Chapter 180 Chapter 180
Violet
She began applying it to Elijah's back, her touch gentle in a way that seemed at odds with her usual cold demeanor. Her fingers traced the damaged tattoos, the ruined skin, with something that looked almost like tenderness.
I couldn't help but stare at her. This woman who'd threatened me, who'd ordered me to break her son's heart, who'd stood by while her husband beat Elijah bloody…she was shaking while treating his wounds.
Her perfectly composed mask had cracks in it, revealing something underneath that looked like an actual feeling.
She caught me staring and her jaw tightened. "I know what you saw," she said quietly. "In the hallway with Alaric and that woman."
I didn't know what to say, so I said nothing.
"All Alphas are like that," Aurelia continued, her voice taking on a bitter edge. "Especially the men in this pack. Ever since the witch..." She paused, her hands stilling on Elijah's back. "Ever since the war with the witches, something changed. The men became harder and crueler. They see women as things to be controlled, used, and dominated."
She resumed applying the salve, her movements mechanical now. "Alaric isn't unusual. He's the norm. They all have mistresses, all treat their wives like decorative objects, all believe that power gives them the right to take whatever they want."
I thought about what I'd witnessed in that office. The casual violence and the utter lack of remorse. The way Alaric had seemed to enjoy his son's pain.
"Not all alphas treat women like trash" I heard myself say.
Her son was a living example of it. He had never touched me without my consent, never forced himself upon me just because he was a man.
Aurelia's hands went still again. She looked at her son's unconscious form, something unreadable crossing her face.
"I don't know," she said finally. "Elijah’s fought against it so far and has tried to be different. But that is considered a weakness. You…are his weakness."
She finished applying the salve and reached for bandages, beginning the process of wrapping the worst of the wounds. I helped where I could, following her silent directions.
"That's why I asked you to do it," Aurelia said suddenly, her voice so quiet I almost didn't hear her. "That’s why I told you to make him fall in love with you and then break his heart."
My hands froze on the bandage I'd been unrolling.
Aurelia didn't look at me, but kept her focus on Elijah's injuries.
"He was fighting Alaric too much. Defying him, challenging him, putting himself in danger. I thought... I thought if his heart was broken, if he was devastated by you, he'd stop fighting. He'd give up on love, on happiness, on all the things that make him challenge his father."
"You wanted him broken," I whispered, horror dawning. "You wanted him too hurt to fight back."
"I wanted him alive," Aurelia corrected, her voice sharp. "I wanted him to stop giving Alaric reasons to do this." She gestured to Elijah's ruined back. "Every time he defies his father, this happens. Every time he shows softness, shows emotion, shows that he cares about anything other than pack duty, Alaric beats it out of him."
She leaned forward, and I saw tears in her eyes for the first time. I had always seen her composed and calm.
But right now I could see actual tears threatening to spill out of her eyes but held back through sheer force of will.
"If he stops caring," she continued, her voice breaking slightly, "if he becomes hard and cold and empty like Alaric wants, then he'll stop getting hurt. He'll survive. Maybe not happily, but he'll survive."
Her hand came up to caress Elijah's face, fingers tracing the line of his jaw with infinite gentleness. The tender gesture looked wrong on her, too vulnerable, too revealing of the feelings she usually kept locked away.
"But instead," she said, her voice hardening again, "he chose you, chose to fight for you. He chose to defy his father again and again because he couldn't let you go. And now look at what that choice cost him."
The accusation hung in the air between us. This was my fault. His pain, his suffering, all of it could be traced back to me.
"I'm sorry," I whispered, though the words felt inadequate.
Aurelia's hand was still trembling where it rested against Elijah's cheek. She stared at her son's face like she was memorizing it, like she was afraid this might be the last time she saw him alive.
"You need to understand something, Violet," she said, finally looking at me. Her eyes were hard despite the tears threatening to fall. "The rosy picture you have in your head about the happy ending, about how love conquers all, the future where you and Elijah ride off into the sunset together…it's not going to happen. It can't happen. Not in this family and not in this pack."
"But…"
"There is no 'but,'" Aurelia cut me off. "This is what love looks like here. Its only pain and suffering and punishment. Alaric loved me once, or so he claimed. But he loved his alpha title above all. And look what that love turned into. Look what it made us both."
She stood up, smoothing down her dressing gown with shaking hands. The wooden box snapped shut as she gathered her supplies.
"Leave after the wedding," she said, her voice taking on that commanding tone I'd heard her use before. "I want you to cut all contact with Elijah and disappear from his life completely. Let him forget you. Let him become what Alaric wants him to become, because that's the only way he survives."
"I can't just…"
"You can," Aurelia interrupted. "And you will. Because if you truly care about my son, if you have any feelings for him at all, you'll save him from himself. From not just his father but from this family." She paused at the door, looking back at me one last time. "Love isn't enough here. It never has been. The sooner you understand that, the better."