[Elara's POV]
Seraphina's face was ashen.
Liana's voice cracked like a whip through the Pack station, striking every ear. "Your own Alpha shoves his mate aside to protect you, an interloper, and you have the nerve to tell her not to be petty? Seraphina, you're the most brazen homewrecker I've ever seen!"
Interloper.
The word was a red-hot nail hammered into Seraphina's forehead. Every wolf in the hall was now staring at her, their gazes filled with judgment and scorn.
Kaelen's face turned to stone.
His prized political ally, the formidable War Master, was now exposed like a common thief, stripped bare for all to see.
"Liana, what lies are you spouting!" Seraphina shrieked, her voice sharp with rage and humiliation.
Kaelen spun on me, fury blazing in his amber eyes. "Elara, are you just going to let your friend humiliate Seraphina like this? Did you have to cause such a scene?"
Liana bristled, ready to lunge again. "I'm saying what I want! This has nothing to do with Elara!"
But I held her back.
I looked at Kaelen, at the man who, for the sake of another woman, was pinning all the blame on me. He didn't care about my pain, only about his and Seraphina's precious pride.
"What will it take to make your friend shut up?" he snarled, his composure cracking. "Do you need to be paid off? Fine. Name your price. What do you want?"
Paid off?
A chill, deep as a winter grave, crept into my soul, followed by a wave of nausea.
Did he think a few trinkets could erase the wounds he'd inflicted, the humiliation he'd put me through? As if he were tossing coins to a beggar?
How could I have been so foolish, to ever believe this man could truly love me?
"I don't need your money," my voice was flat, devoid of any ripple. "I only want one thing."
"What?" Kaelen's brow furrowed with impatience.
"To resign from my position as Chief Strategist," I said, each word clear and deliberate. "And to sever all ties with the Blackwood Pack."
The air in the hall solidified.
Kaelen froze. Even Liana, who had been championing my departure, looked stunned. She had expected me to demand a dissolution of our mate bond, not to cut ties professionally first.
But for me, this was the more critical step.
I had to sever every connection. When I made a cut, I made it clean.
"Are you threatening me?" The knot in Kaelen's brow tightened, his tone dripping with contempt. "Because I didn't defend you in a restaurant, you're using your job to threaten me? Is this your new tactic to get my attention?"
"No. I'm stating my terms," I met his gaze, my own as cold as a frozen lake. "I resign. I leave the Blackwood Pack. From this moment on, your defense systems, your future—they have nothing to do with me. And you and Seraphina… whatever you choose to do is no longer my concern."
The crowd of onlookers grew, their whispers a low, persistent buzz.
Kaelen's face was a mask of strained pride. He rubbed his temples, his voice a dismissive wave. "Fine. Resign if you want. It doesn't matter. Maybe some time off will help you cool your head."
He didn't believe me. He couldn't even fathom it.
In his eyes, I was just a lone wolf from a fallen clan. Without the shelter of his name and the Blackwood Pack, I was nothing.
I said nothing more. I took Liana by the arm and walked out of the station.
Behind me, I could hear Lucian's mocking laughter.
"She really thinks she can leave? Kaelen, she'll be back, crying and begging you to take her back before you know it."
"A jealous woman who clings to her mate, using her job as a bargaining chip," Seraphina's voice, restored to its usual arrogance, followed. "What a waste of her talent."
Talent?
They had no idea what my talents truly were.
But they were about to find out.
————
The next morning, I arrived at the Pack's strategic headquarters on time and announced my resignation to my project team.
"Director, you're leaving? Why so suddenly?"
"What about the project? We're at the most critical phase!"
My team didn't know I was Kaelen's mate, but they knew my work. Every high-stakes project I led was executed to perfection. A sudden change in leadership was cause for alarm.
"The Alpha will appoint a new director to take over," I said, then walked to Kaelen's office with my printed resignation letter in hand.
His sister, Giselle, was there, watching me with a smug, triumphant smirk.
Kaelen stared at the letter, his expression grim. "You're serious about this?"
"I thought I made myself perfectly clear yesterday," I replied calmly.
