SWNOVELS : Chapter 28
Third person
Scarlet looked around the grand circular table sternly, with fire lighting up her dark eyes.
“I will not be disrespected,” she spat at the small crowd of nobles, “regardless of the vile rumors that you have heard. I have been falsely accused of these wretched crimes against my own beloved husband.”
The man who had been arguing with her—he was the Alpha of the Red Moon pack, and Fiona’s father—reluctantly sat back in his chair in sullen silence, his face dark with poorly concealed discontent.
“You dare to even show your face here in the noble werewolf meeting, knowing you wouldn’t be able to control yourself. You dare to speak against your queen. You should be put in prison—not even for your petty attitude, but for your very real crimes of greed and manipulation.”
“Hah!” the man shouted, red-faced and no longer able to control himself. His eyes were bulging and wild. He pointed a finger at Scarlet. “You’re one to speak of greed and manipulation! Even the King knows it to be true. Why else would he not allow his guards to escort you here today? Why else leave you vulnerable like that, my queen…?!”
Scarlet’s face reddened and she clenched her fists behind the podium. The other nobles in the meeting were silent, watching.
The man continued as Scarlet struggled to suppress her anger and rising anxiety. She had lost several of her privately owned properties already, in a mad scramble to undo as much of the damage she had done as was possible before the investigation reached the worst of her secret criminal activities.
She didn’t want to lose anything else. She was afraid of being caught. Of being jailed. And of the King’s personal execution of justice, which he’d wait to dole out until he was positively sure his wife was guilty.
And she was guilty.
Scarlet’s hands started to tremble and she pressed her palms flat against the podium to force them still. “This is your foolish daughter’s fault,” she said, interrupting in the calmest and loudest voice she could manage. “She conspired against the crown to frame me for these things you accuse me of.”
The lie was convoluted and did not make a bit of sense. But Scarlet was a powerful woman among the nobles, and they were inclined to stay on her side.
Fiona’s father grew even more furious, but he knew he had no social power in this audience. Support for Scarlet was stirring inside the fast-beating hearts of all her allies, which he started to realize was… all of them. Everyone in the room was glaring at him like he was the enemy, the one in the wrong.
He stood and left before any one of them could flinch or even bare their teeth at him.
Fiona
I was in our bedroom when suddenly, I heard footsteps approaching.
I was wearing soft socks and standing on the wood floor, and found myself accidentally doing a comical, full-circle spin on one toe. I chuckled as I stopped, facing the door to Alexander’s office. The laugh evaporated into thin air and my whole body froze. I began to worry, remembering the secret passageway that allowed intruders into our private space.
I almost retreated to the position I had taken the last time, when I had crouched behind the sofa and filmed Susan, that traitorous pawn of Alexander’s wicked stepmother, as she emerged from nowhere and traipsed through our private space.
But then I realized that the footsteps were coming from the hallway. I reached the door just in time to see an envelope come sliding underneath it. By the time I could unlock the door and swing it open, the person who delivered it had vanished. They had gone away much more quietly than they had approached.
I locked the door once more behind me before reaching to the floor to pick up the envelope.
It was unmarked on the outside. I fingered the seal to work it open and it tore apart unevenly, almost splitting in half. It had been sealed closed quite thoroughly. The letter inside tumbled to the ground.
I recognized the handwriting the moment I touched the letter. Standing, I started to feel the hair rising on the back of my neck. Like I was in danger.
I wheeled around again. Not laughing this time. All was quiet, on all sides. I believed my instinct when it told me I was alone.
The letter was from my father.
Fiona, You must pay close attention! We are limited in communicating with you, my dear daughter, while you are in the captivity of the enemy that still swears to see to the destruction of your own pack and family.
The paper quivered in my hand. I was shaking with unexpected anger. Alexander may have been my father’s enemy, but he was not mine.
At least, I did not feel that he was. Alexander even seemed to… truly care about me.
I shook my head at the thought. He was just an honorable man. Staying with me to ensure my own health, and that of our child.
Please, my beloved daughter, send word home soon. Below I will detail how to get your letter to our mutual accomplice. He will carry the letter to me directly.
You must uncover Alexander’s agenda and strategy. I am sure he will reveal it to you. He is drawn to you, blind to your true alliance, I know it! Use that power, Fiona, for the good of your family!
I heard a popping sound and felt a sharp, stabbing pain in the lower right side of my mouth. I had been clenching my jaw and grinding my teeth together, so tense while reading this insulting communique from my coward of a father.
I slacked my jaw, trying to release the tension and pain.
My father was asking me to be his spy against Alexander.
He was delusional if he thought I would go along with that. He was even stupider than I had ever realized. That, or he didn’t know me at all.
As promised, he wrote out instructions for when and where I could drop a message to a mole that he had somehow embedded into the palace staff. This measure was necessary, he said, because my calls would be monitored, and we could not risk detection.
At the bottom of the letter, my father instructed me in all caps:
DESTROY THIS LETTER AFTER READING!
I was tempted to do it. Glancing over the letter once more, skimming the content and squinting my eyes, I imagined how it would read from Alexander’s perspective. My father made it sound as if I were already conspiring with him against my fiancé.
But I didn’t want to do what my father told me to. And I thought maybe the letter would be valuable evidence that I’d need to show someone at some point.
I folded it into a small square and tucked it into a zipper pocket in my purse. Zipped my purse closed and hung it in a back corner of my dressing room. Tomorrow I’d find somewhere more permanent to store it, somewhere no one would think to look.