Chapter 273: Next step

ÉTIENNE

Margaux was still gripping the phone when I finally pried it gently from her fingers, her father’s last words still hanging in the air between us like smoke that refused to clear.

"He’s not going to listen," she whispered, staring at the blank screen.

"I know."

"Shanelle," she said suddenly, her head snapping up. "I can call her. She is diplomatic. Maybe she will talk to her father, and he can talk to mine. So my father can see reason."

"Will that work? Sad as it is, he seems set in his ways; I don’t think anyone can change his mind. If Shanelle is not on board, then your friend might just become implicated for no reason."

"I disagree. She wouldn’t agree with any of this. She knows and trusts my judgment, and I will never know till I try."

"Call her then," I said. "See what she knows. But do not push her to do anything rash for your sake."

"I will." She caught my hand before I could step back, her grip tighter than it needed to be. "Where are you going?"

"To Dorian," I said. "He needs to hear about the coalition before it becomes common knowledge in his own halls. I’d rather he learn it from me first."

She nodded, some of the frantic energy in her settling into something steadier, more focused.

"Go," she said. "I’ll reach out to Shanelle now."

I pressed a kiss to her forehead and left her sitting on the edge of the bed, already scrolling back through her contacts.

I found Dorian in his study, exactly where I expected him to be, a glass of something amber untouched at his elbow while he stared at papers he clearly wasn’t reading.

"I heard the tragic news about her mother," he said, before I’d even fully crossed the threshold. "And about Margaux. What she went through last night." He set his pen down. "How is she? How are you both?"

"We’ll persevere," I said. "That’s not why I’m here, though."

Dorian’s eyes sharpened immediately, reading the shift in my tone.

"What’s happened?"

I laid it out for him plainly, everything my spy had relayed that morning. Beaumont’s coalition. Armand’s speech in front of the visiting emissaries. The framing of this as an assault on the sanctity of mating itself rather than a private grudge. The march planned within the week if Margaux wasn’t returned.

Dorian’s face went through several stages while I spoke, shock giving way to fury, fury cooling into something colder and far more calculating by the time I finished.

"They intend to march on us," he said slowly, "over a marriage they half arranged themselves."

"They’re calling it something else now," I said. "Something bigger than a border dispute. It’s working, too. At least three neighboring packs have already committed."

Dorian’s jaw tightened, and he rose from his chair, pacing toward the window, his hands clasped tightly behind his back.

"This changes things," he murmured, more to himself than to me.

"I assumed it would."

He turned back toward me, something calculating now settling behind his eyes.

"Céline," he said.

I frowned. "What about her?"

"With a war forming against us," he said, "she becomes a liability I can no longer afford to ignore. Not just morally, given what she’s already done to me. Tactically."

He crossed back to his desk, gripping the edge of it with both hands.

"There are family members within our own ranks who never approved of me naming you my heir," he continued. "The promise of war gives them reason to act more loudly now. They would never accept Céline in that role either, given she’s a woman, but that has never stopped ambitious people from using a woman as a lever regardless of whether they intend to let her actually sit in the chair afterward."

I suppose I already sensed it, in part, before I arrived. Valcourt, for all its internal squabbles, was a pack that kept its secrets close. Outsiders knew almost nothing about Theodore’s death, which made it easy for me to keep up the charade.

"You think they’d use her against you," I said. "Now, of all times."

"A coalition forming against Valcourt, questions already circling about my judgment and my fitness to lead," Dorian said. "It’s a goldmine for anyone looking to destabilize me from the inside. And Céline, bitter, ambitious, with every reason in the world to resent me after everything that’s come out, would enjoy being that lever herself. She wouldn’t need much convincing."

"So what do you intend to do?"

"Before it spreads any further," he said, "I’m calling for her trial."

I studied him for a long moment.

"You don’t have to do this on my account," I said. "If keeping her means losing the rest, if this costs you standing you can’t afford to lose right now, I don’t need you to choose me over her. You’ve already given me more than I ever expected from anyone in my life."

Dorian’s expression hardened, something fierce and immediate replacing the calculation from a moment ago.

"You are my family," he said, each word deliberate. "I will not be having this conversation with you again, Étienne."

"I’m simply saying—"

"I failed Theodore," he cut in, his voice dropping, rougher now. "I failed my real son, in more ways than I’ve ever been willing to admit out loud, even to myself. I owe it to his memory not to fail at fatherhood a second time." He paused, something flickering across his face, old grief resurfacing briefly before he pushed it back down. "A third time, too. With your sister."

The word sister landed strangely in my chest, given everything Céline had done, given the poison she’d fed him slowly for years.

"If she goes before the elder court," I said carefully, "they’ll propose death. You know that."

"I know."

"But thankfully, most of them are still obsessed with the caste system," I continued. "Turning a highborn woman into a rogue, stripping her of rank and blood and everything that comes with it, they see that as a fate worse than execution. They’d allow that if they can get to see her fall that far."

Dorian’s eyes met mine, something unreadable passing behind them.

"For Céline," I said quietly, "it probably is."

Something in his expression cracked at that, just slightly, the weight of it settling visibly across his shoulders.

"I cannot believe I still hold a lot of pity in my heart for her... I mean... she poisoned me," he said, more to himself than to me, like he was reminding himself of the fact rather than informing me of it. "Slowly... Patiently... For years, while I sat across from her at dinner, entirely unaware."

"I know."

"And still," he said, "I find myself hoping the court shows some mercy I’m not certain she deserves."

"That’s your choice to hope for," I said. "Not mine to judge you over."

He nodded slowly, some of the tension easing from his shoulders, though not all of it.

"I’ll call for the trial within the day," he said. "Before Beaumont’s noise gives anyone else the excuse to act on her behalf, or worse, in her name without her even knowing it."

"Do you want me present for it?" I asked.

"I want you focused on your mate," he said. "On the coalition. On whatever needs doing to keep this war from actually reaching our gates. You can handle that. Céline and my extended family are mine to handle. You’ve carried enough of my family’s troubles already, Étienne. Let me carry this one myself."