Rikae found the letter where he least expected it: tucked into the visor of his car, scented with that haunting, familiar trace of jasmine and rain. It wasn't an encrypted file or a digital ghost. It was paper. Physical. Irrefutable.
His fingers trembled slightly as he unfolded the heavy cream vellum.
Rikae,
*Do not go to the Council. If you are as smart as the world says you are, you will take Silas and your people and disappear into the Northern Tundra tonight.
I saw the look in your eyes at the conservatory. I felt the pull of the Moon between us. It was beautiful, Rikae. It was the first time in three years I felt like a girl again, instead of a ghost. But that pull is a lie. It is a dream that came too late to a house already on fire.*
Valerius was a king once. He was a man of peace until the world tore his heart out. Now, he is a broken storm, and I am the only thing keeping that storm from leveling every pack in this territory. If I have to bleed your pack dry to keep him calm, I will do it. If I have to break your heart to save a thousand others from his rage, I will do it.
This is my final act of mercy as your mate: The invasion starts at dawn on the full moon. We have the backdoors to your security. We have the coordinates of your nurseries. We are coming to take everything.
Run, Rikae. Pray to the Moon for a new mate-one who isn't already stained by the blood of her choices. In this life, I belong to the man who broke me. In the next, perhaps I could have been yours.
Goodbye, my perfect Beta.
- Lisra
Rikae crushed the letter in his fist. A low, vibrating growl started in his chest and didn't stop. He didn't feel sadness. He didn't feel the "pull" she wrote about.
He felt the cold, hard clarity of a man who had finally been given a target.
"She thinks she's a saint," Rikae whispered to the empty garage. "She thinks she's saving the world by stabbing me in the back."
His wolf surfaced then-not the grieving pup from the ballroom, but the Lead Beta's wolf. It was massive, grey-furred, and its eyes were like twin silver coins.
She warned us, the wolf growled in his mind. But she didn't stop the blade.
Rikae straightened his suit jacket. He took the letter to the pack's incinerator and watched the elegant handwriting curl into black ash. He didn't tell Silas about the warning. He didn't tell the Council.
Instead, he went to the Silver-Claw armory.
"Rikae?" Jax asked, looking up from a crate of silver-tipped bolts. "The Alpha said we were supposed to be 'feeding the infection' through the servers. Why are you checking the heavy artillery?"
"The servers are for the human side of the war, Jax," Rikae said, his voice as sharp as a razor. "But Lisra said the invasion starts at dawn. And since she was kind enough to give me the date..."
Rikae picked up a combat knife, testing the edge against his thumb. A thin line of red appeared.
"...we're going to give them a welcome they'll never forget. If she wants to be a martyr for a dead man's ghost, I'm happy to help her find the afterlife."