The kitchen gave me access to things Omegas weren't supposed to notice.
I scrubbed pots at the deep sink and listened to warriors gossip over breakfast. I swept the dining hall and watched Cassidy's schedule unfold with the precision of a woman who had spent months establishing routines. I carried supply crates from the storage cellar and memorized the inventory logs left carelessly open on the Beta's desk.
No one looked at me long enough to wonder what I was doing.
By the second morning, I had the timeline.
Cassidy had arrived at the pack house four days after I disappeared. She'd told Kingston she'd come to help coordinate search efforts. The pack records showed she'd stayed. The records also showed that Kason's collar—standard silver, reinforced at the clasp, designed for adult Omegas who'd proven flight risks—had been requisitioned six weeks after her arrival. The requisition form bore her signature.
I stood in the empty corridor outside the Beta's office, holding a mop I wasn't using, and stared at that signature until the letters blurred.
Six weeks.
She'd waited six weeks before putting a collar on a child.
I set the mop against the wall and pulled out the small notebook I kept hidden in my apron pocket. I wrote the date. The requisition number. The name of the pack smith who'd forged the collar—a man I'd known for years, who'd made the ceremonial blade for my Luna marking.
Then I added a note at the bottom: *Cassidy began "comforting" Kingston two weeks after my disappearance. Collar placed four weeks after that. Timeline suggests establishment of authority before targeting the child.*
I closed the notebook and went back to mopping floors I'd already cleaned.
***
That afternoon, I was sent to the storage cellar to inventory winter provisions.
The cellar was cold and dim, lit by a single overhead bulb that flickered every few seconds. Rows of shelves held canned goods, dried meat, medical supplies, blankets. Standard pack stores.
I was counting blankets when I saw the crate.
It was pushed into the corner behind a stack of empty barrels, half-covered by a tarp. The wood was older than the other crates, weathered in a way that meant it had been outside for a long time. I pulled the tarp back.
The Shadowvale mark was burned into the side. Our pack's territorial sigil, clean and unmistakable.
I knelt and pried the lid open with my fingers.
Inside: dried rations. Medical tape. Wolfsbane powder in sealed glass vials.
I picked up one of the vials and held it to the light. The label was in our pack healer's handwriting. I recognized the slant of the letters.
This wasn't surplus. This was pack supply, logged and distributed through official channels.
I thought about the rogue camp. The silver chains. The wolfsbane they'd mixed into my water every day for a year.
I thought about how well-supplied they'd been. How organized.
I set the vial back in the crate, closed the lid, and pulled the tarp over it again.
Then I went upstairs and added a single line to my notebook: *Rogue camp provisions match Shadowvale supply signatures. Healer's labels. Official distribution.*
I didn't have proof.
But I had the shape of it.
***
That night, I found the hidden food under Kason's sleeping mat.
He was curled on his side, pretending to sleep, when I knelt beside him in the kennel. I didn't say anything. I just reached under the mat and pulled out the three pieces of dried bread he'd saved.
His eyes opened. He looked at me, then at the bread in my hand.
"I wasn't hungry," he whispered.
I set the bread down and touched his face. His cheek was hollow under my palm.
"You don't have to lie to me," I said quietly.
He swallowed. His throat worked against the silver collar, and I saw him wince.
"They watch when I eat," he said. "If I eat too fast, they say I'm greedy. If I eat too slow, they say I'm wasting food. So I just... don't."
I pulled him into my lap. He came willingly, his small body folding against mine like he was trying to disappear into my chest.
I braided his hair in the dim light. My fingers remembered the pattern—over, under, pull tight. I used to do this every morning before he went to training. His hair had been longer then. Healthier.
Now it was brittle and uneven, hacked short in places where someone had cut it without care.
I finished the braid and tied it off with a strip of fabric from my apron.
"We're leaving soon," I said against the top of his head. "Two more days."
He was quiet for a long moment. Then: "Promise?"
I closed my eyes. I thought about the message I'd sent. The reply. The operatives positioning at the frozen lake border.
I thought about all the ways this could go wrong.
"Yes," I said.
It was the only promise I'd made since I came back.
Kason's hands tightened in my shirt. He nodded once, his face still pressed against my shoulder.
I held him until his breathing evened out. Then I laid him back on the mat, pulled the thin blanket over him, and stood.
As I turned to leave, I picked up the three pieces of bread and slipped them into my pocket.
He would need his strength.
We both would.
***
The next morning, Cassidy called me to the central training yard.
The entire pack was there. Warriors running drills. Younger wolves practicing shifts. Elders watching from the stone benches along the perimeter.
Cassidy stood at the center, her posture perfect, her voice carrying across the yard without effort.
"Adaline," she called.
I walked toward her. Slowly. Head down.
She waited until I stopped in front of her. Then she gestured to the training equipment scattered across the dirt—wooden practice weapons, sparring mats, water barrels.
"Clean this," she said. "Immediately."
Her voice was pleasant. Reasonable.
I looked at the equipment. Then at the warriors still training. The session wasn't over. They were still using half of it.
"Yes, Luna," I said.
I knelt and started collecting the nearest weapons.
The yard went quiet.
I didn't look up. I just kept working, stacking the wooden swords, rolling the mats, dragging the water barrels toward the equipment shed.
Some of the warriors moved out of my way. Others stood still and made me walk around them.
I felt their eyes on me. All of them.
Corran—the senior Delta who'd served under me for six years—stood near the sparring ring. I saw him shift his weight. His hand moved, just slightly, like he was going to step forward.
Cassidy's gaze fixed on him.
He went still.
I finished collecting the equipment and carried it to the shed. My arms were shaking by the time I set the last barrel down.
When I turned around, Corran was standing at the corner of the shed, just out of sight of the main yard.
"Luna," he said quietly.
I looked at him. He was older than Kingston, gray threading through his dark hair, his face lined from years of border patrol.
"Some of us remember who you were," he said. Low. Fast. Like he was afraid someone would hear.
I held his gaze for three seconds.
"Remember it quietly," I said.
Then I walked past him, back toward the pack house.
Behind me, I heard him exhale—sharp and frustrated.
I didn't look back.
But I added his name to the list in my notebook that night, right below the supply signature and the requisition form and the timeline that was starting to look less like coincidence and more like conspiracy.
One day and fourteen hours until extraction.
I could survive one more day.
