Chapter 69

Nicholas’s POV

It was supposed to be an ordinary morning.

A quiet one, even the kind where the palace felt less like a fortress and more like a home. The smell of breakfast bread drifting through the halls, the faint laughter of children somewhere near the east courtyard.

Then came the scream.

High. Shattering. Sofia’s.

I was halfway down the marble stair before the guards even moved.

The scent of blood hit next.

Norman lunged in my mind like a beast uncaged. Ours! Pup!

I followed the scent through the corridor and into the training courtyard. The scene froze me mid-stride.

Carl lay sprawled on the gravel, one arm twisted protectively around his sister. His shirt was torn, crimson staining the fabric. He’d stepped between Sofia and another boy, the elder’s son, who was now backed into a corner, white-faced and trembling. The training spear in his hands was slick with Carl’s blood.

My blood.

“Get him out of here!” I roared, voice shaking the rafters. The guards surged forward, dragging the other boy away.

Esther was already there, kneeling in the dirt, pressing her hands against Carl’s wound. Her face was paper-white, eyes huge with fear.

“Don’t move him!” she cried as I reached for the boy. “He’s losing too much—”

“I’ve got him,” I said hoarsely.

Carl whimpered when I lifted him. He was light, too light, his body fever-hot against mine.

His eyes fluttered open, locking onto mine. And the look there, the defiance of it even now, cut me to the bone.

“Don’t… touch… her,” he whispered, blood bubbling at his lips. “Don’t hurt Mom.”

I froze.

Esther’s hands trembled as she followed, tears spilling unchecked. “He’s protecting her,” she said, voice cracking. “Even now. Even when he’s—”

“Save your breath,” I snapped, though the words came out ragged. “We’re getting him to the infirmary.”

Inside, chaos erupted. Healers scrambled, bandages flying, orders shouted. I laid Carl on the operating cot, every nerve in my body vibrating with helpless rage.

“Prepare a transfusion!” one of the healers barked. “He’s losing blood too fast!”

“I’ll do it,” Esther said immediately.

The healer shook her head. “You can’t. We need a family match.”

“I am family!”

“Immediate family doesn’t match,” another muttered. “Already tested. None of them are compatible.”

“What?” Esther blinked. “That’s not possible.”

Norman went utterly still.

Something clicked—deep, terrible, certain—like the tumblers of fate sliding into place.

I stepped forward. “Test me.”

The room went silent. Every healer stopped moving. Esther’s head jerked toward me, her face draining of color.

“Nicholas—”

“Test me,” I repeated, voice low and dangerous. “Now.”

The senior healer hesitated, eyes darting between us. “Alpha, with respect—”

“Do it.”

He obeyed.

The needle bit my skin, drawing a vial of blood. I didn’t flinch. Every breath felt like holding back a storm.

Norman paced under my skin, growling. You already know.

I did. Gods help me, I did.

Still, I waited.

Minutes crawled by like hours. The machines beeped. Esther whispered frantic prayers under her breath, her fingers tangled in Carl’s hair.

When the healer returned, his face told me before his mouth could.

I stepped forward anyway. “Say it.”

The man’s hands shook. “Alpha, the compatibility rate is one hundred percent.”

Time stopped.

Not possible, some part of me whispered, the part still clinging to logic, to denial, to the fragile scaffolding of six years of lies. But the other part—the wolf, the mate, the father—already knew.

Esther’s face crumpled. She looked at the healer, then at me, her mouth opening soundlessly.

I couldn’t even look at her. My knees almost buckled with the force of it. This truth that had been snarling in the dark for years finally breaking free.

Carl was mine. Sofia was mine.

I’d been raging against ghosts while my family lived under my roof.

They prepped the transfusion in silence. My blood filled the IV line, running crimson through the tubes and into the boy’s arm. Watching it was like watching the universe reset itself, one drop at a time.

Esther stood beside the bed, trembling. She reached for my wrist once, then pulled back as if burned.

