“She betrayed me. Darius filled her head with nonsense and told her blood magic was cruel and wrong. That she could never be my equal if she continued down our path. He poisoned her against me. So I took something from him.”
Evelyne swallowed. “You took something?”
“Oh, I did far more than that.” Her voice oozed satisfaction as she let the words hang in the air. “I broke him. Twisted his loyalty until it bent to me. It’s fascinating how quickly a man folds once the right elixir slips into his wine.” She examined her nails with casual elegance. “And then I took what I needed. Lured him to my bed, conceived a child that would be mine and mine alone. Tethered him to me in a way he could never undo.”
A heavy silence followed, crashing down like a wave. Evelyne couldn’t stop the bile rising in her throat as she turned and locked eyes with Kaldrek. His expression was still, but there was something haunted in the way he held himself.
Alaric exhaled sharply. “You’re lying.”
Vaelora chuckled. “Am I? Poor Darius could never forgive himself for what he’d done. When Kaya found out, when she tried to kill me for it, she failed to realize I had already completed the blood magic ritual, and I only needed her death to make it permanent.”
Evelyne’s heart pounded wildly. “You killed your own sister?”
“Yes, but I didn’t stop there.” Vaelora’s smile widened. “Darius realized too late what had happened. He fell into despair, and he took his own life after I killed Kaya. It was quite the tragedy.”
Kaldrek drew in a quick breath, his first honest reaction since the nightmare of this conversation began.
“And with their blood spilled, I ascended. Blood magic was finally mine.”
What kind of monster was this woman? Not only had she drained other magical beings to fuel her power, but she had also drugged her sister’s lover to lure him into her bed, to get back at her sister, to conceive a child, and then slaughtered her own twin as a sacrifice to unlock blood magic. How was Kaldrek processing this? How could he endure hearing thatthiswas the woman who birthed him, not out of love, but as a tool? A puppet crafted from her bloodline to replace the sister who had betrayed her.
“Twenty-five years ago, I became something more than a witch. I became eternal. And a mother.” Her smile faltered for a moment. “Until my child was stolen from me as I lay recovering on the birthing bed. And somehow, none of my servants could tell me who had done it.” Her voice took on a chilling edge. “That was the day I began building my army to hunt for my son and destroy those who stole him from me.”
She paused, as if savoring the memory.
“Such a shame I wiped out Darius’ entire Rimeclaw pack. I was so certain they were the ones who took you,” she said, her dark eyes settling on Kaldrek. “As it turns out, the true thieves were the Ironwolf pack—Darius’ most trusted allies. I should have seen it, but I’ll blame my own hysteria for clouding my judgment.”
Her fingers curled tightly around the arms of her throne, knuckles pale.
“We celebrated the night yourparentsdied,” she said with a chilling smile. “My Noskari and I threw such a lovely party.”
Kaldrek spat at her feet, and her expression twisted, not in rage but disappointment.
“A shame the alpha mark chose you, Kaldrek. You and I could have ruled this world together.”
Evelyne’s chest tightened. What would he have become if the Ironwolf pack hadn’t taken him from this witch? Certainly not the alpha beside her now. Not the man she cared for. He would have been something else. Something twisted; something she might have had to destroy.
She couldn’t linger on that thought. Evelyne’s voice trembled as she pushed forward, needing to shift the conversation. “And what does any of this have to do with my brother? With the prophecy?”
Vaelora grinned. “Ah, the prophecy. A desperate attempt to stop me. But tell me, Lady Evelyne… how does one destroy a prophecy?”
“You can’t.”
“Precisely.” Vaelora exhaled, as if the subject bored her. “A prophecy cannot be destroyed, only diverted. And I knew the witches of Velenshire would have taken precautions to keep it from unfolding. So I waited. I searched for years, looking for any clue as to what—or rather, who—had become the vessel for the prophecy.”
Her gaze slid to Cillian.
“Then I found him. The highborn son of Lord Aron Duskwood. An innocent boy, hidden behind nobility and human frailty. A child bound to a prophecy no one understood—not even I. The Great Rite did its job well, erasing the Duskwood name from every mind. But spells like that don’t stay hidden forever. Not with the kind of power I wield now. Even this one, buried deep, eventually began to unravel beneath my touch.”
Vaelora began to circle him, her voice laced with dark amusement.
“He was just a boy when I first caught his scent. It was faint and fragmented, but still threaded with that bloodline. I couldn’t place itthen, but I knew something ancient stirred beneath the surface. So I waited. Watched. Let him grow into the brilliance of his mind until he began to uncover the truth on his own. I only had to offer the slightest nudge.”
She stopped beside him, fingers brushing along his jaw with unsettling tenderness.
“That’s when I knew. All those years of suspicion had finally led me here. To him. The next male heir of the Duskwood bloodline. The soul fated to carry the light that could destroy me. The prophecy forged at the Solwyn Tree by the witches of Hallowell and the Duskwoods—once the most powerful shifter bloodline in the south. And now, my greatest threat.”
Her smile deepened, cold and triumphant.
