“That’s where the deepest truths are hidden,” I said.
He walked to the far trick wall built by his father, a man who was at least half as clever as he was cruel. You wouldn’t see it unless you were looking for the minuscule seam above the third shelf. He pressed a finger to the spot, then pried the board loose. Behind it, a metal panel with a thumbprint lock. He pressed his finger to the glass, waited for the cold needle to bite, and then the panel slid away with a hiss of exhaled air.
He looked at the contents of the shelf, then looked at me. “Any idea what we’re looking for?”
Inside was a row of books—short, thick, some wrapped in tanned hide, others in black scales, one bound in what I had always suspected was tattooed human skin. I pulled the largest one free, ran my palm over its slick, diseased surface, and let the lamplight catch on the etched runes across the spine.
“I believe these are forbidden,” Dominic commented, but his eyes never left the book. “Council says—”
“Council says a lot of things,” I answered. “None of them matter when the wolves come for you.” I set the tome on the desk, opened it with care, and watched the dust spiral up in thin, gray tendrils. The pages were heavy and stuck together at the edges; it took force to peel them apart.
The language was Old Tongue, but I’d been schooled my entire life in languages. I scanned the index, then flipped to a dog-eared chapter: Rituals of Enhancement, Under the Old Moon.
Dominic read over my shoulder, voice barely above the breath of a dying man. “You think this… this could help me?”
I smiled, but only with my mouth. “You have the natural strength of an alpha, but you haven’t bothered to keep yourself as strong as you should Dominic. But with this? You could be as strong as Menace. Maybe stronger.”
He didn’t even protest the insult. “Is it safe?”
“Probably not,” I said. “But neither is facing a superior fighter.”
He closed his eyes. “What does it require?”
I skimmed the first page, then traced a finger down the column of glyphs. “Blood,” I said. “Yours, mostly. Some… other elements. A wolf to channel it. But mostly, just blood.”
He looked at his hands again. “Fuck. How bad is this going to hurt?”
I shrugged. “All power hurts. That’s why it’s power.”
He laughed, a small, brittle sound. “What’s the worst that could happen?”
I didn’t answer. The worst had already happened: he’d let himself get cornered by an inferior, and now he was mine to shape or break.
I flipped to the instructions, scanned the supplies. Most were trivial—herbs, silver, salt. The rest would require some creativity, but I’d procured worse for less noble causes.
Dominic stood, straightening his tie even though it had wilted to a wrinkled cord. “How soon can we do it?”
I glanced at the clock. “We need to do it close to the time of the fight so it will be a peak potency.” I closed the book, ran a thumb along the edge, felt the prick of the binding needle. “Tonight, you rest. I’ll arrange the rest.”
He almost smiled, the pathetic bastard. “Thank you, Declan.”
I didn’t answer. Instead, I lifted the book and slid it back into the wall. As I closed the panel, I turned to Dominic. “Remember this, King. When you win, it’s because you did what was necessary.”
He nodded, and left the room with the bearing of a man who finally understood his role: the weapon, not the wielder.
When I was alone again, I poured myself another glass of whiskey. I drank, then stared out at the lake until the glass was empty and the sun began to stain the far shore with the color of old bruises.
It was done. My daughter would kneel, or she would die. Either way, I would prove who was the strongest.
The study’s atmosphere had just begun to curdle into a sort of stagnant peace when the door burst open, scattering the heavy silence into tatters. Callum stalked in, hair wet with rain and eyes bright with mischief, a little too satisfied with himself. He moved with the insolent grace of a favored son, but his gaze was all wolf—calculating, hungry, always searching for the spot of softest flesh.
Trailing him was a woman swaddled in a dark, ragged cloak. The hood shadowed her face, but even from across the room I felt the cold spill off her in waves, a temperature drop sharp enough to crack the wax puddles on the desk. Dominic straightened in his chair, went pale as cream cheese, and tucked his chin in as if to avoid the sight.
Callum stopped a foot from the desk. “Father,” he said, with an exaggerated bow, then jerked his chin at the cloaked woman. “Moira Blackthorn. You said to fetch her if things went sideways.”
“Things have not gone sideways,” I said, but even I could hear the lie in my voice. “They have gone terminal. Thank you, son.”
The woman peeled back her hood. Her face was a contradiction: smooth, ageless skin stretched over the fine bones of a child, but the eyes… the eyes were bottomless, tar-black, no white, no iris, only the infinite night. I felt them rake my soul, weigh and measure every secret, every debt owed.
