Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Kieran
I am sitting at my desk with Daciana, amusing her by conjuring fire from my fingers, a trick I learned from my mother a very long time ago, when there’s a knock on the door.
“That’s beautiful,” Daciana breathes, watching the flames dance across my knuckles without burning me. For a moment, the worry lines around her eyes have eased. “Your mother taught you that?”
“Just before she died.” I let the fire spiral up into a small phoenix shape, remembering her patient hands guiding mine. “She said every alpha should know how to work with fire. We’re wolves, yes, but fire is power. Control.”
The knock comes again, more insistent.
I extinguish the flames with a mere thought. “Come in.”
Artisem enters, and I know immediately from his expression that he has found something. Daciana straightens beside me, her brief moment of peace evaporating.
“The sigil,” he says without preamble. “I know which family it belongs to.”
“Tell me.”
“The Ravelholt Clan.” He closes the door behind him. “They were wiped out twenty-eight years ago.”
The name Ravelholt is familiar to me; I must have read it in one of the history texts in my pack’s archives. But it’s the timeline that makes me glance at Daciana. Her face has gone pale, but her jaw sets with that stubborn determination I have come to recognize.
“Around the time I was born,” she says quietly.
“Yes.” Artisem’s tone is gentle, which tells me everything I need to know about where this is going. “This clan was its own entity, with its own lands; they never joined any pack. Technically, they were rogues.”
“Rogues don’t usually last long,” I point out. “Especially not families. Not with their own sigil, their own territory.”
“That’s where it gets interesting.” Artisem leans against the wall.
“Their family lineage traces back to the time of the first royal family—your ancestors, Kieran. The Ravelholt Clan was powerful once, during that reign. But when the royal family fell, the Ravelholt Clan disappeared, too. They’re not royals, never were, but they were connected to that time period somehow. ”
This gets my attention. The bloody coup that led to the fall of the first royal family also gave way to a purist revolution. I wonder if Lucian knows that his ancestors would never have allowed his mate to live, much less be queen.
“Connected how?” I ask.
“I don’t know yet. The records from that time are incomplete at best.” Frustration bleeds through Artisem’s normally careful composure.
“But what I do know is that they resurfaced eventually, living quietly at the base of the mountains. They were under the protection of the gypsy witches for as long as I could trace back. Centuries, possibly. The witches kept them hidden, kept them safe. Until they didn’t. ”
“Hera,” I mutter. “She’d know about this.”
“I’ve reached out to her. Multiple times. Different messengers. She’s not responding to any of it.”
Of course she isn’t. The witches never make anything easy.
“Is there any chance—” Daciana’s voice cracks, and she clears her throat before trying again. “Is there any chance I was born into that family?”
The hope in her voice makes my chest tight. I reach for her hand without thinking, and she grips my fingers hard enough to hurt.
Artisem looks at her sympathetically. “It would make sense. The human town this clan traded with—they visited often, apparently—claims that one of their women was pregnant around that time. The timeline matches.”
“Wait,” Daciana says, confusion furrowing her brow. “You said it was a family. But if they took in rogues…”
“That’s my understanding,” Artisem admits. “I don’t understand it completely, but there were different shifters living with them. I don’t think they were all related by blood.”
The pieces start clicking together in my mind.
“They might have been taking rogues in,” I say slowly.
“Giving them a place to belong. But to remain hidden from the Kingdom’s sight, to avoid questions about pack structure and territory rights, they never called themselves a pack. They stayed under the radar.”
“If gypsy witches mate with shifters and humans,” Daciana says, her voice gaining strength, “could they have mated with one of these rogues? Is that possible?”
“It’s likely,” I say, squeezing her hand. “That would explain why the witches offered them their protection in the first place. If they had children together, if there were bonds between them—”
“But why didn’t the witches help the Clan?” Daciana interrupts me, her frustration boiling over. “If they were under attack, and if the witches were protecting them, why didn’t they stop it?”
Artisem’s expression darkens. “If you were taken from that family, and the necromancer had anything to do with it, he could have kept the witches distracted. Wasn’t there a forest fire during those days?”
The memory surfaces, clear and blinding. “Yes,” I say. “A massive one. It burned for three days.”
