Chapter 8 A Toast to Poison
The Knight estate was a symphony of gilded power, a deliberate display of wealth that made the very air taste of champagne and ambition.
Under the cold eye of the full moon, marble terraces gleamed like bones, and the glass gardens shimmered, their fragile beauty a stark contrast to the wolves within.
Music, a soaring string quartet, spilled from every open archway, tangled with the clinking of crystal and the low, confident hum of laughter, all of it flowing from mouths that had, just a year ago, whispered the Harts’ downfall.
I was a ghost at my own funeral, a specter in moon-silver silk haunting the edges of my old life.
I clung to the shadows of a towering obsidian pillar, a flute of untouched sparkling water turning warm in my hand. The mask of calm I wore felt brittle, a thin veneer over a raw nerve.
I pretended not to feel the weight of a hundred glances, the pitying, the curious, the openly hostile. The scent of night-blooming jasmine and expensive perfume was cloying, thick enough to choke on.
At the heart of the vortex was Grayson. He looked like a memory given flesh, yet carved from harder, colder stone by his time away. His shoulders were broader, his jaw sharper, the easy grace of the boy I knew hardened into the unyielding command of the Alpha heir.
The crowd orbited him, their adoration a palpable force. And anchored to his side was Chloe, a beautiful, venomous shadow. Her gown was a perfect, deliberate match to the deep aubergine of his tie, her smile a fixed, hungry thing that never quite reached her eyes.
A sliver of her conversation, honeyed and cruel, sliced through the ambient hum from a nearby cluster of potted ferns.
“By the end of tonight,” she confided to her rapt audience, her voice carrying on a wave of expensive wine, “Grayson will make it official. The alliance with the Harts is ash. I’ll be the next Luna.” She paused, letting her gaze drift meaningfully toward my shadowed corner.
“Poor Evie can finally crawl back into her ruins.”
The laughter that rippled through her group was like shards of glass grinding under my skin. I turned away, my jaw clenched so tight it ached, the splintering feeling in my chest a betrayal I refused to show.
Later, as the banquet was announced and the crowd flowed toward the long tables groaning with gilded delicacies, the pressure intensified. The air grew warmer, thick with the smells of roasted meat, spiced wine, and the press of bodies. A server materialized, pressing a heavy crystal glass into my hand. The wine within was a deep, bloody crimson, the color of the city’s beating heart at night.
Almost on autopilot, I brought it to my lips. But a jolt of pure, primal dread shot down my spine, a lightning strike of warning.
My wolf, dormant and grieving for a year, surged to the surface with a silent, vicious snarl that reverberated in my very bones. Wrong. Poison. Death.
My fingers went numb. I set the glass down on a passing tray with a clatter that was too loud, the liquid sloshing precariously close to the rim.
I felt a presence beside me before I saw her. Chloe, her scent of jasmine and something sharper, more chemical, enveloping me.
“Well, if it isn’t Silverbourne’s forgotten darling,” she purred, her eyes raking over my simple gown. “You look… presentable. A definite improvement from mourning black.”
I kept my gaze fixed on the crowd. “Chloe.”
“You should be thanking me, you know,” she continued, swirling her own glass of red. “If I hadn’t personally begged Grayson to let you stay invited, you’d still be hiding in that sad, empty tower of yours. It was a mercy.”
“I didn’t ask for your mercy,” I said, my voice low.
Her laugh was the sound of breaking chandeliers. “Oh, I know. You never ask. You just exist, quiet and pitiful... hoping someone will remember you.” She leaned in, her breath a warm, wine-scented caress against my ear.
“Tell me, do you still dream about him? Or did the guilt of your father’s sins kill that, too?”
A low growl rumbled in my chest, a sound my wolf hadn’t made in a year. “You’re treading on thin ice.”
“Am I?” She smiled, all teeth. “I think I’m standing on very solid ground. We all know what your father was. Greedy and thieving coward.” Her voice dropped to a venomous whisper. “Guess the treachery runs in the blood, doesn’t it?”
Before I could retort, she snatched a fresh glass from a passing waiter and thrust it toward me. The dark liquid swirled, ominous and deep. “Oh, relax, Evie. It’s a party. Let’s toast. For old times’ sake.”
I stared at the proffered glass. “I don’t drink red.”
“Don’t be so provincial,” she chided, her voice taking on a hard, insistent edge. She pushed the glass closer, the cool crystal pressing against my fingers. “One sip. For the friendship we had. Don’t be rude.”
I took it, if only to stop her from touching me. The stem was cold and slick in my grasp. I turned the glass in my hand, watching the light catch the liquid. It seemed too dark, too heavy. My instincts were screaming, a cacophony of alarm bells. No. No. No.
“I said no,” I murmured, my voice trembling with the effort of control. I went to set it down on the marble balustrade beside us.
Her hand shot out, covering mine, forcing the glass to stay in my grip. Her touch was like ice. “Just. One. Sip.” The words were no longer a suggestion but a command, her eyes glittering with a strange, feverish intensity. “Prove you’re not the coward everyone says you are. Prove you can still face the world.”
For a long, suspended moment, we were locked in a silent battle, her cold hand over mine, the poisoned chalice between us. The world had narrowed to this single, terrible point.
With a final surge of will, I wrenched my hand back and slammed the glass down on the railing. “I said NO.”
Her face contorted, a flash of pure fury before it was masked by theatrical exasperation.
“Fine!” she snapped, rolling her eyes. “You always were a bore.”
In a huff, she snatched up the other glass, the one she had been drinking from all along, and took a long, dramatic, defiant gulp. “Honestly, you ruin every single...”
The words fractured into a wet, strangled gurgle.
Her eyes, locked on mine, widened in sudden, abject horror. Her fingers spasmed. The crystal slipped from her grasp, shattering on the marble floor with a sound like a falling star. Crimson bloomed around her feet, a grotesque parody of spilled wine.
A sound, half-gasp, half-whimper, escaped her. She clawed at her throat, her perfectly manicured nails leaving red trails on her skin. She stumbled back, colliding with the edge of a table, sending a centerpiece of white orchids crashing to the ground.
A few people nearby laughed, a nervous, uncertain sound, thinking it part of some dramatic act. The laughter died, strangled, as her body began to convulse and then collapsed, a boneless heap of silk and suffering.
“Someone call a healer!” a voice shrieked, slicing through the stunned silence.
Grayson was there in an instant, a black-clad blur, sliding to his knees and gathering her limp form against his chest. “Chloe?” His voice was rough with confusion. “Chloe, look at me!”
He shook her gently, then with more force, his panic a physical thing in the air. “CHLOE!”
I stood frozen, a statue of horror. My gaze was not on the tragic scene at my feet, but on the full, accusing glass of wine still sitting pristine on the railing beside me. My glass.
Then, the scent hit me, cutting through the jasmine and the panic, the unmistakable, faint, and deadly aroma of bitter almond.
My stomach plummeted, the world tilting on its axis.
Grayson looked up, his wild, grief-stricken gaze following the line of my frozen stare to the untouched drink. The realization dawned in his eyes, swift and terrible, transforming his anguish into a scorching, targeted fury.
The music had died. The room was utterly, deathly still.
And when his voice finally broke the silence, it was a low, shattered whisper that carried to the farthest corner of the hall, a verdict delivered on a breath.
“What did you do?”