Isolde’s POV
For the past hour, my irritation had only grown. The brat would not stop talking.
“Auntie Valois, are we almost there? Is Daddy far away? Does Daddy have a big house? Does Daddy like books?”
His small voice bounced off the interior of the carriage like a trapped bird, relentless and shrill. I gripped the reins tighter and stared straight ahead at the road narrowing before us.
“Auntie Valois?”
“What.”
“Will Daddy be happy to see ?”
I exhaled through my nose. “Thrilled.”
Valerius bead. That wide, idiotic grin splitting his face like he’d just been handed the world on a silver plate.
“I’m a very good boy,” Valerius announced proudly, his dark curls pressed flat against the window glass as he peered out. “Mommy says I’m so smart because I know how to read now. I can read whole sentences.”
“Lovely,” I said, not looking.
“Mommy says Daddy is very busy. That’s why he can’t co see . But he loves very much. She promised.”
My jaw tightened. Of course she promised. Elara and her soft, pathetic promises. Filling this four-year-old child’s head with fairy tales about a father who didn’t even know he existed. It was almost cruel, when you thought about it. Almost as cruel as what I was about to do.
Almost.
He was strapped into Gareth’s old safety seat—a pathetic relic from so forgotten era of my husband’s childhood, the leather cracked and the buckle half-rusted. It slled like mildew and failure. A fitting throne for the boy.
The capital’s outer districts fell away behind us. The paved roads gave way to packed dirt, then to rutted tracks that made the carriage shudder and groan. The elm trees of the city thinned into scrubby oaks, and the scrubby oaks surrendered to the dense, ancient growth of the border forests.
The Rogue Territories.
Every wolf in the empire knew what these woods ant. The patrols didn’t co this far. The law didn’t reach. Out here, the displaced and the dangerous road—rogues cast out from their packs, half-feral creatures who answered to no Alpha. Children’s stories were full of them. Monsters in the dark. Teeth in the shadows.
Perfect.
“Auntie Valois?” Valerius’s voice had changed. Smaller. Tighter. “The trees are really big.”
“Mm.”
“It’s getting dark.”
“We’re almost there, darling.”
“But...” He pressed his face harder against the glass. The gold eyes—those unsettling, heartbreaking gold eyes—reflected the deepening gloom outside. “Where are all the houses? Daddy doesn’t live in a house?”
“Your daddy likes the forest. He’s very adventurous.”
“Oh.” A pause. “Like in stories?”
“Exactly like in stories.”
He seed to accept this. Children were so stupidly trusting. So willing to believe whatever an adult told them, as long as the adult smiled and spoke softly. It was almost too easy.
I pulled the carriage off the track and into a small clearing where the canopy overhead was so thick it swallowed most of the remaining light. The air slled different here—damp earth, rotting wood, sothing faintly tallic that might have been old blood.
“All right.” I set the brake and climbed down. My heels sank into the soft ground. Mud. Wonderful. These shoes cost a fortune. “Co along, Valerius.”
I unbuckled the rusted safety seat and lifted him out. He was lighter than I expected—all bones and curls.
His eyes darted around the clearing. The trees towered above us, their trunks thick as pillars, their branches interlocking overhead like the ribs of so enormous dead animal. Sowhere deep in the woods, sothing howled. Long and low and hungry.
Valerius grabbed my hand.
His fingers were so small. Warm and slightly sticky, the way children’s hands always were. They curled around mine with absolute, unquestioning trust.
Sothing flickered in my chest. Brief. Uncomfortable. I crushed it imdiately.
“This way,” I said brightly. “Daddy loves to play hide-and-seek. It’s his favorite ga. He’s hiding sowhere in the shadows, waiting for you to find him.”
“In the dark?” Valerius’s voice wobbled.
“Of course in the dark. That’s what makes it fun. He’s very good at hiding. But I bet you’re even better at seeking.”
