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I nodded, although her words meant nothing to me.

“I meant to come sooner. There was simply too much requiring my attention.”

“No matter. I’m eager to begin my new life.” I tried to sound calm enough to be convincing. Perhaps I could still salvage some of the original plan if Mireya believed I was still willing to follow it.

The brush stopped. “Surely you aren’t that naïve, little dove. Don’t insult our intelligence.”

I lowered my eyes. “Very well. Will you tell me why, then? Surely you can at least tell me why you deceived me.”

Mireya resumed brushing. “I tried to change their minds, darling. You’ve always been precious to me. I never wanted this life for you, but even I have people to answer to, and they didn’t wish for you to mate the Stormforge Pack.”

I turned towards her. “So this…” My words failed me. “You did all this because of the Stormforge Pack?”

“My overseers didn’t wish to see them mated, particularly to an Omega with your match percentage.”

“What difference would it make whether I mate them or not?”

“Don’t disappoint me with shallow thinking, dove. You’ve been raised better.” Mireya worked patiently through another knot in my hair. “They’re already strongly favoured to inherit the leadership of their House. A mating such as yours would strengthen them further, and a child from that union, particularly an Omega child, would secure their position for another generation. My overseers considered that unacceptable.”

“This was never about me. I’m only a casualty in something much larger, aren’t I? A small part of some political scheme?”

“Ah, that’s my clever dove. All that education was not wasted on you after all.”

I ignored the hurt her words caused. “I suppose I made it all too easy for you.”

“You wished to escape Stormforge. I offered you help.”

“You convinced me that a life with them would be worse than any alternative. You encouraged—no, you fed every fear I had until I was willing to do exactly what you needed.”

“I gave you words, Elowen. The choice was always yours.”

“But you influenced that choice because I trusted you. I looked up to you.”

She’d never ordered me to run because she hadn’t needed to. She’d given me stories and questions, then sat beside me and let me frighten myself with the answers. She knew which questions I would keep asking after she left, which stories would return at night, and which fears would grow, without ever telling me what to believe.

“You manipulated me into choosing what suited you and your own interests.” I shook my head slowly. “I loved you, Mireya. I…” I swallowed. “I admired you above every other woman in my life. Above Mother, even. How could you be so cruel? I thought you loved me.”

Something softened in her expression. “For what it’s worth, Elowen, I deeply hoped you would choose differently.” She sighed, and the pity in her eyes turned my stomach. “Every conversation we had on the matter was carefully monitored. I had no choice but to do everything I could to persuade you. I hoped your honour and your love for your family would prove stronger than your fear of Stormforge.” Her gaze remained painfully soft. “But alas, my hopes were in vain, and you chose wrongly.”

“Wrongly?” My laugh broke in my throat.

Mireya’s expression tightened. “You could have said no. Had you refused”—she lifted her hands, palms up—“the matter would have ended there. My overseers would have been satisfied that I’d done everything required of me.” She gestured around the room. “None of this would have happened. You would be mated to the barbarians, yes, but you would have every comfort available to you and still be able to see your family. You chose to walk away from that life, Elowen. Not me. Remember that before you place the blame entirely at my feet.”

My whole body shook hard enough to make my teeth chatter. I clenched my jaw, furious that even my body seemed determined to betray me. Mireya waited patiently for me to regain my composure, and I hated her even more for it.

“If what you say is true, then I see no reason we cannot follow the original plan. I disappear somewhere nobody knows me and begin again. There’s no reason to keep me imprisoned if all you needed was to stop the mating.”

“You can never be found, Elowen. If you are, everything that’s been done becomes meaningless.”

“I’ll make certain I’m never found.”

Mireya sighed and set the brush aside. “You can do no such thing. Look around. You cannot even protect yourself.”

I flinched, and she rose from the bed. “I know it may not seem so now, but something greater than either of us will come from your being here. This facility and the work I’m doing will help many others in the future.”

I shifted farther into the corner of the bed, pulling the pillow more tightly against my chest. “I fail to see how.”

“We’re conducting important research here.”