Cassian scooped her up without a second glance and ran for the pack healer. I screamed after his retreating back until my voice broke, but he never once turned around.
The den attendants carried me back. I had barely finished having my wounds dressed when he stormed in, livid.
He accused me of drugging Vesper's horse, of being the reason she'd been thrown.
He didn't ask a single question before ordering the flogging.
The attendants wielding the rods had their instructions. It took only two or three blows to shatter both my legs.
After that, every slight Vesper suffered, every grievance she nursed, Cassian laid at my feet.
I was bitter, furious, and yet part of me still believed Vesper had deceived him, bewitched him into treating me this way.
Now I saw it for what it was.
He had never held me in his heart. He never would.
A dazed laugh left me, and I shook my head. Something flickered across Cassian's face, and he began to lift his hand toward my hair.
Then Vesper's voice cut in.
"Cousin, you don't understand how a woman's mind works. She's only upset because you're good to me. This pitiful act is just to make you feel sorry for her..."
"We're both women. Why don't you leave her with me? Let me talk some sense into her. She might come around."
"But..."
Cassian's gaze drifted between the two of us, hesitant.
"Cousin! I'll be entering the Heir Alpha's den in a few days. After that it'll just be the two of you here. If I don't smooth things over with Nira now, and you two end up at odds because of me, I'll never forgive myself..."
Cassian could never stand to see Vesper upset. He nodded, rose, and left.
A sly smile curled the corner of Vesper's mouth.
"Now it's just us. Finally, no need to pretend..."
"I haven't even thanked you properly. Without you, the Heir Alpha would never have noticed me. It's not the title of Heir Alpha's mate, but for someone of my standing, just being allowed to serve at his side is more than I could've hoped for..."
"Still, keeping you around is a liability. If the Heir Alpha ever finds out... No. I will never give him the chance."
"Until I leave for my mating ceremony, you're not setting foot outside this room. Not until I've secured my position in the Heir Alpha's den. And if you ever pull what you did that day again, if you so much as catch his eye, I'll have Cassian kill you."
She dropped that threat like a parting gift, turned on her heel, and locked the door from the outside, every bolt thrown tight.
I lay on the bed and let the tears soak into the pillow.
Three full days. Apart from the attendant who brought meals, the silence around me was terrifying. I drifted in and out of consciousness, fever rising and falling, and images streamed through my dreams that I could not tell from memory.
One moment it was warhorses and clashing steel, bodies crumpling before me one after another. The tang of blood so sharp I could taste iron on my tongue even in sleep, and somewhere beneath it a scent I couldn't name, something cold and clean like snow cedar carried on winter wind.
The next, someone was gripping my hand, calling me "Sister."
Just as the face was about to come into focus, the dream shattered. My eyes flew open to an empty room, and a single thought took root in my mind.
If teetering on the edge of death could summon visions like these, then maybe all I needed was to try again. And again. Until I finally learned who I really was.
I dragged myself upright and rummaged through the cabinet until I found a length of white silk.
I flung it over the ceiling beam and knotted it tight.
The instant my neck slipped through the loop, the fabric bit into my throat.
Agony and suffocation crashed over me at once, and everything went black.
Consciousness peeled away, and the face from my dream sharpened, inch by inch. Something deep inside me stirred, a presence I had no name for, pressing forward as if it too wanted to see.
I was so close to seeing it clearly.
BANG.
The door was kicked open.
Vesper stood in the doorway, two senior den attendants behind her, a bowl of broth in her hands.
"Oh my. Still alive?"
She strolled in with a smile, crouched down, and peered at me. "Trying to die? Did you ask my permission first?"
I lifted my head. My throat hurt too much to speak.
