And Corvina had snuffed it out like a candle flame between her fingers, because footsteps were coming and she needed a story to tell.
"I'm sorry, Seraphina. I was wrong. I wouldn't dare dream of mating with Theron anymore. I'll take the pup and go far away. Please, I'm begging you, just stop hurting us, okay?"
"What are you doing? Putting on another act?"
The pain in my abdomen was getting worse. A dark premonition crept through me, and deep in my chest, my wolf stirred from her long silence. Not in anger. In fear. She pressed against my ribs from the inside, whimpering low, her body curling around something she was trying to protect. Terrified that something was actually happening to my pup, I moved toward the door to find a healer, but it swung open before I could reach it.
A crowd stood in the doorway. At the front was Theron.
The moment he saw Corvina and the pup on the floor, the infant screaming in raw, bloodcurdling wails that cut through the room like a blade across bone, the color drained from his face. His Alpha aura surged outward in a violent pulse, thick enough to press against the walls, and the wolves behind him flinched back a step. He dropped the bowl of bone broth in his hands without a second thought and rushed over to scoop the pup up.
"What happened? We were gone ten minutes. What the hell happened?"
"Theron..."
Corvina lifted her face. The handprints across her cheek were vivid and unmistakable.
She was trembling, tears streaming down her face. The cloying sweetness of her scent, that honeysuckle and warm vanilla, thickened in the air until it was almost suffocating, wrapping around every wolf in the room like a snare. "It's my fault. I never should have come to you for help. If I weren't so afraid my pup would grow up without a pack, I'd never have degraded myself like this! Ms. Silvercrest, if you didn't want me and Theron to register the bond and place the pup under his bloodline, then why did you pretend to agree and then turn around and try to force us out? Hitting me was one thing, but throwing a newborn pup on the floor?"
Her shrill sobs and accusations sent a chill through the room.
Everyone turned to look at me. "Seraphina, you..."
"Seraphina!"
Theron walked toward me with the pup in his arms and struck me across the face.
The blow sent my vision black. I nearly passed out.