**Dagen's POV**
“It is good that you made this thing known to all,” Elder Davis commended me after the other rulers had left.
“It was the sensible thing to do. Once I go under to retrieve Regina, other Alphas will have to step up to protect our race,” came my response.
“Sure, sure. We need to send someone else to the Underworld to look for Irvette, George's daughter. I believe we can grill her into giving us more information,” said Elder Walker. What he meant, of course, was that if we found her, we could torture her into revealing what she knew.
“I believe it will be more effective to let her know that she is next on her father's kill list,” was my suggestion. Given that he had killed her mother, it only made sense that she was next on his list. In order to gain more power, he may have to sacrifice his firstborn.
“Alpha George has two sons, if I remember correctly, what about them?” asked Elder Thaddeus. It was true, and it was sort of weird that they had not been mentioned at all.
“They died mysteriously last year; I'm guessing that if we dig their tombs we will not find their bodies,” returned Elder Davis.
How could one man be so wicked? Then I remembered my uncle and his bloodthirsty eyes. Was power really that intoxicating?
“Irvette must know that she is next. Perhaps we should follow her trail to figure out where she is. Although, I believe she is above ground and has not gone under,” said Elder Walker.
“What about Harlin, the Beta? Can we trust him?” Elder Thaddeus asked the question that had been on my mind for a long time. Perhaps we had been in a haste when we had handed the pack over to him. Although, to Harlin's credit, nothing out of the ordinary had happened in the pack since he had assumed power.
“I see what you're saying. Harlin's the only one that has something to benefit from all of this,” said Elder Davis.
The Elders all turned to me as though they were expecting me to provide a wise answer.
“Elders? What do you expect me to say?” I asked them. I was just as clueless as they were.
“What do you think, son? Can Harlin be in on all this?” asked Elder Thaddeus. He rarely called me son, so I tried not to let my smile show.
“Harlin does have a lot to gain. George may have promised him a good position in his court or something, but I really doubt he knows what George is intending to do.”
“It started with his father, remember? On the night he was to accept Regina as his mate, he publicly rejects her and takes Irvette as his choice mate, all on the same night, his father is poisoned and Regina is framed for it. Do you think it's all a big coincidence?” questioned Elder Walker.
If one thought about it that way, it would make sense, but would that also mean that Regina appearing in my pack had not been a coincidence either?
“We can assume George bribed Harlin into rejecting Regina and marrying Irvette?”
“The most likely thing that happened would be that George manipulated Harlin's mind,” I said, because it seemed like we were all forgetting that Alpha George had enslaved the minds of the people around him for years.
“You may be right, Dagen. Besides, there is no point speculating. We need evidence,” returned Elder Thaddeus.
**3rd Person POV**
Irvette examined the only thing that she had left of her mother; the diamond bracelet she always had on. It was the only thing left of her mother because it was the only thing that was a part of her. Irvette had never seen her mother without the bracelet, so, in a way, it had become a part of her. In fact, at some point growing up, Irvette had begun to believe that the diamond bracelet was really a part of her mummy and not separate from her at all.
As she stared at the bracelet on the wooden table before her, a tear managed to drop from her eyes onto the table, just inches away from the bracelet. Irvette quickly blinked the rest of the tears back and continued to give the bracelet a hard look.
It was hard to look at. The more she looked at it the more painfully her chest churned within her. She felt no guilt nor did she feel any remorse or even regret. She was way past the point of those emotions, but she did feel pain in her chest that wouldn't go away. She also knew that she deserved the pain; she deserved to feel the way that she did. She had done horrible things and horrible people like herself had to deal with the consequences of their terrible actions.
She continued to stare at the bracelet, but the longer she looked at it, the more the bracelet began to morph into something else. She blinked her eyes and looked at the table again, but the bracelet was indeed undergoing some sort of transformation on its own. She figured she was hallucinating. Wicked people had almost no time to rest, so this had to be a hallucination caused by sleepless nights. But she wanted to indulge in this one; she wanted to see what the bracelet was going to transition to.
When the transformation was complete, behold! It was her dead mother on the table.
She jumped back, startled to see her mother's body sprawled on the table before her. She wanted to stand up and run away, but she found that she could not move no matter how hard she tried.
“Why did you do it, Irvette?” her mother sat up on the table and looked her dead in the eye.
“Mother?” Irvette’s voice was shaky.
“Mother? How can you call me mother after what you have done? Huh?” queried her mother.