LYRA
I don't obey him immediately; I only stare at him, holding on to my last string of defiance.
"Kneel!" he barks.
I drop to my knees so quickly, I nearly break my bones. The stone is cold, and I can feel the heat draining out of my legs, but I stay perfectly still. I fold my hands and look at the floor. He circles behind me, slowly. I feel his breath at my temple.
"Tell me, Lyra. Do you think about your brother when you do this? When you serve me? Do you imagine him standing behind me with a blade to my back?"
"No, Alpha," I whisper.
"Perharps, you wish to murder me just the way he murdered my family, the way he betrayed his pack. Isn't that what your bloodline does best?"
I keep my mouth closed as my teeth dig into the inside of my cheek. He wants me to break so he can punish my remains. But I am already broken. Ten years of this continuous torture will break anyone. In the beginning, I used to fight so hard, but I'm very tired of fighting. All I do now is bite down my fury and hope to remain invisible and out of problem.
"Lyra," he says, dropping his hand to rest on the back of my neck. "You do realize you're only alive because the council thought execution was too quick. They wanted your suffering to mean something. Even a nothing like you should be able to grasp that."
His thumb presses into the bone at the base of my skull. I do not whimper. Yes, I was only eight when everything crashed. The council thought I was too young to be killed, and said I should be kept alive to bear the brunt of my brother's betrayal.
"Let me tell you what I hate even more than traitors," he continues, his voice low with the pleasure of a private confession. "I hate incompetence. I hate mistakes. I hate when things are not the way I want them." The pressure increases, and I sense every vertebrae in my spine remembering its place.
"Get up," he says and steps back as if my presence is merely an inconvenience.
I stand. He stare hard at me, and his eyes rakes over my face, my hands, and the brown stain soaking through my uniform.
"Coffee duty is obviously too much for you. So you will be reassigned."
He stares at me, as if he is weighing something. I know a punishment is coming. "You're done with kitchen work for now. From now until the Blood Moon Ceremony, you will report to the vineyard. Every evening, you will pick the grapes for fermentation. Alone. Out in the parkland, east of the stables. Three days, starting tonight. Understood?"
I nod.
"That should be enough for you to learn some respect for the house you serve." He says it like he is inventing the word 'respect' just for me. "Now get out of my sight."
I back toward the door, keeping my eyes low and my body bent in the perfect arc of submission he expects. The cup on the desk trembles in its saucer, and I think how easily it could tip, how easily the black liquid could stain his desk, his rug, and his reputation. But I don't look back.
Only when the door is shut behind me do I breathe. There is a little alcove under the stair, the one that stinks of mouse shit, and I let myself slide against the wall and sink until my knees press to my chin. I bury my face in my skirt, wrap my arms around my legs and let the coffee and blood and shame run together, until the cloth is wet and sticky against my cheeks.
The sound that comes out of me is not a sob, not at first, it's a tiny whimper that bounces off the stone and dies in my lap. My shoulders shake; I hate that. I hate that I'm weak enough to care.
I want to hate my brother. I want to hate him so much for every moment of my life that is a small death, for every time I am made to kneel and eat the dust of their boots, for every disdainful look from the Blackwood heirs and their pretty, perfect girls. But when I try to summon it, all I find is a hollow ache.
I remember when the Thorne name was something. When Elias would run the hills with the Blackwood boys, his tunic was always untied, and his hands were always dirty. I try to picture him as a traitor and a monster. But all I see is the boy who taught me how to climb the old orchard wall, how to hold my breath so long I would scare the other pups until I gasped alive again, and told me stories of wolves who loved too deeply. He was never cruel, not to me, not even when he should have been. I remember his mouth, always full of stories and secrets, and the strange patience he had with my questions.
Sometimes, Kade came with him. The Kade before the war, before the ceremonial armor, before the royal regalia, and the stone-cold silence. The three of us would sneak down to the river and throw stones at the moon's reflection, betting on which one of us could strike it first. Kade always won, but sometimes I thought Elias let him, just to see him smile.
When I think of Elias, I remember the sun and the sound of him singing my name like a song only he knew. That is the brother I loved, the brother they said betrayed the entire pack. I don't believe it. Not fully. But I was eight years old, and no one asked me to testify, and I wasn't grown enough to see if Elias was only wearing a beautiful facade.