Ember POV:
The Auction Hall was a cavernous space filled with crystal chandeliers and the murmuring of the werewolf elite. The air was thick with the scents of expensive cologne, champagne, and the underlying metallic tang of power.
I stood in the corner, invisible in my grey wool dress, holding Karyn's fur coat. It was heavy and smelled of her cloying perfume.
Chace and Karyn sat in the front row, holding hands. They were the golden couple of the evening.
"Ladies and Gentlemen," the auctioneer announced from the podium. "We have a surprise addition to tonight's catalog. Lot 45."
Two staff members wheeled out a large easel covered by a cloth.
"This piece was recovered from the estate of the late Ford family," the auctioneer said. "It is a portrait of the disgraced Liana Ford."
My heart stopped.
The cloth was pulled away.
It was a painting of my mother. But it had been defaced. Someone—Karyn—had painted red slashes across her neck and written the word TRAITOR across the bottom in jagged black letters.
The crowd murmured. Some laughed.
"We are starting the bidding at ten dollars," the auctioneer joked. "Proceeds go to the Rogue Rehabilitation Fund. Who wants a piece of history's shame?"
Laughter rippled through the room. It was a sound like breaking glass in my ears.
I looked at Chace. He was laughing too. He was laughing at the desecration of the woman who had practically raised him when his own parents were too busy.
"Chace," I whispered, though he couldn't hear me across the room. Do something.
"Ten dollars!" a drunk Beta shouted from the back.
"Do I hear twenty? For the Rogue witch?"
I stepped forward. I didn't have money. I didn't have status. But I couldn't let them do this.
"Stop!" I screamed.
Heads turned. Karyn glared at me.
"Sit down, Omega!" Chace shouted, half-rising from his seat. "Don't embarrass me!"
"That is my mother!" I yelled, my voice cracking. "She was a high-born Ford! This is slander!"
"She was a whore!" Karyn shouted back.
The auctioneer raised his gavel. "Going once..."
Suddenly, the air in the room changed.
It wasn't a sound. It was a pressure. It felt like the atmospheric drop before a tornado touches down. Every wolf in the room froze. The hair on my arms stood up. My inner wolf lowered her head, not in submission, but in reverence.
This was a Lycan Aura. Pure, ancient, and terrifying.
The double doors at the back of the hall didn't open. Instead, a man in a sharp black suit walked onto the stage from the side. He wasn't the King. He was a Beta, but he carried a tablet with the Royal Seal.
He placed a hand on the auctioneer's gavel. The auctioneer, an Alpha, trembled and dropped the hammer.
"This auction is suspended," the Beta said. His voice wasn't loud, but it carried to every corner of the silent room.
"By whose order?" Chace demanded, standing up. He was trying to look brave, but I could smell the ammonia scent of his fear.
"By order of the Crown," the Beta replied calmly. "King Keith Mosley has declared this item to be evidence in an ongoing investigation regarding defamation of a Noble House."
The room gasped. Noble House? The Fords were extinct. Or so everyone thought.
"The King is not even here!" Karyn shrieked. "You can't just—"
The Beta looked at Karyn. "The King sees everything. And he is displeased."
He signaled to the staff. They covered the painting immediately and wheeled it away, treating it with sudden, terrified respect.
Chace turned pale. To anger the Alpha King was social suicide. He looked around the room, seeing the accusing glares of the other Alphas. He needed a scapegoat.
He pointed at me.
"It was her!" Chace shouted. "Ember! She brought the painting! She set this up to create a scandal! I had nothing to do with it!"
My jaw dropped. He was throwing me to the wolves. Again.
"Ember Ford is hereby demoted!" Chace announced to the room. "She is stripped of her rank within the Red Stone Pack. She is no longer an inner circle member. She is an outcast!"
It was a meaningless punishment. I was already treated lower than dirt. But the public rejection stung.
I turned and ran. I pushed through the heavy doors, out into the cool night air.
My phone buzzed in my pocket.
I pulled it out, my vision blurry with tears.
From: Keith Mosley
Message: Do not cry for them, little wolf. The Pack is family. And I protect my own. Go pack your bags.
I stared at the screen. The fear vanished, replaced by a strange warmth. It felt like a heavy blanket being wrapped around my shoulders.
I wasn't alone.
