Morning came clear and mild. After breakfast Dante found Daniel in the yard, checking tack.
“We should hunt,” Dante said. “Just the work of it. Walk the same trail and put this behind us.”
Daniel looked up, wary, then hopeful. “Together?”
“Together,” Dante said. “Trust needs miles.”
Silas, who had been circling the stables like a quiet shadow, stepped closer. “A sound idea,” he said. “If you bring back a hind, Leah can make a pack stew. She’ll need greens. The market road is open.” He turned to Leah. “Will you go? Nella says the larder is thin.”
Leah nodded. “I’ll take a basket before you hunt someone down.”
Silas used the moment to drift near Dante. “A word, Alpha." His voice dropped. "A truce is certainly a good thing, but don't let your guard down.”
Dante met his eyes. “Enough,” he said, calm. “I hear you. I make my calls. Let the morning be what it is.”
Silas inclined his head, the picture of obedience, and stepped back. Inside, the old method felt slow. Frustration pricked him.
Dante turned to Cordelia. “If I go, will you mind?” he asked. “I don’t want to leave you alone here.”
“I’ll be fine,” she said. “Leah will be back soon. Nella and the boys are in the house. It’s only a short time.”
Daniel came from the tack room with a quiver. “Are we going to hunt humanely or our way?” he said. “Silas is already outside.”
Dante kissed Cordelia’s forehead. “Back by midday,” he promised and returned to Daniel. ‘Of course, according to our plan, otherwise we will return with rabbits, if we are fortunate.’
They left through the arch. Cordelia watched until the road bent and took them from sight.
The house felt large when it was quiet. Cordelia walked its length twice. None of it settled her. Her steps turned, without plan, toward her father’s room.
The door opened on air that still held his tobacco and cedar. The desk waited under the window, tidy as he had kept it. She sat in his chair and let her fingers rest on the wood he had worn smooth.
She drew a sheet of parchment from the drawer, found a pen, and began.
Father,
I am sorry. I am sorry for what I did, and for how fast I did it. I did not honor the time you gave me, or the love you put into every rule. I was your child, and I went where you feared. I wanted you to see what I saw: that they are not the wolves in your stories. I wanted to prove it to you. I thought I had more days.
I feel ungrateful. I ache for what I cannot undo. Some nights I dream this is a bad tale, and I wake to find we are riding to the estate together, you arguing with the gate captain, me laughing at the way you miss the turn and pretend you meant to.
I am trying to be good where I stand now. I am trying to keep the man I chose safe and to be worth the cost. If there is a way to send this to where you are, let the wind carry it. Let it find you. Let it tell you I loved you, and I did not stop.
The nib scratched to a halt. Tears made the ink blur. She blotted the page and put both hands flat on it until she could breathe.
The door clicked. Leah stepped in, hair blown from the road, a basket on her arm. She took in the room, the desk, and the letter, and set the basket down without a word.
“You’re writing to him,” she said.
“I am,” Cordelia whispered.
Leah came closer. “We have a small rite for words that cannot be delivered,” she said. “We burn the letter, let the ash ride the air. It feels like sending, even if the path is one we can’t see.”
Cordelia nodded.
They went out to the summer kitchen, where the small hearth stood under a roof open to the air. Leah set kindling and coaxed a steady flame. Cordelia held the parchment once more, pressed it to her lips, then fed it to the fire. It curled and blackened. Ash lifted in a thin breath and drifted up.
They watched without speaking until the last ember dulled.
Leah broke the quiet. “How did you do it?” she asked—not unkindly, but straight. “If he was so much for you—how did you make your hand move?”
Cordelia’s throat tightened. “I didn’t move it on purpose,” she said. “I moved because I thought Dante would die if I didn’t. My mind felt like glass. I remember my father’s eyes. I remember the sound. I remember the heat on my hands.”
Leah listened, her own hands still.
“And afterward,” Cordelia said, voice low, “I wanted to take the moment back. But I also knew I would make the same choice again, because he—Dante—is what I have left. That truth lives next to the grief. They don’t cancel each other. They just… stand in the same room, and I have to stand there too.”
Leah nodded once. “That’s what courage feels like when you look at it too long,” she said. “Ugly and right.”
Cordelia swallowed. “Sometimes he is close as breath. Sometimes he goes quiet, and I can’t tell if it’s the weight of the pack or a shadow I can’t see. When he pulled away at supper—just a little—I thought I would break in two. If I lost him now, there would be nothing left to build with.”
Leah’s voice softened. “Then stay with him. We leave the rest to the part of the bond that doesn’t need our help.”
Cordelia let out a breath she hadn’t known she was holding. “Thank you.”
They stood there together, two women in an old kitchen, while the ash cooled.
From the road came a faint clatter—cart wheels, a shout. Leah picked up her basket. “I’ll take these greens to Nella,” she said. “Come in when you’re ready.”
Cordelia nodded. She stayed a moment more, pressing the soot-smudged brick with her palm, then turned toward the house.
She had just reached the back hall when a scream ripped the air outside—high and sharp, then another, closer. The door burst inward. Silas stumbled through it, crimson down his sleeve, blood on his cheek and throat. His eyes were wide and bright in a face gone white.
“Hurry!” he barked, voice raw. “We need to help him!”
Leah was there in two steps, catching his elbow before he fell. Cordelia’s hands went cold and hot at once.
“Where are they?” she asked, the words barely sounding.
Silas dragged in a breath that hitched. He gripped the doorframe to stay upright. Blood spattered the stones where he stood.