I can see the moment it happens. His eyes going flat and distant, like a flame turning to ash.
He doesn't say anything.
He doesn't mention Vee or tell the board who actually has her. His lips thin. He waits. Whatever's happening behind his eyes, he keeps it there.
I don't know if it's dignity or defeat. Probably both.
Chase finishes his presentation and then nods at Jasper.
Jasper gives his account steadily. The day-by-day of it. The comfort bans and the nest destruction and the favoritism so blatant it was documented in reports. He doesn't embellish and he doesn't protect anyone. He just says what happened.
The board members take notes.
Then Chase nods at me.
I look at Ragon.
He's not looking back. He's looking at the table in front of him, his hands flat against it, very still.
I face the board.
And I tell them everything.
Every comfort ban. The time she knelt. The nest—I describe that in detail because that one deserves detail, the way she looked after. How she moved through the house for weeks like a light in her had gone out. Drake gagging and sobbing because he didn't want to participate and Ragon pushing him to anyway. Vee not even trying after. How her scent suppressed until she was practically invisible in her own home and none of us said anything meaningful about it. That we all knew something was wrong and chose the path of least resistance every single time.
I say it plainly. I don't soften it or explain it or offer context that might make it easier to hear. I tell them I'm at fault too. I know I am and it deserves to be said.
The alphas across the table look at me and Ragon and sometimes Jasper with an expression that needs no translation.
They're right to look at us that way.
One of them asks about Drake. Chase explains—bond broken, currently recovering, not present.
Ragon's face moves when Chase says it. Grief. Sharp and brief, there and gone before he can manage it. I feel the faint echo of it through our bond, a distant ache from a connection already damaged. He didn't know Drake was sick. He was toowrapped up in himself to think about Drake, and now he realizes what his obstinacy cost.
That’s grief that I don't have the bandwidth to feel for him right now.
A few minutes later Chase sends a text, and Arden comes in from a side door with a briefcase and a stack of papers. He stands tall and delivers his clinical assessment in the precise measured voice he uses for professional settings, working through everything he documented over his sessions.
Then he puts the briefcase down.
"I have one more thing to address," he says. His voice hasn't changed in register but something underneath it has—sharpened, like a blade before it does damage. "Not as a clinician but as the Director of Omega Advocacy at the OPA."
The board members straighten slightly.
"Verena was placed in Alpha Ragon's home without the registry verifying the terms of his offer. He presented a conditional arrangement to her—a five-year probationary period before permanent bonding and the registry failed to catch it. Failed to flag it. Failed to follow up with a single wellness check infiveyears, despite unclaimed omega protocols that mandate annual contact."
He lets the silence sit, his eyes drifting over the board members in turn.
"Quite frankly, you dropped the damn ball. I've brought this before the OPA and we will be conducting a full investigation into placement procedures and follow-up compliance for this registry branch. What happened to Verena did not occur in a vacuum. Your registry created the conditions that made it possible." His eyes move down the table. "I would encourage the board to review those procedures before we do it for you."
The board is very quiet.
He nods then packs his papers.
Chase squeezes his arm before he goes.
Arden pauses at the door. His eyes find Jasper for just a moment, a tension in them that doesn't belong in a registry hearing room, and then he's gone.