I led him forward. Past the clearing. Into the tree line. The undergrowth thickened around us—ferns and brambles and fallen logs slick with moss. My heels caught on roots. I stumbled twice. Valerius kept pace beside , his little hand squeezing tighter with every step.
“Auntie Valois, I don’t like it here.”
“Just a little further.”
“I want to go back to Mommy.”
“After you find Daddy.”
We reached a cluster of rotting logs arranged in a rough semicircle, like nature’s forgotten amphitheater. The wood was soft and black with decay, spotted with pale mushrooms. It looked like a place where things went to die.
“Here.” I stopped and crouched down to his level. My smile was flawless. Warm. Practiced. “This is the spot. Daddy is hiding very close by. All you have to do is wait right here, and he’ll co find you. Can you do that?”
Valerius stared at . Those gold eyes were wide now. Too wide. The whites showed all the way around. His lower lip trembled.
“But it’s dark.”
“You’re a brave boy, aren’t you? That’s what your mommy always says. A brave, good boy who can read whole sentences.”
“I’m scared.”
“There’s nothing to be scared of, darling. Daddy will be here any mont.”
I peeled his fingers off my hand. One by one. Each one releasing with a small, reluctant tug, like pulling petals from a flower.
Then I stood up, turned, and walked away.
“Auntie Valois?”
I did not turn around. I hurried back toward the clearing, leaving him behind.
“AUNTIE VALOIS! CO BACK! PLEASE CO BACK!”
His voice shattered behind —raw, terrified, the desperate scream of a child who suddenly understood he was alone in a place where alone ant dead. It echoed through the trees and was swallowed by the dark.
I reached the carriage and climbed inside. My high heels clicked sharply against the carriage floor as I shut the door, ignoring his miserable, terrified cries. Done. The brat was gone, and the forest would handle the rest. Rogues, wild animals, the cold—it didn’t matter which got to him first.
Almost imdiately after I settled into my seat, the communication crystal beside began pulsing with the Baroness’s sigil. I eagerly activated it, impatient to claim what I was owed for this transaction.
“Mother. It’s done. The boy is gone. Now—about my paynt.”
But the voice that erupted from the crystal was not the composed, calculating Baroness I knew.
“Paynt?! You want to talk about PAYNT?!” The Baroness was shrieking. Actually shrieking. Her voice cracked and splintered through the enchantnt. “That animal—that filthy little beast—she attacked us!”
I sat up straighter. “What are you talking about?”
“That commoner! She hit Harold with a wine bottle! He’s unconscious—bleeding all over the carpet—the court physician has been called—” A ragged gasp. “And she BIT , Isolde! She bit through my arm like a rabid wolf! I think it’s broken!”
The warmth drained from my face.
“She... escaped?”
“Of COURSE she escaped! She fought like sothing possessed! Harold is threatening to press charges—he’s threatening to expose the entire arrangent—do you understand what that ans?!”
No. No, no, no. This was not how it was supposed to go. Elara was supposed to be compliant. Broken. She was a disgraced orphan with no protector—she was supposed to fold.
“You were supposed to control her!” I snarled. “You and that idiot Harold—”
“He’s bleeding on my floor! My arm is shattered! The physician will ask questions—”
“I don’t care about your arm!” My voice rose to a pitch I didn’t recognize. The carriage walls seed to close in around . “Do you understand what I just did? I left that child in the Rogue Territories! I destroyed any chance of using him as leverage because you assured you could handle one woman!”
“She wasn’t just a woman, she was a—”
“That was my bargaining chip! Gone! And for what? Because you couldn’t hold down one commoner?!”
Silence on the other end. Ragged breathing. The faint sound of soone moaning in the background—Harold, probably, bleeding out on the Baroness’s carpet.
“We can still fix this.” The Baroness’s voice steadied. Barely. “She’ll co looking for the boy. When she does—”
“Then force him to want her!” I cut in, fury turning my voice hoarse. “Tie her up, drug her, I don’t care what you have to do! But I will not walk away empty-handed!”
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