Page 117 of The Werewolf’s Wrong Mate

The bond warmed and Cassie’s anger moved through it, clean and sharp. She didn’t like Evelyn naming the violence as if it belonged to her.

Neither did I.

Evelyn turned back to Ronan. “That is why I am asking this council to stop pretending Ian’s guilt is a bond.”

The room stilled. There it was.

Ronan leaned back slightly. “Choose your next words carefully.”

“I have,” Evelyn said. “What Ian placed on her is not a mate bond.”

The wolf went silent. Not calm.

Silent.

Every old instinct in me aimed itself at her throat. Cassie’s hand tightened on the arm of the chair. I felt that too. The small flare of fear. Not of Evelyn. Of me.

I forced my hands open and she noticed, relaxing slightly.

Evelyn continued, “It is a false mark. A bite given in a corrupted circle, under broken conditions, to a human body that cannot answer it. It clings because Ian’s wolf is unstable and because Ms. Morgan has survived long enough for the magic to mistake endurance for acceptance.”

Cassie’s head tilted.

I knew that look now.

She had found the insult hidden under soft language.

“Endurance for acceptance,” she repeated from the study.

Evelyn looked at her. “I mean no insult.”

“That must be convenient for you.”

Malrec tapped his cane once against the floor. “Lady Thorne speaks with reason. The mark has brought fever, pain, emotional contamination, and risk of exposure. It has not produced proof of a true bond.”

I stepped forward. “She lives.”

Malrec’s eyes cut to me. “Survival is not proof.”

“The mark answers her.”

“Poison answers heat, that does not make it sacred.”

The wolf hit the inside of my skin hard enough to hurt and Cassie inhaled behind me from feeling it. I shut my eyes for one breath and locked the wolf down.

When I opened them, Evelyn was watching me. Not afraid. Interested.

“The kindest path is mercy,” she said. “End the human before the full moon. Before the mark roots deeper. Before Ian’s wolf mistakes sickness for fate and tears this pack apart trying to defend what cannot belong to him.”

My vision narrowed but Ronan stood before I moved.

“No one at this table orders her death while she is seated in my house.”

Malrec didn’t lower his eyes. “Then your house risks all of us.”

“My house has carried greater risks than fear dressed as law.”

Evelyn’s face remained controlled, but her hands had tightened at her waist.