeezed my hand under the table again.
I glanced toward him, expecting the same disbelief and outrage, but Bastian remained silent.
Shocked, but silent.
“She confided in me about the curse. The capture and torture stories were her idea. She wanted Veilmoor to believe I’d killed her. But word kept slipping that she lived… so the capture lie stuck throughout the year she lived with me.”
My gaze flicked to Sorin. “You knew? Did Gwen know?”
Sorin refused to meet my eyes, but he spoke. “Gwen was the queen’s feeder at the time.”
I knew that. But then… what was Alpha Mordane trying to say?
“We tried everything under the sun to cure her curse. When she became pregnant, the wrath worsened, and we turned to the mortal scientist who had fashioned the curse in the first place.”
Maverick Graves.
The alpha’s gaze darkened. “Unknown to us, Graves used the opportunity to carry out sick experiments on her, trying to use her blood to turn himself into a vampire. He stole pints and pints of her precious blood.”
“What are you saying?” My voice broke.
“When it was evident nothing would work, around the time of her delivery, Lyssa told me she would rather die than harm her own child in wrath. She’d already attacked me countless times before then.”
Alpha Mordane rose from his seat. The chair scraped along the stone floor with a violent screech.
He crossed his arms behind him, facing the hearth sideways. The flames danced in his eyes.
“Graves fled once he learned we’d discovered his plot. Lyssa fashioned the Crimson amulet to grant me her essence as a gift and memory. The power so I could be even more vicious in protecting our child.”
My stomach churned. If this was true… then…
“She had just given birth when a surge of wrath hit her. While I tried to subdue her, Gwen fled with the baby.” He sounded on the verge of tears.
The alpha—close to tears?
Then he turned once more, facing me.
He towered over my seated frame, his throat bobbing with emotion.
“I combed through the kingdoms looking for you, even infringing on Veilmoor, risking another war… for you.”
My breath caught, then released with a shudder. “What happened to my mother?”
“I killed her. She was approaching a stage where she’d be feral with wrath. The scarce times she’d been sane, she’d expressed her will to die.”
His eyes were filled with immense pain.
My heart clenched and ached behind my ribs, that bitter darkness prowling alongside my wolf.
My mind was not nearly big enough for the two.
“W-will that happen to me?”
Bastian gripped my chin with his fingers, forcing me to face him. “No. Nothing will happen to you,” he said, vehement.
I looked up at Mordane again.
“You… you’re my father?”
“A shabby one. But yes.” His jaw clenched. “After I lost my mate and child, grief led me to seek solace in the amulet.”
“How?”
“The amulet was fashioned in a way that made me able to relive memories with your mother. Though short, I replayed them over and over for twenty years, sinking deeper each time. Unable to part from her in the fog.”
“You’re my father,” I repeated, this time a statement.
“Yes.”
Which meant… I was a Crimson and Lycan hybrid.
His daughter.
My lungs constricted, screaming for air.
“Breathe,” Bastian said.
“You never found a cure for the curse,” I blurted. “So I’ll keep getting worse?”
As I wheezed, the wrath slithered closer. The temptation of surrendering to its mindlessness was too great.
Sink. Wrath. Surrender.
My claws scraped the sides of my chair. Sweat chilled my skin.
Again, Bastian tugged my chin to face him. “Maeve, nothing will happen to you. The curse is no more.”
I snapped. “You keep saying that! I can’t just wish the curse away… it’s inside me, it is me! I can feel it taking over. It’s alive!” I ended on a cry.
Bastian’s brows furrowed, horror spreading across his face. “It didn’t work.” He whispered.
“What didn’t work?”
He stood abruptly, claws raking through his hair. “All for nothing!” he seethed.
Panic seized me, that awareness, that I was missing something, intensifying.
“What are you talking about, Bastian?”
Bastian faced me, his eyes bloodshot. “We have to find Nikolai.”
My heart dropped to my stomach. “Where did he go—?”
The expansive doors of the war room burst open.
A guard rushed in, winded. “Alpha! Vampires are inside the pack. They’re demanding an audience with the prince.”
“Vampires?” Leif sneered. “They’re getting bolder. Round up the soldiers! Prepare to fight.”
“No!” I yelled. “Wait, are they attacking?”
As queen, I didn’t want to be at odds with the IronWolf pack. I didn’t want this to turn into another war.
“Are you asking if vampires want our heads? We kill them first and ask questions later!” Leif barked.
I turned to Alpha Mordane, my gaze pleading.
He nodded.
“An audience, they say?” he asked the guard. “Escort them in.”
Leif sputtered, “Alpha! This is reckless!”
The alpha’s eyes flashed blue like flames. “Mind your station, Commander. You’re here to advise me, not oppose my decisions.”
Leif quieted, then faced the open doors with a glower.
Multiple sets of footsteps echoed on the stone, getting closer… closer…
The vampires entered the war room, all dressed in sun-repellent cloaks covering every inch of skin.
About ten IronWolf guards surrounded them.
Without pausing, two of them removed their cloaks.
Drusilla. Lilith.
They walked into the room with regal bearing.
A cream sheath dress hugged Drusilla’s form like a second skin, her stomach flat.
I winced when I remembered her loss.
Black kohl lined her blazing red eyes, finely wrought gold jewelry glinting in the hearth fire.
Her gaze swept through us, her lips thin with barely concealed fury.
“I sensed my progeny experiencing intense pain.” She looked at Bastian. “What have you done with Nikolai?”