Chapter 71: Chapter 71 – The Truth Kael Was Never Told

Chapter 71 – The Truth Kael Was Never Told

POV: Kael

I had stopped believing in coincidences a long time ago.

In Blackmoor, coincidences were usually planned by someone powerful enough to stay unseen while everyone else paid the price for them later. The older I got, the more I understood that truth. But understanding it and accepting that it applied to my own life were two different things entirely.

The council chamber had emptied nearly an hour ago, yet the tension from it still sat under my skin like something irritating I couldn’t scrape out. They had grown bolder lately. Not openly disrespectful, not enough to challenge me directly, but close enough to test boundaries they never would have touched before.

And every single one of those boundaries led back to Liora.

Some blamed her quietly.

Others blamed her loudly.

A few blamed me for bringing her here in the first place.

I leaned back slightly in the chair inside my study, my gaze fixed on the pile of old documents spread across the desk in front of me. Most of them were incomplete. Some had pages missing entirely. Others looked like they had been intentionally damaged before being hidden away.

That alone told me enough.

People did not destroy records unless those records mattered.

The fire in the corner crackled softly as I reached for another file, opening it carefully. The paper had yellowed with age, the edges brittle enough that too much pressure would ruin it.

Marriage records.

The first wife.

Then the second.

Then the third.

Nine names.

Nine women.

Nine Luna ceremonies.

And nine deaths that had all been explained away differently.

Illness.

Failed bonds.

Mental instability.

Weak wolves.

One by one, they had disappeared from Blackmoor until eventually people stopped questioning it and started pretending it was normal.

My jaw tightened.

I already knew the marriages were not real political alliances. Not truly. I had known that for years, even before Seraphina stopped pretending otherwise with me. The women had been chosen carefully, brought here carefully, observed carefully.

Tested.

The thought left something bitter in my mouth.

I stared at the fourth file longer than the others.

Amelia.

Officially dead.

Body never recovered.

The report claimed she threw herself into the northern river after becoming unstable during her first shift failure. The wording was clean. Too clean. Whoever wrote it had removed every unnecessary detail like they were trying too hard to make it believable.

I flipped through the remaining pages slowly.

There it was again.

Blood irregularities.

Potential compatibility.

Dormancy indicators.

None of it sounded like marriage documentation.

It sounded like research.

I leaned back slightly, rubbing a hand across my jaw as exhaustion settled heavier into my shoulders. I had barely slept in days. Every time I closed my eyes lately, something pulled me awake again. Council pressure. Seraphina. Isolade disappearing without a trace. Liora training behind my back while pretending she wasn’t. The pack dividing itself quietly into factions waiting to see who would fall first.

And beneath all of that—

Fear.

Not fear for myself.

For her.

Because every answer I uncovered somehow made things worse.

A knock sounded against the door before it opened.

Ronan stepped inside without waiting for permission, his expression already tense enough to tell me he had news I wouldn’t like.

"My Alpha."

I looked up. "What is it?"

"We searched the lower archives again."

"And?"

"There’s more missing."

Of course there was.

I let out a quiet breath through my nose. "Specifically?"

"Anything connected to the old bloodlines. The original Luna records. Healing classifications." He hesitated briefly. "White Wolf references."

The room went still around me.

Not physically.

But internally.

Because that name had followed me for months now like something waiting just beyond sight.

White Wolf.

At first it was only whispers hidden inside old legends. Then it became theories buried in sealed records. Then experiments. Then dead wives.

And now Liora.

I leaned forward slightly. "Tell me exactly what you found."

Ronan stepped closer and placed another folder onto the desk.

"This was hidden separately from the others."

I opened it immediately.

The handwriting inside wasn’t official Blackmoor script. It was older. Messier. Written by hand instead of formal record keepers.

My eyes moved across the first page quickly.

Subject compatibility unstable.

Awakening incomplete.

Healing traits present but unsustainable.

Potential White Wolf markers detected.

I froze.

The next line hit harder.

Failure before ascension.

My fingers tightened against the paper.

Not one wife.

Several.

Several of them had carried traits.

Not fully awakened.

Not complete.

But enough for Seraphina to keep trying again.

Again and again.

Again.

The word dragged another memory forward immediately.

The wall.

The hidden writing Liora discovered weeks ago.

Again.

I stared at the page for several long seconds before speaking.

"She knew," I said quietly.

