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“Prepare for his return, and make sure he receives a warm welcome.” Father straightened the jacket that he never took off. “He is not to be treated as anything less than the Alpha he is.”
With that, he walked out of the room. I had no idea why I followed.
“Father!” I yelled, chasing after him. “Father, please! Just look at me!”
“I can’t.” He stopped, but didn’t turn, his voice rumbling from deep in his chest. “Not after the disgrace you put our family through.”
“I had to,” I whispered, tears once again threatening to escape. I had cried so much over the past three months, ever since that night. I was surprised I still had more to shed.
“No, you didn’t,” was all he said before he pushed through the door and out of the building.
Somehow, I ended up back in Beckett’s office.
“We’ll fight back, Kasha, we won’t let him win.” Beckett leaned me against the edge of his desk.
“No, we won’t.” Cole was Logan’s uncle and the head of the Varg Anwyn branch of the High Faction. I should have known this would happen, but I had been ignorant. I had believed all the pretty lies I had been fed for years—that the High Faction protected. That they believed in justice.
“Kas…”
“No, Beckett, I’m too tired to fight.” I shook my head. “I just want to be done with it all.”
“If that’s what you want.” His tone was suspicious, but I couldn’t find it in me to care.
I could never seem to find the strength in me to care about most things nowadays.
“Do you have the training files?” I asked, changing the subject. “I need to review the assignments before I pass them on to the recruits.”
His face crinkled, his white-blond bangs falling gently into his eyes. “I left them in my office at the infirmary. I’ll go grab them for you.”
“Thanks.” I watched him walk out the door.
The truth was, I didn’t care about the files, but I had seen him working on them in the infirmary and I needed him to leave his office. I needed to be alone so I could walk around his desk and take my lockpicks out, prying open the bottom drawer.
I reached in, wrapping my hand around the sheathed dagger within. The Ogdala Blade. The one weapon that could hurt me, that could inflict a mortal wound that actually stuck.
I stared at it for a moment before shoving it in my boot and walking out the door.
***
“No wonder you and your father were so distant when he was here a few weeks ago.” Nolan’s eyes flashed gold once again. “No one should treat their kin like that. He should have supported you.”
“Yeah.” The word felt completely useless. I wasn’t ready to face that skeleton in my closet yet, especially since there was more to the story.
His jaw flexed, hand shaking in a fist on top of the counter. “Why did you take the Blade?”
He was asking, but he was already aware of the physical reason why I took it; so I explained in a different way. “Because I was tired of trying to fight.” I rubbed my face, scratching at my knotted hair. “Every day felt consumed with the desperate need to survive, and I just wanted a moment of peace.”
His face softened, hands flexing on the countertop. It was clear he wanted to reach out to me, to comfort me with his touch, but didn’t know how to react. So I showed him it was welcomed and reached out to him myself, wrapping my fingers with his on top of the counter. His shoulders loosened a bit at the contact, his grip squeezing mine, the subtle movement releasing a bit of the pressure on my chest.
“You asked me once why the secrets of the Faction seem to revolve around me.” It was time to give him the whole story, my soul settled knowing the rest of the team would be alright with me saying these truths. “It’s because you were right, and it all started because of what happened later that night…”
***
The knife shook in my hand, my body full of nothingness. I couldn’t go on, I couldn’t face tomorrow. This was the only way.
I had lost everything.
My dignity. My comfort. My strength.
