Chapter 16 Poison And Betrayal
The infirmary smelled of sharp herbs, hot iron, and the copper tang of blood that never quite washed away. Torches and oil lamps burned low, throwing golden light across rows of narrow cots. Most stood empty tonight. Only one held a patient.
Alberto lay motionless beneath layers of clean linen, skin the color of old ash. His chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven pulls. The stump of his missing finger had been neatly bound, but the rest of him looked as though he had been dragged behind horses for days. Black lines radiated from the silver wound in his side, spidering across ribs and stomach like roots of some deadly tree. His pulse fluttered weak and fast beneath the healer’s fingers.
Mira, the pack physician, straightened slowly. Gray streaked her dark braid, and exhaustion lined her face, but her eyes remained steady. She wiped her hands on a cloth already crimson and turned to the broad figure filling the doorway.
Fernando stood with arms folded tight, knuckles white. Snow still clung to his boots from carrying Alberto through the courtyard. He had not spoken since the healers took the boy from his arms.
Mira pulled the curtain partway closed around the cot, giving Alberto what little privacy the room allowed, then crossed to her Alpha.
“Speak,” Fernando said. One word, rough as broken stone.
Mira did not flinch from the storm in his gaze. “Silver poisoning, deep and deliberate. The blade was coated, maybe dipped in nightshade too. His blood is thick with it. Organs are failing one by one. Liver, kidneys, heart. The moon goddess would need to smile very brightly for him to see spring.” She drew a slow breath. “Even with every antidote I know, it may take months, if he lives at all.”
Fernando’s jaw worked. “Do everything.”
“I will. I have already started the strongest purification rites. Wolfsbane extract, blessed silverroot, fresh blood transfusions from our purest donors. I will sit with him myself.” She hesitated, then added more softly, “But you should prepare yourself, Alpha. He may never wake to answer questions.”
Fernando stared past her to the cot where Alberto lay so still he might already have been a corpse laid out for burial. Something ancient and terrible moved behind the Alpha’s eyes.
“He will wake,” Fernando said. “He has to. There are things only he can tell me.” His voice dropped to a growl that vibrated through the floorboards. “Keep him alive, Mira. Whatever it costs. Whatever you need. He is not allowed to die.”
Mira inclined her head. “As you command.”
Fernando turned on his heel and left without another word. The door closed behind him with a heavy thud that echoed down the corridor like a war drum.
Darius waited in the shadowed hallway, back against the stone wall, arms crossed. Torchlight carved harsh lines across his face. When Fernando emerged, Darius pushed away from the wall.
“Well?” he asked quietly.
Fernando did not slow. “Follow me.”
The two words cracked like a whip. Darius fell in behind his Alpha without question.
They strode through the keep in silence, boots ringing on flagstones. Wolves they passed flattened themselves against walls or melted into doorways, sensing the rage rolling off their leader in waves hot enough to scorch the air. Fernando’s face was granite, eyes burning gold at the edges, the wolf beneath his skin pressing so close to the surface that fur bristened along the backs of his hands.
He threw open the door to his private office and stalked inside. Darius followed and closed it softly behind them.
The room was lit only by the fire roaring in the hearth. Maps lay scattered across the great desk. The oilskin bundle Alberto had carried rested in the center like a poisonous offering. Fernando did not go to it. He rounded on Darius instead, shoulders filling the space, presence suddenly enormous.
“Explain,” he snarled.
Darius lifted both hands, palms open. “I do not know what—”
“Liana.” The name tore out of Fernando like a blade leaving the sheath. “Alberto said her name before he passed out. He said she is still in the southern rogue pack. You swore to me, Darius. You stood in this very room and swore on your blood that she was safe. That she was with Doctor Mackenzie for the heart transplant. That you were watching over her yourself.”
Darius’s face paled beneath the tan. “I did. I swear by the moon, Fernando, I placed her in Mackenzie’s hands myself. The surgery was scheduled. I have checked every week. She was there. Healing. Learning to walk again with a new heart.”