Ronan stayed silent.

"She knew exactly what she was searching for."

Not a powerful Luna.

Not political alliances.

Not stronger heirs.

The White Wolf.

Everything led back to that.

The marriages.

The experiments.

The ceremonies.

The deaths.

Even Liora.

Especially Liora.

I stood abruptly and moved toward the shelves lining the far wall, searching through another locked compartment hidden behind old military ledgers. My fingers found the smaller box immediately.

The one I had avoided opening for years.

I unlocked it carefully.

Inside were older reports. Personal ones.

Not written by Seraphina.

Written about me.

I pulled the first document free.

Condition worsening.

Dependency increasing.

Vial stability temporary.

Recommended isolation during episodes.

My expression darkened immediately.

I hated these reports.

Hated the weakness written into every line of them.

Seraphina’s control over me had started long before I was old enough to fully understand it. Every time the pain became unbearable, every time my body started failing under whatever poison she kept inside those vials, she was there with the cure.

Or what she called a cure.

Enough to keep me alive.

Enough to keep me functional.

Enough to keep me dependent.

My grip tightened slightly.

For years I convinced myself enduring it was necessary because Blackmoor needed stability. Because challenging her directly before I understood everything would destroy the pack faster than she ever could.

But lately I had started asking a different question.

What if the instability had been her all along?

I looked down at the final report in the box.

The date made my stomach tighten instantly.

Winter Solstice.

Three years ago.

The mountain incident.

I opened it slowly.

Subject found near northern ridge.

Signs of severe internal collapse.

Vial deprivation confirmed.

External injuries suggest deliberate attack.

Recovery interrupted by unknown female presence.

I went completely still.

Ronan frowned slightly. "My Alpha?"

I barely heard him.

My eyes stayed locked on the page.

External injuries suggest deliberate attack.

Not ambush by rogues.

Not accident.

Attack.

Someone had left me there to die.

The memory returned sharper than I wanted it to.

Snow.

Cold so brutal it burned my lungs.

Blood soaking through my clothes while my body shut down piece by piece.

And then—

Her.

Liora.

Standing in the snow looking terrified and stubborn at the same time while trying to drag me toward shelter even though she barely knew who I was.

At the time I thought fate had a cruel sense of humor.

Now I wasn’t so sure.

I flipped the page quickly.

The final paragraph had been partially burned, but enough remained readable.

Monitoring confirmed subject encountered compatible carrier prior to arranged selection process.

I stared at the sentence.

Then read it again.

Compatible carrier.

Liora.

Prior to arranged selection process.

The room suddenly felt too small.

"They already knew about her," I said quietly.

Ronan’s expression hardened. "Before the marriage?"

"Yes."

Not random.

Never random.

The realization settled slowly and heavily into my chest.

Seraphina had not chosen Liora after meeting her.

Liora had already been chosen long before the ceremony was arranged.

Maybe before I even met her.

Every piece moved into place with terrifying precision after that.

The attack.

The missing vial.

Being left near death on that mountain.

Liora finding me there.

The sudden marriage proposal afterward.

Ebonvale agreeing too quickly.

Seraphina watching everything too carefully from the beginning.

None of it had happened naturally.

Someone orchestrated it.

Someone needed me desperate enough, weak enough, vulnerable enough to bond with the exact woman they wanted inside Blackmoor.

And somehow that terrified me more than everything else combined.

Because if Seraphina planned all of this—

Then what exactly was Liora meant to become?

I looked back down at the report, my chest tightening as another thought forced its way forward.

Would Seraphina even let her live if she awakened fully?

The question answered itself immediately.

No.

Not if she couldn’t control her.

Not if the White Wolf became stronger than the leash she spent years tightening around this fortress.

A cold anger settled into me then, steadier than rage and far more dangerous.

All this time I thought I was protecting Liora from Blackmoor.

But what if Blackmoor itself had been built around hunting women like her?

I closed the file slowly.

Ronan watched me carefully. "What do you want me to do?"

For a moment I didn’t answer.

My thoughts kept circling back to that night in the snow.

The way Liora looked at me.

The way she hesitated before helping anyway.

The way everything after that unfolded too perfectly to be chance.

I finally looked up.

"That meeting..." I said quietly, more to myself than to him.

The truth settled fully into place.

And once it did, there was no unseeing it.

"That meeting was never an accident."