The uniform was designed to humiliate. White collar, black dress cut too short, a frilly apron that belonged in a costume shop. I tugged at the hem while Adelyn circled me like a predator evaluating prey.

"Perfect." Her smile was all teeth. "You'll serve the champagne tonight. Try not to embarrass us."

The gala blazed with excess. Crystal chandeliers threw fractured light across marble floors. Visiting Alphas from across the Eastern seaboard filled the Knight pack house ballroom, their laughter booming over string quartets. Five years since Wyatt had marked Adelyn. Five years of this.

I moved through the crowd with my tray, invisible except when someone needed their glass refilled. My shoulder ached—the cough had been worse this morning, black blood staining my pillowcase. Twelve days left, maybe less. I could feel my wolf spirit flickering like a candle in wind.

"More champagne." A visiting Alpha thrust his empty glass at me without looking up from his conversation. I refilled it, my hands steady despite the tremor in my bones.

Across the room, Wyatt stood with his father, both of them commanding in their formal suits. Wyatt's amber eyes swept the crowd, passing over me without recognition. Five years, and he'd perfected the art of looking through me.

Adelyn appeared at my elbow, her designer gown shimmering like oil on water. "Camille, darling, the guests near the terrace need service." Her voice dripped false sweetness. "Do try to keep up."

I turned toward the terrace. Didn't see her foot snake out.

The world tilted. My tray launched skyward, champagne arcing through the air in golden streams. I hit the marble hard, my knees cracking against stone. The glasses shattered around me, a constellation of broken crystal.

The champagne splashed across expensive Italian leather shoes. I looked up into the furious face of Alpha Dominic Russo, one of the most powerful wolves on the East Coast.

"You clumsy bitch!" His voice cut through the music. The quartet stopped playing. Conversations died. Every eye in the ballroom turned toward us.

"I'm so sorry, Alpha Russo." I kept my head down, my voice barely above a whisper. "I'll clean—"

"Five years in this pack and you still can't walk straight?" Adelyn's laugh rang out, bright and cruel. "Honestly, Wyatt, I don't know why we keep her."

Heat crawled up my neck. I reached for the fallen tray with shaking hands. Someone kicked broken glass at me. Laughter rippled through the crowd—not everyone, but enough. Always enough.

Wyatt's voice carried across the room, flat and administrative. "Clean it up. Now."

I gathered shards of crystal, each piece biting into my palms. Blood mixed with champagne on the white marble. No one helped. No one ever helped.

The first scream came from the entrance hall.

Then gunshots. The ancient chandelier swayed as wolves shifted, the air crackling with transformation energy. Rogues poured through the doors—six of them, maybe seven, their eyes wild with bloodlust and something else. Revenge.

"Marcus Knight!" The lead rogue's voice boomed. "You killed my brother!"

Chaos erupted. Visiting Alphas shifted mid-stride, their formal wear shredding. The Knight pack guards formed a protective circle around Marcus and Wyatt. I pressed myself against the wall, still holding broken glass, my heart hammering against my ribs.

The rogue leader moved like lightning. He broke through the guard formation, silver-laced dagger gleaming in his fist. Heading straight for Wyatt.

I didn't think. Thinking was for people with futures, with something to lose.

I threw myself forward. My body—weak, dying, barely holding together—collided with Wyatt's chest. The dagger meant for his heart sliced through my shoulder instead, silver burning like acid through muscle and bone. I screamed, the sound ripping from somewhere primal, and my momentum knocked the attacker sideways.

His blade spun from his grip as he fell. It skittered across the blood-slicked marble.

Pain exploded through my shoulder, white-hot and all-consuming. Silver poisoning spread like fire through my veins. I collapsed, my vision tunneling.

Through the haze, I saw the blade's trajectory. Saw it arc through the air. Saw it graze Adelyn's arm—barely a scratch, a thin line of red against her pale skin.

Adelyn's scream could have shattered the remaining chandeliers.

"She tried to kill me!" Adelyn clutched her arm, blood—so little blood—seeping between her fingers. "Camille attacked me! She's working with them!"

No. No, I—

Pack guards swarmed the rogues. Someone kicked the dagger toward me. It stopped inches from my hand.

Wyatt's face appeared above me, his expression twisted with something I couldn't read. Rage. Betrayal. His eyes locked on the blade near my bloodied palm, then on Adelyn sobbing theatrically in her mother's arms.

"You." His voice was winter itself. "You did this."

"Wyatt, I saved—" The words died in my throat as his hand closed around my injured shoulder. The silver burn intensified. I couldn't breathe.

"Take her to the dungeon." Wyatt's command rang through the ballroom. "Lock her up. I'll deal with her myself."

Hands grabbed me. Dragged me. The last thing I saw before darkness swallowed me was Adelyn's smile—small, private, victorious—as she pressed a silk handkerchief to her scratch.

