Chapter 25
The car ride to the Grand Hall was a blur. Ethan had given me a new dress after the terrace. It was practical, dark, and form-fitting. I smoothed my hands down the front before the doors opened. The chamber held the pressure of a fist that had been clenched for a long time.
Last night, this place had been a cathedral of flickering torches and dancing shadows, a sea of roiling silk and muscle beneath the open moon. Now, the ceiling was sealed tight, and the sparkling lights doused.
Sweat beaded at the back of my neck as everyone came into view down on the lower floor. Instead of the guest entrance I’d used with Shane—where I was meant to be seen and not heard—I was now standing at the threshold of the private entrance Ethan used for his inner circle.
Ethan’s hand gripped my waist possessively as he stopped at the top of the grand staircase. All heads turned.
Twelve Alpha chairs. Twelve Alphas.
They sat at an onyx table, documents spread before them.
The weight of their stares pressed against me, but my body remembered the last time I’d stood here, watching Ethan from the shadows of the crowd.
Last night, I was just a woman trying to survive the weekend.
Today, I was walking down into the mouth of the crowd as the woman who just had the Mad King on his knees.
They’d been waiting for us. Irritated looks from men who weren’t used to being kept had the hair on my arms standing.
Ethan didn’t say a word. He simply began the descent, forcing the most powerful men in the territory to track our movement as we walked down from the high ground into the center of their judgment.
Alpha Jaxon sat near the center of the Alphas. The moment his gaze traveled up to the stairs to us, his posture hardened. His nostrils flared, his chest expanding as he drew in the air around us, and realization slammed into him the second he caught the scent.
He wasn’t just looking—he was tasting the air, scenting me on Ethan’s jaw and the way my mate’s fingers sank into the soft give of my waist. They had already heard Ethan’s claim this morning; they had heard him demand I be treated as a Luna.
But now, the air told a different story. It wasn’t just a declaration anymore.
The message Ethan was broadcasting was clear: he hadn’t forgotten the trial—he’d been too consumed by me to care.
The realization hit Jaxon visibly, rippling through the other Alphas as they caught the musk and the honeyed heat still clinging to both of us. Silence fell over the room as those nearby noticed it too.
They’d seen us dance and many had seen us leave, but this confirmed the depth of the obsession: I wasn’t just someone he was claiming. I was his in every way that mattered.
I’d been in rooms that wanted me gone before—every room at Half Moon, every desk at the Academy—but this was different. This room had teeth, and I was currently in the mouth of the beast.
As Ethan led me toward the table, my eyes scanned the perimeter—Shane wasn’t here.
His thumb brushed my arm, not a caress, but a seal.
A reminder that he was here. We passed one Alpha and mate after another, a gauntlet of judging eyes, until we reached the center.
He placed me into the first of two empty chairs.
It was a cold throne, and for the first time I wasn’t looking up to power, I was sitting in it.
There was only one chair between me and Alpha Jaxon. Ethan took his place at the head of the table, towering over the seat he’d just claimed for me. I was where I belonged: under his hand, within his reach, and woven into the very stone of his command. Luna Emilia sat beside Jaxon.
Before me were two smaller tables that sat in the dead space between us and the crowd of people here to watch the circus.
The table to the left had a chair. Anyone called to the right was meant to stand, exposed with nothing but their word.
It was a stage designed for confession, or for the truth to be revealed.
He remained standing, still and controlled. The iron spikes of his mask caught the low light, and I understood now why he wore it in rooms like this. It wasn’t just an armor. It was a sentence already passed.
“We are here to settle the matter of the Half Moon Kingdom’s transgression,” Ethan’s voice vibrated through the cold room.
Whispers broke out as the onlookers huddled close.
“Let the record show that the victim is my mate. This trial is no longer about a Giftless woman from their pack, but the Luna of the Desert Moon Kingdom.”
A ripple moved through the crowd at the word—Giftless.
I flinched as a hush fell over the crowd.
Giftless. I’d heard it whispered my whole life and never once let myself define it, because defining it meant admitting what everyone already knew: I didn’t have a second soul, and I was proof the Goddess’s split had gone wrong.
A woman with no gift was evidence. That was the difference between what I’d feared they’d call me and what Ethan had just called me instead, in front of every Alpha at that table.