“I tried to tell you,” she whispered.

“No,” I said flatly. “You tried to hide it.”

Her head dropped. The sound of Carl’s steadying heartbeat filled the room.

I couldn’t stay. Not then. Not with the room spinning around the truth.

I turned on my heel and left.

Outside, the evening had turned cold. The palace gardens stretched wide and silent, shadows long across the stone. I made it halfway to the fountain before the first surge of fury hit, hot and wild and merciless.

Six years.

Six years believing she’d betrayed me. That she’d borne another man’s children. Six years tearing myself apart, hating her, hating myself, all for nothing.

Norman’s growl filled my mind. You pushed her away. You let her suffer alone.

“She lied,” I snarled aloud. “She lied!”

Because you made her afraid.

The words hit harder than claws.

I sank to the edge of the fountain, gripping the marble until it cracked under my fingers.

She had lied. But what choice had I given her? When I’d treated her like a possession, a punishment, instead of the mate she was?

I pressed my hands to my face. The stone was slick beneath my palms.

“What do I do now?” I whispered.

Claim them. Protect them. Tell her you know.

“And if she won’t forgive me?”

Then you make her see. Not with words. With actions.

I looked up at the moon rising pale above the rooftops, the same moon under which I’d once marked Esther as mine.

The mark had faded but never died.

Neither had we.

Hours later, Dan found me still by the fountain. He hesitated before speaking. “Alpha, the boy’s stable.”

I exhaled shakily. “Good.”

He waited, then added, “The DNA test… it’s been confirmed. Both children. Yours.”

I nodded once. “Destroy the records. Every copy. No one sees them until I say so.”

“Yes, Alpha.”

He lingered. “And Esther?”

“What about her?”

“She’s in the infirmary still. Refuses to leave his side. Looks like she’s waiting for a sentence.”

I stared into the water. “She’ll get one, but not the kind she expects.”

I went to her hours later, after the palace had gone quiet.

The infirmary lights cast everything in pale gold. Carl slept peacefully now, color returning to his cheeks. Sofia was curled in the chair beside him, fast asleep, her small fingers still wrapped around her brother’s.

Esther sat between them, head bowed, her hand resting gently on Carl’s arm.

For a long time, I just stood there, watching them, the three halves of what I’d been too blind to claim.

When she finally looked up, her eyes met mine, her gaze wary, exhausted, and impossibly fragile.

“I know,” I said softly.

She went still. “You know?”

“The tests confirmed it.”

She swallowed hard. “Then say it.”

I took a step closer. “Carl and Sofia are my children.”

Her lips trembled. “Nicholas—”

“I should hate you for keeping this from me.” My voice shook despite myself. “But I can’t. Because I hate myself more.”

Tears slid silently down her cheeks. “I didn’t do it to hurt you. I did it to protect them.”

“I know.”

“You don’t. You never believed me capable of protecting anything. You only saw what you wanted. Betrayal, weakness, sin. You made me into something I wasn’t so you didn’t have to feel guilty.”

The words hit like blows, each one deserved.

I moved closer, crouching beside her chair.

“You’re right,” I said quietly. “And I will spend the rest of my life proving otherwise.”

She blinked, startled by the simplicity of it.

“I can’t undo what I’ve done,” I continued. “But I can give them a life where no one whispers murderer’s child ever again. A life where they know their father would burn the world for them.”

She studied me for a long, trembling breath. “And what about me?”

I held her gaze. “You already know the answer to that.”

Her eyes softened like dawn breaking through storm clouds. But she said nothing, only reached for Carl’s hand again.

I rose slowly, my pulse loud in my ears.

“Rest,” I murmured. “We have a long road ahead.”

When I left the infirmary, the corridor felt different. Lighter. The air itself seemed to breathe easier, as if the walls had been waiting years to exhale the truth.

Norman stirred, satisfied. Our blood. Our mate. Our pack.

“Yes,” I whispered. “And this time, I won’t lose them.”