So he laced my favorite pastries with the drug, and I ate them without a second thought.
"Caelan, my stomach hurts so much. I just ate them, there's still time. Please, go find a healer."
He didn't move. My voice cracked raw with panic. "I won't mate with you, is that what you want? I just want my pup. I'll take her and leave, go far away. I won't be in your way, I swear."
No matter how I screamed and begged, Caelan didn't flinch.
He held out his arm. "Bite down on this. It won't hurt as much."
I shoved his arm away. "Go find a healer. I'm begging you, Caelan."
"Seraphina, don't be ridiculous. No pack healer is going to treat someone of your standing."
"The wolfsbane's already taken effect. It's too late. Be good. Once Sable gives birth to the legitimate heir, we can have another pup."
I seized his hand and held on with everything I had. "Caelan, listen to me. I am a princess. Princess Seraphina Silvercrest. Go get the healer. Save this pup."
But he thought I was lying. He wrenched his hand free, anger flashing across his face.
"You've truly disappointed me. If you're going to lie, at least make it believable. This is the Silvercrest Dominion's capital territory, not your little borderland den. One wrong word here can cost you your head."
He flicked his cloak and stormed out.
"A pup loss won't kill you. Look after yourself."
I watched his retreating figure until it disappeared. Every last shred of hope in me went with it. Deep in my chest, my wolf went silent. Not howling, not keening. Just silent, as though the part of her that knew how to make sound had been cut away.
I curled into the corner, the pain splitting me open. I could feel it, every moment of it, the pup slipping away from my body.
The pup I had longed for day and night, killed by its own father on the very first day he learned of its existence.
I was unconscious through the night. The furs beneath me soaked through with blood. The scent of it filled the small room, iron and salt and something sweeter underneath that I couldn't let myself name.
The door crashed open with a kick. Sable Ashveil strode in, flanked by several older den workers. Her scent hit me before I could focus my eyes: overripe plum and that cloying sweetness that never quite covered the sharper thing underneath.
She glanced at me, drenched in blood from the waist down, then settled into a chair by the table and poured herself a cup of tea as if she had all the time in the world.
"Don't blame me. The pup in my belly has to be the firstborn heir. That's the only way I'll have any standing in the Blackthorn Pack. Surely you understand."
I braced myself against the wall, barely upright. "So you had my pup killed."
Sable let out a short laugh. "Now that's unfair. Caelan was the one who laced the food. Caelan was the one who didn't want it. All I did was mention it in passing."
I stared at her, unblinking. My nails dug into my palms until the skin split.
She rose and walked over to me, one hand resting on her belly.
"Besides, you should count yourself lucky. Even if your pup had survived, it would have been taken from you and raised under the recognized mate. Better this way, really."
"Bring the tincture over. Make her drink it. Help her recover."
The den workers pried my jaw open and forced the liquid down my throat. I recognized the taste. Bitter and acrid, burning like poison. Concentrated wolfsbane tincture. The kind that kills the womb.
I thrashed, tried to spit it out, but they pinned me down and held my mouth shut. My wolf surged once, a single desperate lunge against the inside of my ribs, and then the wolfsbane reached her too. She collapsed somewhere deep inside me, and I felt the exact moment she went still.
Sable crouched beside me and patted my cheek, slow and deliberate, every touch a humiliation. "Can't have you bearing more pups down the line. All that squabbling over heirs gets so tiresome."
"My mating ceremony is in two days. I still need to go try on my jeweled ceremonial crest. If you'll excuse me."
As she stood, she let her robe fall open just enough to reveal the moonstone pendant at her waist.
Caelan's moonstone pendant. He told me once that his mother left it to him, the only thing he had of hers. And he had given it to Sable.
She was nearly at the door when she paused, as though something had just occurred to her. "Oh, one more thing. Caelan transferred this property into my name. I hear you're fond of the simple borderland life, so by all means, keep living here. Just remember, it's my territory now. My rules."
My whole body went rigid. When Caelan burned down our den, he told me he bought this place for me. Told me I could fill the grounds with moonflower bushes and herb gardens.
He never intended to give me anything. Not from the very beginning.
"Sable."
I called after her, my voice scraped hollow.
"Miss Ashveil, have you ever heard of Princess Seraphina Silvercrest?"
Sable froze for a beat. "What, are you going to tell me that reclusive princess has something to do with you?"
