Chapter 173 Bonus Chapter 2

Chapter 173 Bonus Chapter 2
The Games had drawn allies from surrounding territories, turning the field into something larger than usual.

Kane and Aria had already been called forward for the next stage of the Bonding Games, leaving the children near the outer edge of the field where the crowd was thinner and the noise less structured.

The games had been running for only hours when the kids found themselves drifting.

Kai had exhausted his commentary on the other pairs. Lily had stopped pretending she was watching. Leo stood with his arms crossed and said little, which was normal, and Emma was looking around, trying to find something to pique her interest.

After a while, Kai gave up and headed toward the food stalls near the boundary.

Lily followed, mostly out of habit rather than interest.

Emma stayed close.

Leo stayed close to all of them without making it obvious.

A man appeared near the outer gathering point where allied visitors were mingling.

His gaze moved over the group once.

Then again, slower.

It paused on Kai.

Then Lily.

Then Emma.

“You are Alpha Pierce’s kids,” he said, almost immediately.

Kai frowned. “Yes.”

A faint smile crossed the man’s face. He was older, heavyset, with the territorial band of a northern pack on his wrist and the easy manner of someone who attended events like this often and considered himself well connected because of it. He stopped near their section of fence, looked at all four of them, and smiled like he had found something he expected to find.

“I thought so,” he said. “The resemblance is something.” He leaned against the fence post with the comfort of someone settling in. “Kane and Aria are good people. I met them once, years back, at a summit in the eastern territory. Alpha Pierce is an impressive man. Luna too.” He nodded like he was granting them something. “You should be proud.”

“We are,” Leo said.

The man’s eyes moved across all four of them the way eyes did when they were accounting for something. Kai, Leo, Lily, one by one, and then Emma. He stopped there.

His brow shifted slightly.

“And you,” he said. “Are you a friend of theirs?”

Emma hesitated. “Aria is my aunt.”

“Is she?” He looked at Emma for a moment with the careful attention of someone assembling pieces. “What’s your name, then.”

“Emma.” She responded. “Emma Cross.”

That changed his expression slightly, like the information aligned something in his mind.

“I see,” he said.

Then, as if continuing a thought that had already formed earlier, he added:

“I knew of your father. Devon Cross.”

Emma went still.

Kai glanced at her.

The man continued, unaware of the shift.

“Another strong alpha. You know he was once Kane’s rival.”

Emma’s voice came quieter. “He was?”

“Yes,” he said. “But they became friends.”

A pause.

Then his tone shifted, casual but certain.

“Until he betrayed his pack,” he said.

The words did not carry emotion.

That made them worse.

Emma’s breath caught slightly.

“That is not true,” she said immediately.

The man gave a small shrug. “You can ask him.”

Emma didn’t say anything.

She looked at the man’s profile for one long moment, then turned and ran into the crowd.

“Emma, wait.” Lily called, already stepping after her.

“Did I say something too much?” The man asked.

“You think?” Leo hissed and walked away from him, pulling Kai along.

A few minutes passed.

“Leo.” Kai called.

“Yeah?”

“Did you know? About her father?”

Leo said nothing.

“Because he sounded like he knew what he was talking about.”

“Kai.”

“I’m just saying.”

“Don’t.” Leo’s voice was even but there was something underneath it. He was still watching the crowd. “Don’t do that.”

They stood in silence for a few minutes. Around them the Games continued. Sixty pairs running rotations. The crowd was moving and shifting. All of it carried on like nothing had happened at the fence.

Lily reappeared later.

She came back through the crowd holding a wrapped portion of something from the refreshment table, slightly out of breath, scanning the area around her as she walked. She reached them and looked at the empty space where Emma had been and then at Leo and Kai.

“I didn’t find her,” she said.

Leo looked at the food in her hand. “You stopped for food?”

Lily followed his eyes. “I was hungry.”

“Maybe you lost her because you stopped for food.”

“I didn’t lose her. She ran away.” Lily unwrapped the food with complete composure. “She probably needs some space. She’ll come back when she’s ready.”

“She just found out her father betrayed the pack,” Kai said. “From a stranger. She shouldn’t be left alone to think the worst.”

“I’m aware of what happened, Kai. I was standing right there.” Lily took another bite. “Give her a few minutes.”

Leo turned back to the crowd. His jaw was tight.

Lily looked between them. “Did you know? About her father?”

Neither of them answered.

“So we didn’t know,” Lily continued. “And now Emma knows, and she found out like that, from someone who doesn’t even live here.” She paused. “What if it’s true?”

Leo turned to look at him.

The look was enough that she stopped talking.

“Whatever that man said, it has nothing to do with Emma,” Leo said. “She didn’t choose any of this. She didn’t choose her parents, she didn’t choose what people say about them.”

He looked at both of them.

“She is our family. That is not conditional. Not negotiable.”

A pause.

“And if either of you ever reduce her to anything less than that again, I will have a problem with you.”

Kai said nothing.

Lily had stopped eating.

Leo turned back to the crowd.

“Give her five more minutes,” he said. “Then we go find her.”

They gave her five minutes.

Emma didn’t come back.

Leo searched the full perimeter. The refreshment tables, the Elder hall entrance, the seating areas along the south fence. Lily took the east side. Kai covered the exits.

They came back empty.

“She left the field,” Kai said.

Leo looked at the three gaps in the fence line where the crowd thinned out into the wider pack grounds. Any one of them could have taken her somewhere they couldn’t see from here.

He looked at the field where Kane and Aria were mid-challenge.

Then he looked at his brother and sister.

“We need to tell Mom and Dad,” he said.