"What you did was cruel to yourself," Korran said. "Anything could have happened to you." He shook his head. "And I want you to know I am not afraid of the Alpha. There is nothing he can do that would break me." He straightened with exaggerated confidence. "Have you already forgotten what I did out there when the crows came? I was magnificent."
Hazel laughed despite herself.
"But why has my carriage been attacked twice now?" she asked, the laughter settling back into something more serious.
Korran's expression followed hers.
"Beastmen clans like the Snakemen take pleasure in targeting those they perceive as vulnerable," he said. "But we are preparing to move against them. They have been aggressive and calculated. The alliances we were building have been flipped to their side." He paused. "And it gets worse. They can shape shift. We believe some of them may already be inside Redlunar without our knowledge."
"The citizens are not the immediate target," Hazel said. "Not yet. Their first move will be to infiltrate the palace. They will shape shift into existing workers, learn everything about how this place operates and feed that information back to their people. Then they will filter in gradually, slowly increasing their numbers until they match ours from the inside."
Korran stared at her.
"How do you come up with these things?" he said. "You speak like someone who has spent years in military strategy."
"It is simply how my mind works," she said simply. "Now listen. You can counter this with the mindlink. Generate a rotating cheat word for every palace worker. The word changes every five minutes. Have designated people moving through the palace at all times asking for it. Anyone who hesitates or gives a wrong answer gets detained immediately for investigation."
"That is extraordinary," Korran said.
"The border soldiers also need to rotate every thirty minutes," she added. "Predictable schedules are easy to study and exploit." She paused. "Present all of this to Phoenix yourself."
"Why should it come from me?" he asked.
"Because it will make him more lenient toward you," she said. "You need that right now far more than I do."
Knock knock.
"Come in," Phoenix said.
Korran entered and bowed.
"Alpha, I have a proposal."
He laid out the entire plan. The rotating cheat word through the mindlink. The designated checkers moving through the palace every five minutes. The border soldiers rotating every thirty minutes. Every detail exactly as Hazel had given it to him.
Phoenix listened without interrupting.
"That is an exceptional strategy," he said when Korran finished.
Korran straightened.
"It did not come from me Alpha. It came from Lady Hazel." He met Phoenix's eyes steadily. "She can be difficult. But what comes out of her mind is worth listening to."
He bowed and left.
At Bloodmoon
Valeria looked up from her seat.
"Evelyn. What brings you here?"
"Can I not visit a place where I already hold standing?" Evelyn said, stepping inside without waiting for an invitation. "Or are you planning to find a way to take that from me too the way Andrian was taken?"
Valeria's expression tightened. "That was settled years ago. There is no reason to drag it back into the present."
That evening the dining table was set and filled. Everyone settled into their seats and Roxanne rose briefly.
"It is my honour to welcome you Mi Lady to this banquet. Please consider this your home."
"You are remarkably kind," Evelyn said, looking at her with genuine appreciation. "And intelligent. It is a shame you are not the Queen."
"Mi Lady," Roxanne said gently, "our Queen is seated right before us carrying the heir of Bloodmoon. Some words are however sensitive and should not be spoken infront of her."
"I meant no harm," Evelyn said, her voice not softening entirely. "But I am not wrong either. The ones who stay and carry the work are always the first to be set aside for those who simply return."
The table went quiet.
Valeria's hand came down on the table hard enough to rattle the dishes.
"Enough, Evelyn. We are having dinner. Let it be peaceful."
"Peaceful," Evelyn said, her voice dropping into something quieter and far more dangerous than shouting. "You have had a peaceful life. I did not."
"Do not do this here," Valeria said. "Do not destroy what I have built."
"What you have built." Evelyn looked at her steadily. "This was supposed to be my life Valeria. All of it." She leaned forward. "When I was moving through thick forest in the dead of night delivering messages to spies, where were you? When I was crouching in the bushes for hours without thought for my own safety, where were you?" Her voice did not rise but every word carried the weight of twenty five years behind it. "I gave everything. My safety. My sleep. My youth. And you sat down and received the reward of it as though it was always meant for you."
"I never went to him and asked to be chosen," Valeria said. "I could not control his decisions."
"You feel no remorse Valeria," Evelyn said. "Not even a shadow of it. You wear it proudly. And you are doing the exact same thing to the Duchess right now."
"Mi Lady," Roxanne said gently, "I have known my place long before I walked through these palace doors. Whatever good exists has always gone to the Queen first. I grew up in that truth and I made peace with it. Please do not trouble yourself on my account."
Evelyn looked at her for a long moment then turned back to the table.
"Then I will also speak my truth," Fiona said, her voice steady. "I was married without my consent to preserve a pack running low on strength. No one asked me. No one considered what I wanted." She looked at Evelyn. "Everyone at this table carries bitterness Mi Lady. You are not alone in that. But this dinner table is not the place to empty it."
"You say that," Valeria said, turning to Fiona, "because you have always been the chosen one. You never had to fight for anything." Her voice sharpened. "If this marriage was truly forced upon you then dissolve it now. You are Queen. You lose nothing." She paused. "But you cannot. Because this marriage gave you everything you have. And it is deeply disrespectful to your husband sitting at this very table for you to say otherwise."
The table fell into a silence so complete that the candles seemed to stop flickering.