Ch. my pack erased me, the lycan king didn’t 12 my pack erased me, the lycan king didn’t 12

Chapter 12 

“Absolutely not,” Kael said. 

“It’s the only way he opens the door.” 

“You are not walking into that mine alone.” 

“I’m not alone.” I tapped the tiny earpiece. “You’ll hear every breath I take.” 

+45 Coins 

We were parked a mile from Hollow Ridge at 11:40 p.m. Thirty of the King’s warriors spread through the pines in wolf form. Jonah in a van with twelve screens. My father and brothers in a second truck with their hands on their knees, because I’d told them what would happen if they moved. 

“Casimir wants a silver–eyed Ashford girl walking through his door,” I said. “So I’ll walk through his door. Every second he spends looking at me is a second he isn’t looking at you.” 

Kael’s jaw was so tight I could see the muscle jump. 

Then he did something I didn’t expect. 

He took my face in both hands. Sparks everywhere he touched. 

“Come back out,” he said, very low. “That’s an order.” 

“Since when do I follow your orders?” 

“Since tonight.” 

I walked into the mine alone at 11:58. 

The iron door in the back tunnel stood open. The tunnel where Rose Ashford died forty years ago. Silver glittered in the walls. It made my skin itch and my wolf whine. 

Six figures inside. I counted them before my eyes adjusted. Two vampires by the door. Two by the ore carts. One on the rock ledge above with a crossbow. And one in the corner who kept checking his phone and smelled like wet dog and fear. 

Brock Danner. 

And in the middle of it all, chained to a chair with silver, my mother. 

Clara Ashford looked up. 

She saw me, and it took her a moment. The hair. The suit. 

Then she said, “Sienna?” like a prayer from someone who’d stopped believing in God. 

Every speech I ever wrote disappeared forever. 

“Hi, Mom,” I said. “Sorry I’m late. I was busy.” 

She made a sound like she was dying. 

“There she is.” Casimir Morrow stepped out of the dark. “The treasure.” 

“Let her go. You have me.” 

“I’ll keep both. I’m sentimental.” He circled me slowly. “Do you know what your aunt was worth to my father? Every secret in the north. She listened at doors. She remembered everything. Just like you.” 

“Is that why you killed her?” 

“She stopped being useful.” He shrugged. “Girls do.” 

I watched all of them. The crossbow on the ledge kept shifting left. Brock kept glancing at his phone. And Casimir 

touched his collar every time he lied. Exactly like Brock. 

Birds of a feather. 

“Ledge, left side, crossbow,” I murmured, like I was talking to myself. “Danner, northeast corner. Four on the floor.” 

“Copy,” said the voice in my ear. 

“Who are you talking to?” Casimir snapped. 

“My aunt,” I said. “Rose. Say her name.” 

His lip curled, “Your aunt was-” 

The lights died. 

The whole mine dropped into black. Wolves poured through every tunnel at once, a storm of fur and teeth. And somewhere in the dark, something enormous moved. Bigger than any wolf I’d ever seen. A Lycan, fully shifted. 

Kael. 

Chapter 12 

I grew up around wolves who fight for a living. I have never seen anything like it. 

I didn’t wait. 

+45 Coins 

I’d memorized the floor. Nine steps to my mother’s chair. I counted them in the dark, wrapped my sleeves around my hands, ripped the silver chains loose, and pulled her down behind an ore cart. 

“Stay down. Don’t move. Don’t argue.” 

“Sienna-” 

“Mom. For once in your life, listen to me.” 

She stayed down. 

Emergency lamps flickered on, red and ugly. Vampires lay broken on the rock. Brock was face–down with Silas’s knee in his back. 

And Casimir Morrow stood ten feet away with a crossbow aimed straight at my mother’s hiding place. 

I saw his shoulder tighten half a second before he fired. 

That’s what a year of being invisible gave me. Not power. Time. Everyone else lives in the present. I live half a second ahead. 

I shifted mid–leap. Small, white, fast. I hit his arm before the bolt flew. It slammed into the ceiling. My teeth closed on his wrist until bone cracked. 

He screamed. 

1 shifted back, pinned him to the same rock floor where Rose died, my knee in his spine, my mouth at his ear so my mother would hear. 

“Rose Ashford. Say her name.” 

“You little-” 

I leaned harder. 

“Rose Ashford,” he gasped. 

“She’s getting a headstone. I paid for it last week. Before I even knew she was mine.” 

Then the Lycan King was there in human form, hauling Casimir up and throwing him to his warriors. Then his hands 

were on me, running over my arms, my face, checking every inch.. 

Chapter 12 

“Are you hurt?” 

“No.” 

He pressed his forehead to mine. His eyes blazed gold. Molten. Unhidden. 

“Mine,” he breathed. Not to me. Like the word had escaped him. 

Behind us, my mother was on her knees on that terrible floor, sobbing my name into her palms. 

And I finally understood what I’d been feeling every time he touched me.