"Kael Frostclaw, does destroying us like this truly make you happy?"
I blinked, quickly understanding. She had pinned the blame for the spreading rumors squarely on me.
True enough—after all, I once served as a Pack Chronicle Keeper, and my greatest skill was stirring the winds of rumor until they became storms.
Unfortunately, the first time I lost control and exposed her shameful rut-bond with Dorian Frostclaw, she threatened to have me scent-suppressed and cast out from the profession entirely, claiming I had violated pack privacy laws and damaged her standing. The pack council sided with her.
Now finding anyone willing to help me was nearly impossible.
I cast a sidelong glance at her, long past feeling any wounded pride from being falsely accused.
My hands continued wrapping the anniversary offering for Noah—a small bundle of herbs and moon-blessed tokens for his rune-stone.
"You should know that your disgraceful affairs aren't limited to what's already been revealed. If I wanted to expose more, you'd bleed territory and resources far worse than before."
She stood frozen in the doorway for a long while.
Finally, her voice emerged, almost helpless.
"After this, I'll sever things with him completely. But promise me—we'll live properly from now on, yes? Once the pup comes, we'll be a happy family."
During my pregnancy, she had said such things nearly every day.
Yet it never stopped her from remaining tangled with Dorian Frostclaw.
Sometimes she pitied his status as an unacknowledged offspring. Other times she felt sorry that he had no pack to call his own, no family to lean on.
In short, she had ten thousand reasons why she couldn't help being drawn to him, why she had to help him rise through the ranks.
She remained blocking the doorway as though she wouldn't leave until I answered.
Watching her shadow swallow the morning light, I gave a hollow response just to be rid of her.
It wasn't until the next morning, when an uncensored scent-vision recording of my supposed betrayal spread across every territory network, that I understood what she meant by "after this."
Selene Valeheart had released a public proclamation.
In the recording, she wept before the pack councils, her voice breaking as she declared that her own brother-by-bond had discovered me rutting with another during her pregnancy. She claimed I had struck first with false rumors about her to cover my own guilt.