Chapter 176

CASSANDRA

Derek knows.

The thought pounded in my head like a war drum, louder than the creaking floorboards beneath my feet as I stumbled back inside my cottage. I couldn’t breathe. My skin was ice. I gripped the edge of the counter like the world might slide out from under me if I let go.

He knows.

How? How could he possibly know?

My mind raced. The memory had been buried so long—so deep—even I had nearly forgotten it. I’d done everything to keep it hidden. To rewrite the truth in Derek’s eyes. It had worked. For years, it had worked.

But now?

Elena.

Of course.

She must have remembered.

I felt bile rise in my throat.

The bitter taste of humiliation, of fury.

Elena Hart.

She had always been the thorn in my side. The ghost in every one of Derek’s stares. The ache he never admitted to. It was always her. Even when she was gone. Even when she was dead.

And now she was back. And worse—she remembered.

She remembered what happened in the woods that day. The day he was attacked. The day I stood frozen and she picked up her bow.

The day she saved him.

I sank onto the couch, head in my hands. My entire body shook. It wasn’t just that she had done what I couldn’t. It was that she had the courage to act when I didn’t. I’d built my entire life on a single, stolen moment of bravery that hadn’t even been mine.

And now it was gone.

"You know what this means, don’t you?"

I looked up.

My father was still standing in the doorway, his expression carved from stone.

"It means I’m finished," he said.

His voice was strangely calm, even as his hands shook slightly at his sides. "The second this gets out, I’ll be challenged. Another young Alpha will rise up and take what we built. The creditors will come after us for the rest. Every bargain we made—every favor we pulled—they’ll all turn against us."

He stepped forward, face dark with fury.

"You’ve ruined everything. Either we lose the pack, or we lose our place at the top. Either way, this is the end of the road."

The words felt like a slap.

I stood slowly, shaking.

"Get out," I whispered.

"Cassandra—"

"GET OUT!"

He stared at me for a long beat, then turned on his heel and left, slamming the door behind him.

I stood there for what felt like hours, staring at nothing.

Then I moved.

I don’t know how I ended up in the Blightwood.

It was nearly midnight when I crossed the old service road, the trees crowding around me like cloaked figures whispering my name. The woods were colder than I remembered. Colder than any spring night should be.

Dead leaves crunched beneath my boots.

Somewhere, far in the distance, an owl called once and then fell silent.

The further I walked, the more the world changed. The stars disappeared behind thick, knotting branches. The path narrowed. The trees leaned in, their bark slick with moss and secrets.

I had been here before.

With Logan.

And Logan never came back.

A chill danced down my spine, but I kept walking.

The ground sloped downward, into the oldest part of the forest. The part we weren’t supposed to enter. The part that smelled of damp earth and death.

I told myself this wasn’t madness.

That I wasn’t desperate.

That Derek still loved me. Somewhere inside, past the anger, past the betrayal. That if Elena weren’t in the picture, everything could go back to the way it was.

But that was the problem.

Elena was always in the picture.

I couldn’t kill her. Not outright. Too many eyes. Too many people who already suspected me of every wrong thing she ever suffered. No, I couldn’t make her disappear.

But I could erase her.

Her memories, at least. It had been done before. It could be done again.

The whispers began around the time the moon vanished behind the clouds. Faint. Hissing. Like the wind speaking in a language I almost understood.

My pace slowed.

I was close.

The grove opened ahead of me, circular and impossibly quiet. The ground was covered in dead moss. Stones lined the perimeter, carved with symbols so ancient they seemed to hum.

And in the center, she stood.

The dark priestess.

Tall. Shrouded in a veil of black. Skin like moonlight on bone. Eyes like ink spilled on water.

"Cassandra of the Stolen Glory," she said.

Her voice was soft, but it echoed like thunder through the grove.

Shame crawled up my throat like a vine.

She knew.

Of course she did.

"Why are you here?" the priestess asked. "The last time you came, it was with a man who asked too much. The Blightwood does not take kindly to greed. Or foolishness."

My heart pounded.

"What did Logan ask for?" I asked, before I could stop myself.

The priestess tilted her head. "Something he had no right to claim."

I shivered.

"I—I need help," I said.

"So many do."

"My life has been destroyed. All because of one woman."

The priestess raised an eyebrow. "You have come to ask me to kill her?"

I hesitated.

Thought of Elena’s face. The way she smiled at Derek. The way she spoke with confidence now, remembered now, lived fully now.

But no. Not death.

That would be too easy. Too fast.

"No," I said. "I don’t want her dead."

The priestess’s eyes gleamed. "Then what do you want?"

I swallowed.

"I want her to forget."

The words came out hoarse, scraped raw from somewhere deep in my chest.

The priestess didn’t flinch. She stood perfectly still, wreathed in shadows and silver mist, her hood pulled low over her face. Only her mouth was visible, painted black and unsmiling.

"Forget what?" she asked.

I swallowed hard. My hands were trembling, but I curled them into fists at my sides. I was done trembling. Done watching Elena Hart walk through life like everything belonged to her. Her memories. Her mate. Her power.

I raised my chin and met the priestess’s gaze—or what I imagined her gaze to be beneath that veil of darkness.

"Her mate," I said, voice steady now. Solid as stone. "I want her to forget Derek King."

For a heartbeat, everything was still.

Even the breath of the forest held.

Then it began.

The wind came first—a slow, curling twist of air that spiraled through the grove like a whisper waking up. It rose with a shriek, violent and sharp, tearing through the trees with the force of something ancient and hungry. Branches groaned and snapped overhead. The leaves lifted from the ground in waves, swirling into the air like ash from a funeral pyre.

The light fled.

And the Blightwood... answered.

I staggered back a step, heart hammering in my chest. The priestess hadn't moved, but her presence suddenly felt immense—like the earth itself was leaning toward her. Like the roots beneath my feet had turned to watch me.

She didn’t speak.

She didn’t have to.

Because the forest had heard me.

The Blightwood had heard me.

And it did not forget.

The air thickened, heavy and pulsing with static, like a storm was coiling just above the treetops. I felt it on my skin—prickling, tightening, buzzing beneath my bones. A scream built in my throat, but I swallowed it down.

This was what I wanted.

This was what I came for.

Wasn’t it?

Suddenly, the grove felt wrong. Tilted. Like it was sliding sideways. The shadows moved where they shouldn’t. Something brushed past me—fingers? vines?—but when I looked, nothing was there.

Nothing but the blackness pressing in from all sides.

I couldn’t see the priestess anymore.

Only trees. Only dark.

My voice shook. “What’s happening?”

No answer came.

Only a sound, rising from the deeper forest—a low, rhythmic chanting that I didn’t understand. Not language. Not exactly. But old. Older than anything I’d ever felt. Like the bones of the earth were speaking.

I turned.

And I ran.