Chapter 23: Blood and Business

The news of the attack on the Emberfall Alpha spread through the territories like wildfire, carried on the frantic howls of her pack. The message was clear: the sanctuary had been breached, its heart wounded. In the Shadow Claw den, Wesley received the news with a stillness that was more terrifying than any outburst. The report was grim: Sarah, the exiled, had been granted shelter by Emilia's mercy, and had repaid it with a wolfsbane-laced assassination attempt. Leo had killed the traitor, but Emilia hovered at the edge of death, the potent poison coursing through her veins. A cold, murderous rage settled in Wesley’s bones, so absolute it felt like clarity. 「She showed her mercy, and my failure tried to kill her. Again.」 The thought was a brand, searing away the last vestiges of his attachment to the past. Sarah was not just a mistake; she was a cancer that had metastasized. His justice was swift and brutal. He summoned the pack, his voice devoid