“Then why did Alberto come back half dead whispering that she is a prisoner of Vargus?” Fernando’s voice dropped to a deadly whisper. “Why did Alberto think he had to trade his life for hers?”
Darius opened his mouth, closed it again. For the first time in years, the younger wolf looked genuinely lost. “I do not know. The last report I received was three days ago. She was walking in the gardens with the doctor’s daughter. Laughing. I have the letter in my quarters.”
Fernando took one step forward. The fire behind him outlined him in crimson. “You are telling me someone took her from under your nose and you knew nothing?”
“I—” Darius’s throat worked. “If this is true, then someone betrayed us both.”
The growl that answered was not human.
Fernando’s control snapped like a brittle bone. His wolf surged forward, golden eyes swallowing the man entirely. Bones cracked and shifted in a heartbeat. Fur, black as midnight, burst across his broadening frame. In less time than it took to draw breath, the Alpha wolf stood where the man had been, massive, ancient, terrifying.
Darius had only a fraction of a second to drop to his knees before iron hard jaws closed around his throat.
The wolf’s weight slammed Darius to the floor. Hot breath washed over his face. Teeth pricked his skin, not yet piercing but promising agony with the smallest increase in pressure.
Fernando’s wolf spoke with his voice, but deeper, rougher, every word vibrating through fangs and bone.
“If she is hurt,” the wolf rumbled, “if one hair on her head has been harmed, I will strip the flesh from your bones inch by inch. I will make you feel every lash, every blade, every moment of fear she endured. And when you beg for death, I will deny you until the moon herself grows bored watching you scream.”
Darius did not fight. He lay still beneath the crushing weight, throat bared in absolute submission. Blood trickled where a canine had pierced skin, but he did not move.
“I understand,” he whispered. “I deserve it. If she is not safe, take my life and my wolf with it.”
For a long moment the only sound was the crackle of the fire and the low thunder of the Alpha’s breathing.
Then, with visible effort, Fernando dragged the beast back under control. Fur receded. Bones reshaped. In moments the man knelt over Darius again, human eyes once more brown shot through with furious gold.
He released Darius’s throat and rose, chest heaving.
“Get up,” he ordered.
Darius climbed slowly to his feet, hand pressed to the ring of punctures at his neck. Blood stained his fingers.
Fernando turned to the desk and swept the scattered maps aside with one violent motion. Papers fluttered to the floor like dying birds.
“Someone lied,” he said, voice raw. “Someone inside our walls or inside Mackenzie’s. Tomorrow at dawn you ride south with every tracker we have. You will follow Alberto’s trail back to the rogue den. You will find out what happened to my daughter. And if she is in Vargus’s hands, you will bring her home or you will die trying.”
Darius wiped blood from his neck and met his Alpha’s gaze steadily. “And if she is dead?”
Fernando’s fists clenched until knuckles cracked. “Then you will bring me Vargus’s heart in your teeth.”
Silence stretched, thick and violent.
At last Darius bowed his head. “It will be done.”
Fernando stared into the fire for a long moment, shoulders rigid, every muscle trembling with the effort of keeping the wolf leashed.
“Send Mira whatever she needs for Alberto,” he said without turning. “And double the guard on the infirmary. No one enters or leaves without my seal.”
Darius hesitated at the door. “Alpha Fernando... if Alberto wakes—”
“When he wakes,” Fernando corrected fiercely, “he will tell me everything. And the moon helps anyone who tries to use my kind as pawns.”
Darius left without another word. The door closed softly behind him.
Alone, Fernando stood before the hearth and watched the flames devour the logs the way rage devoured him from the inside. On the cot in the infirmary lay the boy he had pulled from ashes years ago. Somewhere in the south, if the gods had any mercy left, his daughter still drew breath.
He would have answers.
He would have blood.
And whoever had orchestrated this betrayal would learn that there were things far worse than death in the north.