The dungeon stairs were stone, each one slick with centuries of moisture and despair. Wyatt's grip on my uninjured arm was iron, his fingers digging deep enough to bruise. My feet barely touched the steps as he hauled me down, down into the earth beneath the pack house.

"Wyatt, please—" My voice came out broken, threaded with pain. The silver burn in my shoulder had spread to my chest, wrapping around my lungs like barbed wire.

He didn't answer. Didn't look at me. His jaw was locked, a muscle ticking beneath his skin.

The dungeon opened before us—a cavern of wet stone and rusted chains. The air tasted like iron and rot. Wyatt shoved me forward. I stumbled, my knees hitting the ground hard enough to split skin. Cold seeped through my ruined dress.

"I saved you." The words scraped out of me. "The blade was meant for—"

"Shut up." He crouched, his face level with mine. Those amber eyes I'd once loved held nothing but ice. "You think I'm stupid? The blade was in your hand. Adelyn's blood was on it."

"Because it grazed her after I knocked—"

His hand cracked across my face. My head snapped sideways, stars exploding across my vision. I tasted copper.

"Five years," Wyatt said, his voice low and venomous. "Five years I let you stay here out of pity. And this is how you repay me? Conspiring with rogues? Trying to murder my Luna?"

The chains were old, the kind used for prisoners who'd committed unforgivable crimes. He locked them around my wrists, the metal biting into my skin. Then my ankles. The silver content wasn't high enough to kill quickly, but it would burn. Constantly.

"I gave you everything." My voice cracked. "My wolf essence. Three years of my life. I loved—"

"You gave me nothing I didn't pay for." He stood, brushing off his hands like I'd dirtied them. "You were compensated. Housed. Fed. That debt is settled."

The hollow space in my chest where my wolf used to sing throbbed with phantom pain. Eleven days left. Maybe less now, with the silver poisoning spreading through my system.

Wyatt walked toward the stairs. Stopped. Turned back.

"If you survive the night," he said, "I'll decide your sentence in the morning."

The door slammed. The lock turned. Darkness swallowed everything except the distant torch flickering in the corridor beyond my cell.

I don't know how long I hung there. Time moved differently in the dark, measured only by the drip of water somewhere in the shadows and the steady burn of silver against my skin. My shoulder screamed. My wrists bled where the shackles cut deep. The cough building in my chest promised more black blood.

Footsteps echoed down the corridor. Multiple sets. I lifted my head, hope flaring stupidly in my chest. Maybe Wyatt had come back. Maybe he'd listened, finally heard—

Adelyn stepped into the torchlight, flanked by two guards I recognized. Brock and Silas, both fiercely loyal to the Luna. Both known for their cruelty.

Adelyn's scratch had been bandaged with theatrical precision, white gauze wrapped around her entire forearm like she'd lost a limb. She smiled, and it was the most honest expression I'd ever seen on her face.

"Hello, Camille." She circled me slowly, her heels clicking against stone. "Comfortable?"

I said nothing. Saved my strength.

"I want you to know something." She stopped in front of me, close enough that I could smell her perfume. "I knew you were innocent. Obviously. That blade barely touched me."

My breath caught.

"But you see, you've always been a problem. Even powerless, even dying—" Her eyes flicked to my chest, and I realized she knew. Somehow, she knew about my failing wolf spirit. "—you're still in his head. He still looks for you in crowds. Still flinches when someone mentions your name."

She nodded to the guards. Brock moved to the wall, lifting something from a hook. Silver-laced whips, the kind used for execution.

"So I'm going to make sure," Adelyn continued, her voice light, conversational, "that even if you survive this, you'll be too broken for anyone to want. Especially him."

The first lash tore across my back. I screamed, the sound echoing off stone walls. Silver fire raced along my spine.

"Don't hold back," Adelyn instructed. "I want scars."

The second lash. The third. I lost count after seven. The whip found my back, my shoulders, my face. I felt skin split, felt blood run hot down my body. The silver burned deeper than flesh, searing into muscle, into bone.

I stopped screaming. Didn't have the air left.

Adelyn's face swam in my fading vision, beautiful and terrible. "Goodbye, Camille. Thank you for your service."

Darkness pulled at me, merciful and complete. I let it come.

Somewhere in the void, I felt hands on my wrists. Different hands, gentle ones. The chains fell away. A voice, old and rough with emotion, whispered near my ear.

"Forgive me, child. I should have come sooner."

Reuben Young's face materialized above me, his weathered features twisted with horror. Behind him, a guard lay unconscious on the floor.

"Stay with me." Reuben lifted me like I weighed nothing, cradling my broken body against his chest. "There's a tunnel. Old escape route. I'm getting you out."

I tried to speak. Couldn't. My back was on fire, my face wet with blood. The world tilted as Reuben carried me through a gap in the stone wall I'd never noticed, into a passage that smelled of earth and freedom.

Behind us, the dungeon door remained locked. Wyatt would find an empty cell in the morning.

I hoped it haunted him.