Before Ethan could say another word, the Alpha with gray-streaked hair—the one with violet eyes—rose to his feet, his chair scraping against the stone. He looked at the doors at the far end of the hall.
The heavy iron doors groaned, and my gaze locked on Shane.
He was handcuffed and being dragged forward by two Enforcers.
A gasp ripped from my lips at the sight of him.
His lip was split fresh to match mine, and a few new dark bruises marred his face, one on his cheekbone and the other on his eye.
One eye was swollen nearly shut, making the cold, calculating look in the other stand out more.
He was a wreck of bruises and split skin, cuffed in silver that dimmed the rank that made him a god in every room I’d ever shared with him.
I sat at the Alpha Table, unchained, wolfless, and somehow the freer of the two.
The irony made me want to laugh, but as his eye found mine, something inside me lurched.
Despite the wounds and the silver around his wrists, he didn’t look like a prisoner.
He carried himself like a man who held all the cards.
Behind him, Doctor James filed in, a weary expression on his face.
He was dressed in his white coat, holding his leather physician’s bag in hand.
“The Table has noted the record of your mate, Alpha Ethan,” Hannes growled, his voice a low tremor. “Behold, the Half Moon Kingdom’s heir. Instead of discussing the safety of the border lines and new protocols to put into place to protect from rogues, we are here for this.”
Ethan leaned forward. “You should be down on your knees, Hannes, thanking the Goddess that I am even allowing a trial. I’m a breath away from ripping his throat out and painting this table with his blood.
If you want to talk about borders, we can talk about where your kingdom ends and my graveyard begins. Otherwise, sit down.”
Hannes cleared his throat and leaned back.
Shane was brought forth to the table and forced into the chair directly across from me. His mother inhaled sharply, but his gaze remained on me—a mix of ownership and righteous fury. The law couldn’t touch him, and the trial was nothing more than a formality.
I was in a different territory, with the King as my mate, yet I was still that small, wolfless girl with a debt to Half Moon.
“Bring in the first witnesses. Let us see if she followed the heir, or if the heir followed a lie.”
“Watch yourself, Hannes,” Ethan growled beside me. The Alphas closest to us straightened in their seats.
Alpha Hannes took his seat as the doors opened.
My jaw dropped as Beka stepped into the Hall.
She wore a high-collared dress of muted gray, the fabric modest and slightly too large for her, making her look fragile and small.
Her blond hair was pulled back in a simple, loose braid, and her eyes were rimmed red.
Heads turned as she walked through the crowd and took her place, standing at the table on the right. She didn’t look at the Alpha who had called her forward; she only looked at me, her lip curling before she dropped her head as if in shame.
“Beka Ruduro, Half Moon. I’m Adea and Shane’s classmate at Lycan Academy.
I swear to speak only truth on the Goddess herself.
Adea has always had a thing for him,” Beka whispered, casting a tearful look at Shane.
“Even though she knew he was seeing me. She wouldn’t stop approaching him.
She’d follow him into lecture halls. I thought it was just a crush.
I never thought she’d try to seduce him into taking her to the Mating Festival. ”
The stone under Ethan’s fist cracked and began to crumble. I balled my hands as her lies fell over the crowd. Some gave me accusatory glances, while others considered her so-called truth. A low rumble started in my mate’s chest. Beka’s tearful facade faltered.
Beka stepped back, crying softly. She had turned my trauma into a desperate girl’s fantasy.
The heat of their judgment burned, and for a second, I wanted to look away.
But no. I wouldn’t let them win. My silence would only be Shane’s shield.
I’d be damned if my silence would be used to sharpen his weapon.
“The Table recognizes the witness,” Alpha Hannes said.
Alpha Jaxon stood next, his gaze traveling over the crowd.
“Next witness, Mavelin of Half Moon.”
My heart stalled.
The crowd parted as Mavy stepped forward. She wasn’t wearing a costume like Beka. She was in her tactical gear, looking like she’d been pulled straight from the Academy grounds. She didn’t look at Shane, and she didn’t look at me. Her silver eyes were fixed on the grain of the onyx table.
She took her place standing at the table. The silence in the Hall grew heavy, the walls seeming to close in on me as she took the stand against me. Every breath felt like I was inhaling glass.
“Mavelin. Daughter of Alpha Jaxon and sister to the heir.”