"If this is your way of trying to force my hand, I can only say I'm deeply disappointed in you," he said coldly.
I almost laughed. I was the one whose disappointment had been carved into her very soul.
"Kaelen, I have no interest in playing games with you. I simply refuse to work for a man who would shove his mate aside in a moment of crisis."
The words were a slap, sharp and stinging.
His face contorted. "Fine! Don't you regret this!"
He snatched a quill, scribbled his signature across the letter with furious, jagged strokes, and threw it back at me.
"From now on, Giselle will take over your projects," he announced, his voice like ice. "Complete the handover with her before you leave."
Giselle's chin lifted in triumph. She had just come of age and was desperate to prove herself.
"Don't worry, brother. I'll get it done!" She shot me a provocative glare, as if to say, Anything you can do, I, Giselle Blackwood, can do better!
In the handover meeting, Giselle's arrogance and ignorance were on full display.
She barely glanced at the defense schematics I had poured my blood and soul into. The complex formations, the energy flow analyses—they were like a foreign language to her.
But she wouldn't admit it.
"I thought your job was supposed to be so difficult. This looks simple enough," she sneered, tossing a stack of my reports onto the table. "I guess you really have been freeloading off my brother all these years."
The other team members exchanged looks of disbelief.
Simple?
The complexity of this defense plan, with its ancient runes and strategic arrays, was textbook master-level work. For Giselle to say that only proved she knew nothing.
To make her the director? It was like making the Pack's safety a child's game.
But no one dared to speak up. She was the Alpha's sister. To offend her was to be cast out.
"Alright, I've seen enough," Giselle waved a dismissive hand. "You can get lost now. And don't even think about coming back. My brother's Pack isn't some back-alley dumpster for you to crawl back to."
The team looked at me with a mixture of pity and regret.
"Don't worry, I won't be back," I said, my gaze steady on her. "As for you… a dumpster seems like a fitting place for trash like you to stay."
"You—!" Giselle's face flushed a deep, ugly crimson. She finally understood. I had just called her trash.
"How dare you!" she shrieked, her hand flying toward my face.
I didn't move an inch.
The moment before her palm made contact, my hand shot out, catching her wrist in an iron grip.
"Ah!" Giselle cried out in pain.
My fingers were like steel clamps on her bones.
"Giselle, I used to tolerate you for Kaelen's sake," I leaned in, my cold gaze raking across her face like a blade. "Now, I have no reason to tolerate you at all."
"Let go! You're hurting me! Let go!" Tears welled in her eyes.
I released her abruptly.
Giselle clutched her reddened wrist, about to unleash another tirade. But when she met my ice-blue eyes, the words died in her throat.
There was no anger in my gaze. Only a dead, silent cold.
A shiver of pure dread snaked up her spine.
It wasn't until I had walked out the door with my box of personal belongings that she managed a defiant pout.
Why… why had she been afraid of that lone wolf?
She was just a paper tiger! That had to be it!
That evening, when Liana heard I had officially resigned, she cheered through the communication crystal.
"You should have done that ages ago! You slaved away for Kaelen, and did he ever show you an ounce of gratitude? Does he even realize that without you, his Blackwood Pack would never have become one of the strongest in the eastern forests?"
I just offered a faint smile.
"So, what's next?" Liana asked.
"I haven't decided. Maybe I'll start looking for my brother."
"Then come help me first!" Liana's voice buzzed with excitement. "My new mercenary company, the Azure Fang, needs a Chief Strategist. Come on, Elara. Together, we'll make it the most powerful neutral faction on the continent!"
The Azure Fang. It had been my parents' company.
It was disbanded after they fell. Now, Liana was rebuilding it.
"I'll think about it," I said.
"Great!" Liana replied brightly. Coming from a friend, "I'll think about it" was practically a yes.
Just then, my communication crystal chimed with an unknown number.
I answered. Giselle's imperious voice screeched through the connection.
"Elara, if you're not dead yet, get over here! Did you forget that today is the day you take my mother to the Temple for her follow-up appointment?"