Violette did not answer and closed her eyes.
"Are you going to keep your mouth shut? Fine, shut your mouth forever!" Hans rose from beside her bed, his Alpha aura flaring hot against the walls before he stormed out of the room.
He stopped outside the door and spoke to one of the pack servants, his voice flat and absolute. "From now on, Violette is not allowed to leave the estate. Her daily rations are bread and water. She needs to learn to live like a packless stray. Don't give her anything else."
In the days that followed, she ate only bread and water. Her body grew thinner, more fragile. The wolf inside her, already quiet, grew quieter still, curling into a tight knot somewhere beneath her ribs as if trying to make itself small enough to disappear.
This made Irene feel powerful in the den. She took the opportunity to torment Violette further, ordering the servants to give her stale bread, days old, sometimes spotted with mold. The scent of night-blooming jasmine and warm honey drifted through the halls more frequently now, layered over something acrid that no one else seemed to notice.
Violette consoled herself with the fact that her bond-severance was only five days away. She spent her time in her glass greenhouse at the edge of the estate grounds.
She heard the servants whispering just outside the greenhouse walls, thinking Violette couldn't hear them. But even starved, even diminished, a wolf's hearing was a wolf's hearing.
"Oh my... I've never seen Alpha Blackthorn so wild and reckless during a rut. He's never been like that with the Luna."
The servants giggled.
"I feel sorry for the Luna. She has no idea that while she's locked away, her mate is bedding another woman right next to her chamber."
"Shh, you don't know. The Luna is as cold as silver. She must be boring in bed, which is why the Alpha lost interest. Besides, we all know that five years ago, Alpha Blackthorn's first obsession was Irene. I'm sure the death of the second young master had something to do with the Alpha wanting to claim his brother's mate. Damien must be his biological pup. Otherwise, why would Alpha Blackthorn name him heir to the Blackthorn Pack?"
"That's for sure. Since Miss Thornveil moved into the den, the Alpha smiles more often. He treats her like a Luna. They go on retreats to different territories, just the three of them — the Alpha, Damien, and Miss Thornveil. They're the real family."
Violette's hand clenched around the watering can. She stayed still until the servants had gone.
She came out of the greenhouse and nearly collided with Damien, who was running down the corridor. He almost knocked her over.
Violette caught his hand before Damien fell.
"Damien, I've told you many times not to run. You'll get hurt," she said gently.
Although Damien was Irene's pup, Violette had raised him since he was a newborn. She still loved him.
"Stop pretending to care about me! You're not my mother! I hate you!" Damien snapped and shoved her away. His scent hit her — milk and grass and something faintly sour, like unripe fruit. Not a trace of Blackthorn iron or char.
"Damien," Violette looked at him, her expression heavy with sorrow. "Even though I'm not your birth mother, you shouldn't yell at me and be rude to me. I have raised and loved you all this time."
Damien grinned arrogantly.
"You're only pretending to be nice to me because you're afraid Daddy will leave you! You're a barren she-wolf who's jealous of my mommy! If you're nice and beg me, I might persuade Daddy not to throw you out of this pack, you barren she-wolf."
Violette stared at him in pain, her voice choked. "Damien, who taught you to say such cruel things?"
"Is that wrong? You're barren. My daddy only loves my mommy! You forced my mommy to go abroad and took me away from her. If it weren't for you, me, Daddy, and Mommy would have been living happily together for a long time!"
Damien pushed Violette roughly, hard, until she fell onto the stone floor.
A sharp pain tore through her stomach. Her face turned pale.
"Damien, don't be rough!" Hans appeared suddenly, Irene at his side.
He scolded Damien and pushed him back without thinking, then crouched beside Violette, his expression flickering with something that might have been worry. "Are you okay?"
"My stomach..."
Before Violette could finish, Damien's loud wailing filled the corridor.
"Daddy doesn't love me anymore! Mommy, it hurts!"
Hans's attention snapped to Damien, who was crying in Irene's arms. His small palms were scraped and bleeding.
"Hans, I'm sorry for Damien's behavior. Please don't hurt him like this. After all, Damien is small — how could he push someone as big as Violette to the ground?" Irene said. Her eyes were teary, tears streaming down her beautiful blue eyes as if her heart ached to see her pup hurt. The jasmine-and-honey scent around her thickened, cloying, pulling at something instinctive in Hans's wolf.
A guilty expression flashed across Hans's face, and he quickly gathered Damien into his arms. "I'm sorry, Daddy was wrong. Damien, don't cry anymore."
"Daddy, it hurts, my hands are bleeding..."
"Daddy will take you to the Healing Hall." Hans stood up, his voice tight with anxiety.
"Hans, my stomach hurts..." Violette tried to call out to him, her voice weak from the pain spreading through her body.
Hans turned without glancing at Violette and left.
Irene smiled triumphantly at Violette, then followed Hans out.
Violette lowered her eyes to the cold ground, her shoulders slumped as if she had lost all hope. She covered her face and laughed. Her hopes had soared for a moment when Hans showed concern for her, then those hopes fell cruelly in an instant.
The laughter turned into cries of pain.
Pain spread through her body. She curled up on the stone floor, feeling warm liquid flowing down her thigh. Violette's face paled as she saw blood flowing from her leg and pooling on the ground. Her wolf, that faint and starving thing inside her, let out a sound she had never heard it make — a low, thin keening, barely there, like something dying far away.
"Ah! Luna!" A groundskeeper passing by found her and shouted in panic as he rushed over. "I'll contact Alpha Blackthorn."
Violette immediately gripped his hand. "No need. Send for a healer's litter. Take me to the Healing Hall. And please tell them to keep my identity confidential."
They arrived at the Healing Hall. As Violette had requested, the healers kept her presence there confidential.
"Where is Alpha Blackthorn? We've tried reaching him through the mind-link stone, but he's not responding!" a healer's assistant said anxiously. "We need him to authorize the ritual."
"Luna, what should we do? Alpha Blackthorn isn't answering even though I've reached out twenty times using your signal," the groundskeeper said, his voice strained.
The head healer spoke gravely. "We can't wait. The situation could be dangerous for the Luna if we delay any longer. This pup cannot be saved because of the delay, and the Luna's body is severely malnourished..."
Violette turned to look at the healer's assistant and took the consent parchment. "Perform the ritual. This pup... I don't need it anymore."
She had waited for this pup for fifteen years. She found out about her pregnancy today and lost it on the same day.
Hans had always looked forward to a pup of their own coming into their lives. But he wasn't there when this pup needed him to save her.
Violette pulled the mating band from her finger and dropped it in the waste bin.
"Understood. We'll begin immediately, Luna."
Violette stared at the ceiling of the ritual chamber. Her face was pale, her lips colorless and marked with bite marks because she kept biting them.
The healers moved around her, preparing instruments and laying out herbs.
"Luna Blackthorn, we're about to begin. We'll administer a sleeping draught so you won't feel any pain."
"No need. Don't sedate me."
She needed a reminder of when the fully formed pup was taken from her womb and how Hans was not present.
"Very well. Begin the ritual."
"Yes, healer."
Violette felt something being pulled from her body, and the pain grew sharper. She tried not to cry, but her tears could no longer be held back. Somewhere inside her chest, the place where her wolf lived went completely silent. Not keening. Not whimpering. Silent, the way a room goes silent after someone has stopped breathing.
"It's over, Luna. The pup has been removed."
Violette felt her body go weak, and everything went dark.
Tears streamed from the corners of her eyes.
