"I personally borrowed five hundred thousand gold-marks from the neutral territories. I endured over a thousand days and nights of grinding labor, and we finally established our dominion last year."
"After all that suffering together, how dare you claim you built this territory alone?"
The evidence was overwhelming.
I had the blood-sealed debt scrolls from when I'd borrowed the gold-marks.
I had memory-crystals showing us celebrating moon-cycles in that cramped, run-down den during the early days.
Every trace of our struggle to build this pack's holdings from nothing—how could any of it be erased?
Ronan drew a deep breath, his Alpha scent souring with frustration. "I can give you something. But not much. A hundred thousand gold-marks."
A territory worth tens of millions in resources and influence, and he was offering me a hundred thousand.
My vision blurred. Not from tears.
From the aftershock of bonding with a wolf I'd never truly known.
It took me a long moment to steady myself enough to speak normally. "There has to be a reason. Give me a reason for the hundred thousand."
Ronan inhaled and spoke as if stating something perfectly reasonable: "She's carrying a pup. She's bearing my heir during her Heat. And you—you can't produce pups."
That reason nearly knocked me off my feet.
So that was it.
"But being unable to bear pups—is that really a reason?"
"There are so many healer remedies now. Carrying a pup isn't impossible for barren Omegas. So why are you saying I can't?"
I laughed, mocking him.
And as I laughed, it suddenly clicked.
"You never loved me. Raven is the one you've always wanted, isn't she? Once you had power and territory, you went running back to your first choice to have pups with her."
"But have you forgotten how she used to treat you? Do you have some kind of submission-sickness?"
In my memory, Raven Ashthorne had tormented Ronan more times than I could count.
Before we'd built ourselves up from nothing, that Omega from the rival territory had made his life hell.
She'd forced him to eat scraps meant for the lowest-ranked wolves. Made him kneel and bare his throat before her.
On our mating ceremony day, she'd shown up at the sacred grounds and set the bonding altar ablaze.
Our ritual had only made it halfway through.
After all that suffering, Ronan—and his entire pack—were now protecting this female. I couldn't wrap my head around it.