Chapter 169

Ronan

I’d spent enough years here to know he palace’s rhythm; the rhythm of boots on patrol, the faint scrape of servants moving through lower halls, the way torches sputtered when drafts slipped between the stones.

Tonight, I wasn’t listening to the rhythm to do something I never thought I was capable of.

My boots barely touched the flagstones, weight pitched forward as if I were stalking an enemy camp. My pulse kept time in my throat, steady and even.

This wasn’t a mission or duty. It was the highest betrayal.

The word caught under my ribs. I forced my face into its cold neutral state, the soldier’s mask I’d worn for years. Calm on the surface, a storm underneath.

My wolf prowled inside, restless and uneasy.

This was Damon’s palace. Damon’s halls. And here I was, threading through them with the intent to steal from the man I’d sworn to protect with my life.

But I’m not doing this for me. The thought came sharp, almost pleading. I’m doing it for her.

Lila’s face rose in my mind: ashen, trembling in the library chair, whispering that she couldn’t stay here when it would mean fading to nothing.

I’d seen soldiers beg for their lives on battlefields, blood rushing between their fingers, but none of that had gutted me the way her voice had.

That plea carried me forward, down the narrow hall to Damon’s private study.

The door loomed heavy in front of me. I stopped, my fingers hovering just shy of the handle. The air smelled faintly of his scent, and my guilt rose again.

A hundred memories hit me at once: Damon bent over maps, eyes sharp. Damon barking again, again across the training yard until my arms shook with exhaustion. Damon nearly bleeding out under my hands, and me silently swearing I’d never let him fall, not as long as I drew breath.

My throat tightened.

This was treason. Against my King. My Alpha. My brother in arms.

I slid the key into the lock, one of many I was trusted with as Beta. The soft click echoed far too loud. I froze, ears straining for footsteps, but all was quiet. My actions were still secret. So far.

I eased the door open and slipped inside.

The study was alive with his presence, even in his absence. Everything here was him; the high-backed chair, the blade resting in the corner, the neat stack of documents waiting for his signature.

And then there was the chest.

A wolf’s head was carved into the lid, teeth bared in a snarl to warn anyone of trying break into it.

I crouched in front of it, palms damp despite my gloves. My picks whispered against the lock, the sound nearly drowned out by the pounding in my chest.

Insert. Twist. Listen. The lock gave.

When I lifted the lid, firelight spilled over glass. Vials gleamed like bottled moonlight, the liquid inside catching the glow with an iridescent shimmer.

It was the complete antidote.

My hand dipped into the chest and came out as quickly. One vial slid into the pouch at my belt, fingers shaking. By the second vial, my chest felt tight.

I shut the chest, relocked it, and rose. My hand lingered on the carved wolf’s head, thumb brushing over its snarling muzzle. A silent apology.

Then I turned. The pouch weighed heavy at my hip, and it took a monstrous effort to leave it alone.

If Damon caught me – if Damon ever found out – there’d be no forgiveness. No coming back from this.

I slipped out into the hall, closing and locking the door behind me. But my guilt followed, pacing beside me like one of Lila’s guards.

The corridors felt longer on the way out, like the palace had learned what I’d done and stretched itself to keep me here.

I kept to the shadows, breath measured, shoulders loose. The pouch at my hip was a live thing, bumping softly against my thigh with each step.

Every brush of glass on leather sent a spike through my nerves. If I broke one, or anyone heard…it would all be over for both of us.

A figure detached from a doorway ahead. It was another guard, alone this time, adjusting his belt. He turned right, not left. The space he left behind was a gap I folded into.

Half a corridor later, the quiet was over. A bell clanged three fast strokes from the far side of the palace. From the kitchens, I knew by the echo.

The sound ricocheted down the stone like a thrown plate, and doors whispered open along the hall as servants peered out.

“Another fire?” someone hissed.

“No, a spill,” another voice snapped back. “Boiling oil. Kitchens will want more towels. And a healer.”

I exhaled but the tension didn’t leave. A spill could become a blaze in a kitchen like ours, but the bell meant I had a distraction. Which was good until it herded bodies into the halls I needed to cross.

Footsteps multiplied as a couple of pages rushed past, arms full of linens.

One clipped my shoulder, and I heard glass kiss against glass inside the pouch with the softest chime. I swallowed a curse and angled my body so the pouch rode flat against my thigh, wedged by my forearm.

Two more turns. One more flight of stairs. The door’s iron latch waited like the decision point it was.

If I crossed that threshold, I would be leaving my King to steal his cure for the woman who held both our hearts.

I reached the bottom of the stairs and stopped dead. Voices low, then sharpening filled in the passage that led to the door.

It was one of my Captains and a junior officer whose name I could never remember.

“…so the south gets double watch,” the Captain was saying. “You’ll reroute the western rotation. Ronan will sign off.”

If I walked out now, he’d read me like a map. I pivoted and took the service landing instead. I’d hidden contraband here when I was a raw recruit. What felt like a rebellion then was child’s play now.

The niche was still there, a shallow relief behind an ornamental shield no one had polished in a decade. I worked the shield loose just enough to slip my fingers behind it.

I slid the pouch into the crevice, easing the leather so the vials lay level instead of stacked. The space took them, barely.

The shield settled back with the faintest kiss of metal on stone, its dust cloak disguising the disturbance. I traced a tiny gouge into the mortar to mark the spot in case I needed someone else to retrieve it later.

I cut back through the stairwell and into the corridor beyond, rejoining the flow of nighttime palace life. A runner pelted past, nearly colliding with me, eyes wide and wild.

“Beta Ronan!” he blurted, skidding when he recognized me. “They’re calling you to the war room. Now.”

“Reason?” I kept my tone level, the mask snugly in place.

“Tracks along the south road,” he said, breathless. “Two sets, heavy. Could be rogues. Could be the arsonist. Mis Majesty said to find you.”

I nodded and angled toward the war room.

“Ronan,” Damon said, voice rough with lack of sleep. “I’m short on warriors for the south sweep.” He thumped a finger on the map. “Take a patrol through the river bend and report back.”

The river bend. The very path I’d planned to run.

A dozen answers and refusals flashed through my head and died there.

I couldn’t get back to Lila tonight. Not with the palace turning its entire attention outward. If I tried to break away now, someone would notice. And someone would follow.

So, I nodded once to my King, who was fully unaware of my betrayal, and began giving orders I didn’t believe in.

My loyalty had already shifted.