Chapter 125

Three days dragged by after my presentation to the Alpha Council imploded. Kane’s absence stung, despite how much I tried to avoid thinking about him and focus on work. The conspiracy was growing stronger while I sat here completely alone.

I hunched over Elsa's notes, trying to decode activation rituals for the crystal. Ancient symbols swam before my tired eyes. Each page felt heavier than the last, featuring warnings about magical backlash mixed with protective spells I barely understood.

I nearly jumped when Raymond suddenly appeared in my doorway.

He'd cleaned himself up since our last encounter. Fresh clothes. Groomed hair. The whole rational leader routine. But his eyes still burned with that crazed fevered intensity that made my skin crawl.

Someone had coached him on presentation. Probably Giana herself. He looked like a politician preparing for cameras instead of the obsessive stalker he'd become.

"Aurora," he said with fake warmth. "I hoped we could talk privately."

He walked into my quarters without invitation. Still considered me his property, regardless of everything that had happened between us.

"We have nothing to discuss." I didn't look up from my research.

"I think we do." Raymond settled into the chair across from my desk like he owned the place. "Especially now that your partner abandoned you."

Kane's departure hit like salt in an open wound. I refused to give Raymond the satisfaction of seeing my pain.

"Kane made his choice," I said with forced indifference. "Just like you made yours with Giana."

Raymond's expression shifted. Became almost sympathetic. The change was so sudden it felt rehearsed. Like he'd practiced this conversation in front of a mirror.

"That's what I wanted to discuss." His voice dropped to intimate tones. "I've been thinking about our conversation the other night. I realize I may have been unclear about my intentions."

I looked up from my notes with growing alarm. The fevered obsession was still there but mixed with something that looked like genuine delusion.

"What intentions?"

Raymond leaned forward. His voice became a whisper. "My feelings for you, Aurora. They never disappeared. Even with Giana, even with all these political complications, you've always been in my heart."

My stomach turned. This wasn't love speaking. This was possession. Obsession. Magical conditioning twisted into something that resembled affection.

"Raymond." I kept my voice firm. "You're with Giana. You've made that very clear."

"But that doesn't have to end what we have," Raymond continued. His eyes bright with manic hope. "I've been thinking about traditional pack structures. How Alphas in the old days often had multiple mates to strengthen alliances."

My blood ran cold. I realized where this conversation was heading.

"You're suggesting Giana and me should both be your mates?"

"Think about it logically," Raymond said. His voice gained enthusiasm as he warmed to his theme. "Giana handles the political aspects of Luna duties while you could focus on the more... intimate aspects of our relationship."

He reached across the desk to touch my hand. I jerked away like he'd tried to burn me.

The suggestion was so revolting that words failed me. This was the boy I'd grown up with. The man I'd once loved. Now he was proposing to reduce me to the role of concubine.

"I could give you children," Raymond continued. Apparently oblivious to my revulsion. "The heirs you were always meant to provide. We could be happy, Aurora, if you just stop fighting what's natural between us."

His voice carried the fervor of a true believer. The magical conditioning had convinced him this degrading arrangement was not only reasonable but generous.

"Natural?" I repeated incredulously. "Raymond, there's nothing natural about what you're suggesting."

But Raymond was lost in his delusion. Painting pictures of a future that existed only in his magically conditioned mind.

"I know you still care about me," he insisted. "I can see it in how you look at me. How you worry about my safety. Kane never understood you the way I do."

The delusion ran deeper than I'd realized. He genuinely believed my concern for his wellbeing was romantic interest rather than basic human decency.

"Kane understood me perfectly," I snapped before I could stop myself. "He just chose to throw it away."

Raymond's expression darkened at my defense of Kane. His hands clenched into fists on my desk. I could see rage building behind his conditioned devotion.

"He abandoned you when things got difficult. I would never do that, Aurora. I've loved you since we were children."

The word 'love' coming from his lips sounded like profanity. Whatever he felt for me now had nothing to do with innocent childhood affection.

"What you're describing isn't love," I said firmly. "It's ownership. Possession. A fantasy based on magical conditioning that's made you forget what healthy relationships actually look like."

Raymond's face flushed with anger at my rejection. The rational facade he'd been maintaining began to crack. The obsessive predator underneath started showing through.

"Healthy relationships?" he snarled. "Like what you had with Kane? A man who used you for political advancement and discarded you the moment it became inconvenient?"

The attack on Kane was meant to hurt me. And it succeeded. But it also revealed how completely Raymond had misunderstood everything about my partnership with Kane.

Kane had hurt me, yes. Betrayed me, certainly. But he'd never used me for advancement. If anything, his feelings for me had compromised his career prospects.

"Whatever Kane and I had, at least it was real," I shot back. "At least it wasn't manufactured by magical artifacts and psychological manipulation."

Raymond stood abruptly. His chair scraped against the stone floor. His mask of civilized persuasion was slipping fast.

"You belong to me," he said with quiet intensity. "You were promised to me, raised to be my mate, trained to fulfill that role. Kane was just a distraction from your true purpose."

The possessive language made my blood run cold. This wasn't a man trying to win his wife back. This was an owner discussing his property.

"My purpose isn't to be your property," I replied with steely calm. "My purpose is to stop the conspiracy that's destroying werewolf civilization. Something I could've accomplished if you hadn't been corrupted by Giana's magic."

"Giana isn't controlling me!" Raymond exploded. His composure finally cracked completely. "She loves me! She supports me! She understands what a Luna should be!"

The fevered intensity in his voice when he spoke Giana's name confirmed everything I suspected. He literally couldn't conceive of her as anything other than perfect.

"A real Luna wouldn't need magic to maintain her Alpha's loyalty," I observed coldly.

Raymond's eyes flashed with dangerous rage. For a moment, I thought he might actually strike me. His hands trembled with barely controlled violence.

Then his expression shifted again. Became calculating and cruel. This was perhaps more frightening than his rage.

"You'll change your mind," he said with chilling certainty. "When you're alone and abandoned, when the political consequences of your choices become clear, you'll realize I'm offering you salvation."

The threat was barely veiled. He was suggesting my isolation would become so complete that even his degrading proposal would look like mercy.

"The only thing you're offering me is a cage," I replied firmly.

Raymond moved toward the door but paused to deliver his parting shot. His smile was cruel and satisfied. The expression of someone who knew exactly where to strike for maximum damage.

"Kane chose another woman over you," he said with deliberate cruelty. "At least I'm offering to choose you alongside Giana. Think about which one of us actually values what you bring to a relationship."

He left before I could respond. His words lingered like poison in the air.

I sat alone in my quarters, processing the disturbing conversation and its implications. Raymond's magical conditioning was getting stronger. His obsession more dangerous. He genuinely believed he was offering me something valuable rather than a degrading arrangement that would strip away my autonomy.

The worst part? Some small, broken piece of me actually considered his proposal. Not because I wanted him, but because Kane's abandonment had left me so desperate for any kind of connection that even Raymond's twisted offering looked like shelter from the storm.

But I pushed that weakness aside. I had work to do.

Elsa's crystal pulsed with dark energy on my desk. It promised the power to destroy the conspiracy that had corrupted Raymond and stolen Kane's courage.

The forbidden magic was dangerous. Potentially deadly. But it was the only weapon I had left. If learning to use it meant risking my life or soul, that was a price I was willing to pay.

Time to learn forbidden magic and end this war. No matter what it cost me.