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Arlene freezes. Her chest heaves with each breath, and I can see the calculation behind her eyes, weighing the risk, measuring the distance between her fingers and her pups' hair. She keeps reaching, blood pouring from her wrist.

Candice stands in the doorway, arms crossed, watching us like we’re specimens in a jar. Zeke positions himself behind her, one hand pressed against the wound in his side where my teeth found him. The bleeding has slowed, but the wound will scar. I made sure of that.

For a long moment, no one speaks. The only sounds are the drip of water, the ragged pull of Arlene’s breathing, and the faint, too slow pulse of my pups' hearts.

“How,” I manage. The word scrapes out of my throat like broken glass. I force my head to turn, my neck screaming in protest, until I can see Candice’s face through the curtain of my hair. “How did you know?”

Candice tilts her head, considering me the way someone considers a puzzle they’ve already solved. “The pups told me.”

The words don’t make sense at first. They bounce off the inside of my skull like stones thrown at a wall.

“During breakfast,” she continues, examining her nails. “You told them not to tell anyone about your little escape plan. But pups are terrible at keeping secrets, Darian. Especially when you promise them an adventure.” She crouches down, bringing herself to my eye level. “Darlene asked me if I had a sleeping bag she could borrow for the trip. Damian wanted to know if we’d be back before the full moon. They were so excited about their secret mission.”

The betrayal isn’t aimed at my pups, they’re five and seven; they don’t know better, but at myself. I should have been more careful. Should have known that whispering don’t tell anyone to a child is like whispering please tell everyone.

“My clever pups,” Candice says, and the endearment in her voice makes my stomach turn. “They handed you to me on a silver platter. Literally.”

Arlene’s chains rattle again. I can feel her gaze burning into the side of my face, but I can’t look at her. Can’t bear to see what’s in her eyes right now.

“Why?” Arlene’s voice is raw, scraped clean of everything but the question. It fills the cell like smoke. “Why are you doing this? What did we ever do to you?”

Candice straightens, brushing dirt from her knees. For a moment, she looks almost human, almost like the woman who brought us bread on our first night in the rogue camp, who played with the pups while Arlene and I unloaded our meager supplies.

“Nothing,” Candice says. “You did absolutely nothing to me, Arlene. That’s what makes this so perfect.” She reaches into her jacket and pulls out a folded piece of paper. Not modern paper, parchment, yellowed at the edges, covered in handwriting I recognize.

My blood turns to ice.

“That’s from the Nightfall Pack archives,” I whisper.

“Very good.” Candice unfolds it carefully, holding it up so the torchlight catches the ink. “A powerful person, well, we can’t say his name… he was quite thorough in his instructions. Signed in blood, of course. A blood pact doesn’t leave much room for interpretation.”

“He paid well,” Zeke chimes in.

Zeke’s laugh is low and wet, catching on the wound in his side. “You want to know what he paid?”

Candice folds the parchment with the care of someone handling an heirloom. “The instructions were specific. Keep the family breathing. Let them believe there was a way out.” She tucks it back into her jacket. “Hope is a useful thing. It keeps people cooperative.”

“And then?” Arlene’s voice is barely sound.

“The pups first,” Zeke says. “Then her.” His eyes move to Arlene. “He wanted Darian to watch all of it before he died.”

The cell goes very quiet. Even the water stops, or seems to.

“The final order came the morning you disappeared,” Candice says to Arlene, almost gently. “Zeke had already signed. Breaking a blood pact meant death for Zeke. And well, I can’t lose my mate for you.” She makes a small gesture, the kind you make about something that cannot be helped.

“Please.” Arlene’s voice cracks open on the word. Her chains pull taut as she leans toward the pups, toward their slow, shallow breathing. “Please. They’re pups. Whatever he wants from Darian and me, whatever this is, they don’t have any part in it. Let them go.”

Candice watches her with something that is not quite pity and not quite nothing.

I find Arlene’s eyes. I’m sorry I couldn’t protect our family. She looks at me not with anger but as if she’s still calculating, still trying to figure a way out of here. That is the worst thing she could have done.

The cell door opens again. Four guards enter carrying swords that don’t reflect the torchlight the way iron should. They take their positions without a word next to each of us. The last thing I hear is the sound of their swords slicing through the air. I failed them. Pain. Then there’s nothing, but darkness. Endless Darkness.

ARLENE’S POV

I failed to protect my pups. Pain. Darkness. I no longer feel pain. The darkness is not empty.

There is light in it, soft, silver, the kind that doesn’t come from any torch or window. It pools around my feet and rises slowly, and I realize I am standing in a field I don’t recognize, though something in my chest does. The grass is pale under a full moon so large it seems to rest on the horizon.