“What if that fire was the distraction?” Artisem narrows his gaze. “It was quite near the territory of the gypsy witches. While they were dealing with that, containing the damage, protecting their own lands—”
“Someone was slaughtering the Ravelholt Clan,” I finish. “And taking a newborn baby.” My wolf snarls inside me, rage building at the calculated cruelty of it. “I don’t like this. The witches know more than they’re telling us. They have to.”
Daciana stands abruptly, pulling her hand from mine. She paces to the window, her whole body vibrating with tension. “I need to get out of here,” she says. “I need to breathe. I need—”
Artisem stops Daciana by saying, “I ran into Healer Selene. She seemed to be looking for you.”
She sighs. “I’ll go see what she wants.”
“There’s a guard outside waiting to accompany you,” Artisem adds.
Daciana glances at me as she starts for the door. “Is it okay if I leave?”
I smile at her as I reach for her hand and kiss the back of it. “Go. Stay within the palace grounds. Don’t give the guard the slip.”
Her lips curve. “I value my life, Kieran. I’ll stick to him like glue.”
I yank her closer with my grip on her hand, and she stumbles toward me. Our faces end up inches away from each other’s. “Not that close,” I murmur.
Her face flushes, and she presses her lips against mine softly. “Alright. See you in a bit.”
I watch her leave, then turn to my right-hand man. “So, what is it that you don’t want her overhearing?”
Artisem winces. “Caught that, did you?”
“I’ve known you since you were but a boy, Artisem. Of course I picked up on it. Now, what is it?”
He sighs, running his hand through his hair. “There is no doubt your mate was born from the Ravelholt Clan.”
My brows raise. “You have irrefutable proof?”
“One of their servants escaped during the massacre,” he continues. “She ran to the human town. She told a human woman who helped her that their home had been invaded by shifters and that they had killed her mistress. Everybody was slaughtered.”
My wolf goes still. “Her mistress. Daciana’s mother?”
“Yes. The servant said she was killed immediately after giving birth. Still bleeding, still weak from labor. They didn’t even give her a chance.”
I press my fist against the desk, feeling the wood crack under the pressure. “Keep going.”
“The human woman I talked to—she’s old now, but she remembers everything.
She said that twenty-eight years ago, a man came into town asking questions about the Clan.
About their numbers, their routines, when they traded.
” Artisem pauses. “The description she gave matches Lord Theodore. A younger version of the man, but I’m convinced it was him. ”
Every muscle in my body tenses. “Theodore.”
“More people joined him later, but they stayed hidden. Watched from the shadows. And the day after the massacre, they all disappeared.” Artisem meets my gaze. “Like they were never there.”
“The servant,” I say. “What else did she say?”
“She died from her wounds, but not before she told them what she had seen. The man who took Daciana had a blanket. And the mother’s pendant. The servant watched him carry the baby away.”
I press my lips together, thinking. Human memory isn’t exactly reliable, but what do I really know about Lord Theodore? From the day my delegation arrived, he has been very vocal against us. Then, he started trying to push his daughter on me. Is he our necromancer?
“I’ll tell Lucian to look into Theodore’s family,” I say. “But I want more than history. Send our best spies into his lands. See what they’re hiding.”
Artisem nods and turns to go. “I’ll have them leave tonight.”
He reaches the door, but I call out, “Artisem.”
He stops, glancing back at me.
“I want stealth,” I say. “Nobody should know what we’re doing. Not the King’s guard, not the other nobles. Nobody.”
Artisem nods assuringly. “No one will know.”
The door closes behind him, and I’m alone with my thoughts.
If Artisem’s suspicions are correct, Theodore orchestrated or participated in the massacre of the Ravelholt Clan.
He took Daciana as a baby. Gave her to another family.
And now, twenty-eight years later, he’s pushing his daughter on me while trying to destroy my mate.
I have to talk to Lucian. He needs to know about this, needs to understand what we’re dealing with. The noble families, the necromancer, and now this. It’s all connected. It must be.
I’m halfway to Lucian’s study when Celeste appears in my path.
“Alpha Kieran,” she says, her tone honey sweet. “I was hoping to speak with you.”
I keep walking toward her. “Get out of my way.”
She doesn’t move. Her chin lifts, and I see the calculated determination there. “I would make a better mate than Daciana,” she says.
The audacity of it makes me stop and glare at her.
“With me as your mate,” she continues, “doors will open for your pack. Better trade agreements, more power, more influence. My father is one of the most important nobles in the Kingdom. He could—”