Chapter 500: Dusk.

Vincent.

The heavy canvas flap of the main war tent snapped violently as a wounded scout stumbled inside, dripping dark mud and fresh blood onto the fur carpets.

I didn’t move from my seat at the head of the oak war table. I simply kept my fingers wrapped around the silver goblet in my hand, staring down at the sprawling map of the valley pass.

"My Prince..." the scout choked out, dropping heavily to one knee, his chest heaving under his dented leather armor. "General Alaric... he’s back. He barely made it up the ridge."

I took a slow, deliberate sip from my goblet before setting it down with a quiet, hollow click against the wood. "Send him in."

A second later, two guards dragged Alaric into the tent. His silver cloak was shredded, his face bruised and covered in dried river mud. His broadsword was gone, and his right shoulder hung at an awkward, broken angle.

I looked at him, my expression unreadable. "You look like hell, Alaric." I blurted out.

But admist my words, I thought and had assumed the quadruplets would have handed Maria over without a fight?

Alaric swallowed hard, his jaw trembling as he met my gaze. "It was... it was a setup, my Prince... the carriage was empty... Daniel is a traitor... the qudruplets never planned to surrender."

The quiet inside the war tent turned instantly suffocating.

I leaned forward slowly, resting my elbows on the table, my dark eyes locking onto my general. "What did you say?"

"There was no surrender," Alaric rasped, his voice cracking with pure panic. "Aidan brought Daniel bound on horseback to make us think the deal was real. The moment we stepped into the river pass to take the carriage, Marcus’s elite guards flanked us from the timber line. They cut our forward vanguard to pieces."

"And Daniel?" I asked, my voice dangerously low.

"Captured," Alaric whispered, wincing as he shifted his weight. "Aidan took him down himself. The whole operation... it was a trap from the start."

I sat back in my chair, staring at the map. A slow, cold burn began to spread through my chest.

One month.

I had kept Maria in my stronghold for a single month. Every single day, I had personally handed her those silver-willow tonics, lacing them with tiny, precise drops of refined wolfsbane. It was supposed to be subtle. Just enough to keep her wolf dormant, just enough to break her spirit, and just enough to ensure her bond to those four arrogant quadruplets faded into nothing. I had spent four solid weeks slowly eroding her strength, making sure she couldn’t run, making sure she belonged to me.

And in less than twenty-four hours, those bastards had ripped her out of my hands and turned my own vanguard into bird feed.

"Where is she, Alaric?" I demanded, my tone flat, stripped of all warmth.

"They... they took her west, sir," Alaric stammered out, blood dripping from his lip onto the carpet. "Before Aidan left me in the river mud, he gave me a message for you. He said Maria is safe. He said they took her to Noah’s territory... and their physician is purging the wolfsbane from her blood as we speak."

I slammed my fist onto the war table so hard the heavy oak cracked down the center, sending my silver goblet flying across the room and spilling red wine across the map.

Alaric flinched, dropping his head to the floorboards, while the guards at the tent entrance shrank back into the shadows.

"A month of work!" I roared, standing up from the chair, my Alpha aura flaring so bright and suffocating that the lanterns hanging from the tent poles flickered violently. "One month of carefully feeding her that poison! Keeping her weak! Keeping her locked in my sight! And you let them march her straight off to Noah’s pack house?!"

"My Prince, we didn’t know Noah was aligned with them!" Alaric pleaded desperately, his voice raw. "We thought Noah was neutral! We had no idea his border guards would open their gates to the quadruplets!"

"Noah is a opportunistic rat!" I snarled, pacing back and forth behind the table, my chest heaving with cold fury. "He wants her just as badly as the rest of them. The moment he realized she was vulnerable, he offered up his infirmary just to get his hands on her!"

I stopped pacing, staring down at the wine-stained map where Noah’s territory was outlined in black ink.

If their physician was flushing her system right now, my control was completely gone. The wolfsbane would be out of her blood by nightfall. Her wolf would wake up, her bond to the quadruplets would snap back into place, and every single week I spent breaking her down over this past month would mean absolutely nothing.

"My Prince..." Alaric rasped out from the floor. "What are your orders? Do we fall back to the upper mountain stronghold?"

"Fall back?" I repeated, turning my head slowly to glare down at him with a murderous sneer. "You think I’m going to run into the mountains while they sit in Noah’s pack, laughing at my failed trap?"

"They’re coming for us," Alaric warned, his voice shaking. "Aidan told me... he said they--- the quadruplets are done playing defense... they’re marching on this camp."

"Let them march!" I shouted, kicking my chair backward against the tent wall. "They think because they won a tiny skirmish at a river pass that they’ve won this war? They’re coming into my domain!"

I turned sharply toward my captain of the guard standing near the entrance. "Get the heavy cavalry prepped right now! Sound the war horns across the entire ridge!"

"Sir?" the captain asked, stepping forward nervously. "Do we fortify the perimeter around the camp?"

"No," I growled, pulling my broadsword from its scabbard, the heavy iron blade gleaming in the dim light. "We don’t wait for them to reach our gates. I want every armored soldier, every scout, and every heavy blade on the front line at the edge of the valley by dusk."

"We’re launching a full siege on Noah’s border?" the captain asked, his eyes wide.

"We are going to burn Noah’s pack house to the ground," I said, my voice dropping into a razor-sharp, lethal promise. "I don’t care if I have to march through every single guard he has. I am taking Maria back tonight, and I will put an end to those quadruplets once and for all."

I stepped over Alaric’s bleeding frame, shoving the heavy canvas flap of the tent open. The icy mountain wind hit my face as the sound of war horns began to echo across the high ridge, calling hundreds of armored soldiers to battle.

I looked down at the dark valley below, my jaw set, my grip tightening on the hilt of my sword.

They thought they had saved her. They thought one flushed vein changed everything. But by the time the sun came up tomorrow, there wouldn’t be a single pack house left standing in this valley.