Chapter 82

Chapter 82: Chapter 82

Sophia stepped out of Kael’s office, in her hand a leather bag filled with five million silvers. She’d struggled to contain her smile—the relief that filled her insides.

Oh, she was so relieved.

She held the bag tightly as she walked down the corridor. She’d made Kael believe the healer would come at night. Sometimes she wondered how it was that Kael became Alpha. He believed everything she told him. That kind of trust was so rare.

She’d nearly reached the corridor’s end when a strong hand suddenly grabbed her arm, pulling her into a room. Sophia’s eyes widened with shock upon realizing who had grabbed her.

Beta Callum stood before her in the library room.

"What the hell do you think you’re doing?" Sophia snapped angrily, keeping the bag much closer to her.

Callum released her arm but didn’t step back, his eyes dropping pointedly to the bag clutched against her chest. "Five million silvers."

"I don’t have time for this, Callum." Sophia moved to step around him. "Lily needs that healer—"

"That’s the exact amount you asked me for three days ago." He didn’t move out of her way. "Before Lily was ever sick."

Sophia froze.

"Strange coincidence," he continued, watching her face carefully. "Lily suddenly falls gravely ill, and suddenly you need the precise sum you were already desperate for."

"What are you insinuating?" Her voice came out sharper than she meant it to, panic bleeding through the edges despite her best effort to sound offended rather than caught.

"I’m asking you to explain it." Callum stepped closer, his tone even, though something colder had settled behind his eyes. "Tell me why the healer you claim can save Lily needs exactly five million silvers. Tell me why you came to me for that same number before anyone knew she would collapse."

"Are you interrogating me now, Beta?" She spat the title at him, chin lifting. "I don’t answer to you."

Callum’s expression didn’t change. "No. You don’t. But you answer to Alpha Kael. I’m not sure how he’d react if he finds out the five million silvers you needed is the same one Lily now needs to be healed. What healer asks for such a sum, Luna Sophia?"

Sophia’s eyes narrowed. "You’re becoming very suspicious for someone who is supposed to be helping the Alpha. Don’t forget who I am, who Lily is. Not only am I Luna, the mate of the man you serve. I am Lily’s mother, and I would do anything to save her."

Sophia took another step toward him.

"Lily is lying unconscious in the healing ward. I found someone who can save her, and instead of helping me, you’re standing here demanding explanations about money."

"I would help you," Callum said, "if you gave me a reason to believe this is actually about Lily."

Sophia’s face turned red. "How dare you—"

"How dare I?" His voice stayed level. "A child collapses with no fever, no wound, no cause any healer in this pack can name. And somehow the one person who can cure her charges the exact sum you tried to pull from the treasury before any of this happened. Forgive me, Sophia, if that doesn’t sit easily with me."

Sophia’s grip on the bag tightened until her knuckles whitened. "You think I would hurt my own daughter. My own child!"

"I think," Callum said carefully, "that you’re hiding something. I don’t yet know what. But I intend to find out."

The door opened before she could answer.

Kael stepped through, exhaustion written into every line of his face, and stopped at the sight of them standing so close, the tension thick enough to taste.

His brows furrowed. "What is going on here?"

"Nothing," Sophia said quickly, stepping back from Callum, her jaw tight. She gestured toward Callum, who stood beside her. "It seems Beta Callum has a problem with me taking the money to save our daughter."

Kael’s eyes moved to Callum. "Is that true?"

"It’s a significant sum, Alpha." Callum held his gaze steadily. "And we haven’t diagnosed what’s actually wrong with Lily. We haven’t exhausted what other healers can offer before handing five million silvers to a stranger none of us have met."

"A stranger I know that I have met. Do you really think of me so low that I will bring a random person to cure my daughter?" Sophia said, her voice rising. She ran her fingers through her hair.

"Is that what we’re doing now?" Sophia’s voice rose. "Waiting until we’ve exhausted every option while she lies there, not waking up? This is the only way, Kael. I know it."

Kael looked between them, and whatever exhaustion had slowed him before seemed to burn away.

"Bring the healer," he said finally, turning to Sophia. Then, he turned to face Callum, voice firm. "I know you’re thinking about the investors. About what this looks like, pulling that kind of money right now. But my daughter’s life matters more than what any investor or their thoughts of me."

"Alpha, I only meant—"

"Bring the healer," Kael repeated, and this time it wasn’t a request.

Sophia didn’t wait to be told twice. She swept past both of them, the bag clutched tight to her chest, and disappeared down the corridor without a backward glance.

Kael lingered only a moment longer, his jaw tight, before he too turned and left.

Callum stood alone in the library. He waited until he was certain he was truly alone, then shut his eyes, opening the mind link.

’Alpha Damon.’

’Here.’ Damon’s voice came through sharp with interest. ’Tell me Kael’s finally lost his mind completely.’

’Lily collapsed this morning. No fever, no wound, nothing the healers can identify. Sophia claims to have found a healer who can cure her. The price is five million silvers.’

A pause. ’Five million. That’s a very specific number for a miracle cure.’ Damon responded.

’It’s the exact amount she asked me for three days ago. Before any of this happened.’

’Then something is happening. Find out everything you can.’ Damon’s voice sharpened further. ’Where she goes. Who she meets. What this is really about. If Sophia is bleeding Silver Creek dry for something that has nothing to do with Lily, I want to know before Kael does.’

’Understood.’

---

Sophia moved very quickly. It was still daytime, but it didn’t matter. She’d told Kael she’d be back at night with the healer, thus buying herself time.

She walked right out of the main gate, this time not the servants’ quarters. She’d sent a message beforehand to the cloaked man. Their meeting was set too. Sophia hurried along.

She did not notice the figure watching her from a few steps away. The head healer stood partially hidden behind a pillar, her eyes fixed on Sophia.

She had been suspicious of Sophia since the day she saw her sneaking out of the healing ward and the missing vial.

Now Sophia was carrying a bag large enough to hold a fortune. She wasn’t dumb. She put two and two together, and it summed up.

Sophia poisoned Lily to extort Alpha Kael, all so she could pay the man. She couldn’t believe it. If someone had told her, she’d laugh. But a mother was poisoning her own child for money.

She knew Sophia was vile, but never to this extent. She waited until Sophia mounted her horse before quietly slipping away toward the general market direction.

She had no horse of her own waiting, but there wasn’t time to find one. She knew the back roads toward the market square better than most, and if she moved quickly enough on foot, she could beat a horse forced to keep to the main road through the gates.

And so, she ran. By the time she reached the market district, her lungs burned and her legs shook, but she’d made it in time to see Sophia dismounting near the fountain at the square’s center, tying off her horse with hands that trembled despite her attempt to appear composed.

The healer slipped into the crowd, weaving between stalls and merchants, using the press of bodies as cover the way she’d seen guards do a hundred times.

Sophia didn’t go far. She stopped at a stall, beside a tall figure cloaked in dark fabric, his hood drawn low enough to cover his face, but his tattoo was visible, making her recognize him.

The healer edged closer, ducking behind a cart and straining to catch their exchange over the noise of the square.

"—told you three days," the cloaked man was saying. "You’re early."

"I have it." Sophia’s voice shook. "All of it. Take it and leave us be."

The healer inched forward, desperate to hear more, desperate to understand exactly what this man held over Sophia, what debt five million silvers and her own child’s suffering had been spent to settle.

She’d been so focused on them, she never saw the hand that seized her from behind.

Pain exploded across the back of her skull, bright and sudden, the crowded square lurching sideways as her knees buckled.

The last thing she saw was Sophia’s head snapping toward the commotion, her eyes going wide with recognition and horror.

Then everything went dark.