Chapter 213
A Plaque
The portal shimmered once, then sealed behind them with a low hum that echoed through the palace corridor.
Althea staggered the moment her feet touched solid ground.
Zander was quick to steady her, his hand closing around her arm as a faint glow passed between them. She felt it instantly. A warm current threading through her veins, steadying her breathing, easing the ache that still clung to her bones after healing Riela.
“I’m transferring just enough energy,” Zander murmured quietly. “Not more than you can handle.”
She nodded, grateful but too focused to speak. Her heart was pounding far louder than her footsteps as she straightened and lifted her gaze.
She walked forward without hesitation. Gamma Simon spotted her almost immediately. His eyes widened. “Lady Althea?”
Before she could answer, he was already moving, blocking her path. “Please wait here. I need to inform the Alpha King. You’re not supposed to be here.”
“I know,” she said softly. “But I want to see him.”
Simon hesitated, then nodded and turned aside, his eyes glazing faintly as he mindlinked Gavriel.
At the same time, Althea reached Gavriel through their bond. [Gavriel. I’m here,] she told him still even knowing that Simon probably reported it already through mindlink. [I know judgement is about to begin. I’m not asking to stop it. I just… please. Let me see him first. Privately. Just once.]
There was a pause. She felt his presence like a wall of iron and fire, restrained but dangerously close to breaking. Then his voice came through the link, low and steady.
[I will come to you.]
Moments later, his footsteps echoed down the corridor.
The moment Althea saw him, something inside her loosened. Gavriel stopped in front of her, his sharp gaze sweeping over her face, her posture, the faint pallor she had not managed to hide.“You should be resting,” he said.
“I know,” she replied. “But I couldn’t.”
Simon cleared his throat. “Alpha King, the prisoners are secured. The dungeon is sealed and heavily warded.”
Gavriel nodded once. “You may return to your post.”
Simon bowed and stepped away.
Gavriel turned back to Althea. For a long moment, he simply looked at her. Then he exhaled slowly. “I will take you to him,” he said. “But you will follow my lead. And you will not put yourself in danger.”
She nodded immediately. “I promise.”
Zander stepped forward. “I will go as well.”
Gavriel studied him, then gave a short nod. “Stay close.”
They descended deep into the palace, past halls that grew colder with every step. The air changed the farther they went, heavy with old magic and iron.
The dungeon doors stood sealed by glowing sigils, chains carved with runes coiled around thick bars of blackened steel.
Pain was woven into the space itself.
Althea felt it before she saw him.
Cain hung suspended by enchanted iron chains, his wrists bound above him, his body sagging under their weight. The magic carved into the metal burned constantly, feeding on his strength, tearing at his mind as much as his flesh.
He looked thinner. Older. His once proud posture broken by exhaustion and restraint.
Her chest tightened painfully.
“Father,” she whispered.
Cain’s head jerked up.
For a heartbeat, disbelief crossed his face. Then his eyes softened, filling with emotion he did not try to hide.
“Althea,” he rasped. “My daughter.”
The word shattered her. She could read his thoughts, yet Althea was too afraid to do so. For some reason, she wanted her image of Cain as a good father to remain untouched. It was the version she had grown used to, one she wanted to hold on to even in what might be their last moments together—despite the truth he already knew, that she was not his real daughter.
She rushed forward instinctively.
Gavriel’s hand caught her arm. “Althea.”
“I just want to get closer,” she pleaded, tears spilling freely now. “Please.”
His jaw tightened. “He is dangerous.”
Zander stepped in calmly. “Let her. He is bound. I will shield her.”
Gavriel hesitated.
Zander met his gaze without flinching. “Despite everything, he raised her. He protected her. Whatever his sins are, this moment matters.”
A long silence stretched between them.
Finally, Gavriel nodded sharply. “One step closer. No more.”
Zander lifted his hand, weaving a barrier so subtle it was almost invisible, wrapping Althea in a cocoon of protective magic.
She stepped forward.
Cain swallowed hard before he firmly stated, “You are my daughter. Blood or not, nothing will change that. I loved your mother more than life itself. When she died… you were all I had left of her.”
Her breath hitched. “Mother loved you too.”
Cain closed his eyes briefly. “I know.”
A sharp, unhinged laugh cut through the air.
Rett.
He was bound to the opposite wall, his eyes wild, his expression twisted with hysteria. “How touching,” he sneered. “A family reunion in a dungeon.”
Cain’s head snapped toward him. “Be silent.”
Rett laughed harder. “We’re both doomed and you still cling to her? You still soften when you look at your precious daughter who turned out to be not your own!”
He glared at Althea. “Do you know what he did? What he dragged us into because he couldn’t let go?”
Cain growled. “Enough.”
Rett’s voice rose, cracking as he glared at Althea and spat. “This is your fault! I should have let you die during the ambush! I should have made sure you died with your mother, just like my mother wanted!”
The words struck like a blade.
Althea recoiled, her breath catching painfully in her chest. Her mother’s death had been caused by Luna Meena. Justice had already been served when that woman died, yet hearing the truth spoken so cruelly from Rett’s mouth still reopened wounds Althea had never fully healed.
It was not only her mother who had died that day. Amon had died too.
The memories crashed into her all at once, blurring her vision.
Rett snarled, his voice sharp with hatred. “You’re a plague, just like your mother! If not for the two of you, our pack wouldn’t be in this mess!”
Althea stiffened.
“Because of your mother, my father became weak,” Rett continued, his eyes burning with resentment. “And because of you, you little whore, he’s still hesitating! He’s dragging all of us down with him!”