Chapter 8: The Poison in Our Veins

The howl faded, but its echo stayed trapped in Aria’s chest like a splinter of glass.

She stood frozen at the edge of the training yard, frost crunching beneath her bare feet, the night wind dragging strands of hair across her face. Every instinct screamed at her to run—to find Kael, to warn him, to hide. But the smarter part of her, the part that had survived two years in Cyrus’s grasp, held her still.

*Think.*

Cyrus was here. Inside the borders. Which meant either Kael’s patrols had failed, or someone had let him in.

The thought sent a fresh wave of nausea rolling through her stomach. She pressed a hand to her mouth and forced herself to breathe. The bite mark on her shoulder throbbed—not the ache of a healing wound, but a warning. A tether. Cyrus’s claim on her flesh had never truly faded, and now it pulled taut, a leash yanked from a thousand yards away.

He was calling her.

Aria turned and walked—no, stalked—back toward the main hall. Her bare feet slapped against the stone floor, and the few wolves still awake in the corridors parted for her without a word. She’d learned quickly that the pack didn’t know what to make of her. The Alpha’s caged Luna, they whispered. The one who sleeps in his room but won’t let him touch her.

Let them whisper.

She found what she was looking for in the infirmary.

The healer’s stores were kept in a narrow room off the main hall, and the door was, predictably, unlocked. Werewolves didn’t expect thieves among their own. Aria slipped inside and lit a single candle, its flame trembling in the draft.

The shelves were lined with jars, vials, and bundles of dried herbs. She scanned them quickly, her fingers brushing labels written in a neat, slanted hand. Wolfsbane. Silverroot. Nightshade. All the usual poisons, carefully catalogued and locked in glass.

But it was the row of small, dark bottles at the back that made her blood run cold.

She knew that shape. Knew that stopper—a cork sealed with black wax, stamped with a crude crescent moon. It was the same poison that had been used on the captive rogue Kael had interrogated two weeks ago. The same toxin that had nearly killed three of his warriors during a border skirmish.

And it was the same poison her father had once brewed in the cellar of their home pack.

Aria picked up one of the bottles and held it to the candlelight. The liquid inside was nearly black, viscous, and it clung to the glass like oil. She didn’t need to open it. She knew the scent—bitter almonds and something older, something wrong.

This wasn’t a rogue’s poison. This was Blackwood stock.

Her own pack’s stock.

Her hands began to shake. She set the bottle down carefully, as if it might bite her, and pressed her palms flat against the shelf. Her father had been the pack’s apothecary. He’d made this poison for the Alpha’s private use—for executions, for enemies who needed to disappear quietly. When she’d fled Blackwood two years ago, she’d assumed the stock had been destroyed.

Apparently not.

Which meant someone had brought it here. Someone who knew exactly what it was and how to use it.

Someone from her past.

Cyrus.

The howl. The poison. It all clicked into place with a sickening clarity. Cyrus wasn’t just here to hunt her—he was here to tear Kael’s pack apart from the inside. Poison the warriors, weaken the borders, and then strike.

And Aria was the bait.

She closed her eyes and saw it all: Kael, furious and betrayed, demanding to know why her pack’s poison was in his stores. The pack turning on her, calling her a spy, a traitor, a curse. Cyrus watching from the shadows, smiling.

If she told Kael the truth, he might not believe her. Worse, he might think she was involved. She’d been his prisoner for weeks, his reluctant Luna, and he’d never fully trusted her. Why would he start now?

But if she stayed silent, the poison would spread. More wolves would fall. And Cyrus would win.

Aria grabbed one of the bottles and tucked it into the waistband of her skirt, the cold glass pressing against her hip. She blew out the candle and slipped back into the corridor.

She had to find Kael.

She didn’t have to look far. He was in the main hall, standing before the great stone hearth with his back to her, his shoulders rigid. The firelight carved shadows across his broad frame, and his hands were clenched at his sides.

“You should be in bed,” he said without turning.

“We need to talk.”

He turned then, slowly, and the look in his eyes stopped her cold. It wasn’t anger. It was something worse—a quiet, simmering suspicion.

“I know,” he said. “I felt him cross the border. Cyrus.”

Aria’s mouth went dry. “You knew?”

“My scouts reported a rogue howl twenty minutes ago. I was about to wake you.” His gaze dropped to her hip, to the bulge beneath her skirt. “What’s that?”

She hesitated. One second. Two. The truth balanced on the tip of her tongue, heavy and sharp.

And then the door behind her burst open.

A warrior stumbled in, blood streaming from a gash on his forehead, his eyes wild with panic.

“Alpha!” he gasped. “The eastern patrol—they’re dead. All of them. And the wells…” He choked, doubling over. “The wells are poisoned.”

Kael’s head snapped toward Aria, his eyes blazing gold.

“What did you do?”