Dr. Vance's words sent the sterile white corridor tilting around me. I reached out a hand, my palm slapping against the cool stone of the wall to keep myself upright. The world narrowed to a roaring in my ears.

"Is he... is he conscious?" I managed to choke out, my voice a stranger's rasp. "I need to see him."

A complicated expression, something like pity, flickered across the doctor's exhausted face. "His consciousness fades in and out. He has been calling a name..."

A fragile, impossible sliver of hope ignited in the wreckage of my chest. Was he calling for me? After ten years of silence, of being disowned, did some part of him still want his daughter?

"He's calling for Celeste."

The voice was like a whip crack in the tense silence. It came from behind me, laced with a venom so pure it was breathtaking. "Not you. Never you, you filthy little thief."

My body went rigid. I turned slowly, as if moving through water. My brother, Ethan Blackwood, stood there, blocking the hallway. He was taller than I remembered, broader, his presence radiating a raw, aggressive power that sucked the air from the space around us. The look in his eyes was the unforgiving cold of a winter storm.

Beside him, our mother, Luna Genevieve, stood like a statue carved from grief. Her face was a ruin of its former beauty, her eyes hollowed out by sorrow. She looked at me, and I saw a flicker of pain, of disappointment, but she said nothing to stop her son. Her silence was its own condemnation.

Ethan took a step toward me, then another. The sheer force of his Alpha-heir aura pressed down on me, making it hard to breathe.

A cruel, humorless smile twisted his lips. He glanced around at the watching elders, his voice ringing with theatrical contempt. "Well, look what the cat dragged in. The great shame of the Blackwood family. I'm surprised you have the nerve to show your face on this land again."

His words were lashes, striking me across the face in front of everyone. The heat of shame burned my cheeks.

"I came to see Father," I bit out, my teeth clenched.

"Father?" Ethan laughed, a harsh, ugly sound. "You dare call him that? After what you did? You destroyed Celeste's life, you shattered her bond with her mate and forced her to go Rogue! Do you have any idea what she's endured out there alone for ten years because of you?"

The mention of Celeste was a fresh stab of guilt. I didn't remember what happened that night, not really, but I remembered her pain. That was real.

Ethan's rage seemed to feed on my silence. "He's in that bed because of you! The shame you brought on this family wore him down, year after year! It weakened him! And now, some enemy strikes, and you show up at his deathbed to torment him one last time!"

He was blaming me for this, too. For the attack. It was the most poisonous accusation he could have possibly made.

*We did nothing!* Lyra snarled in my head, a furious, desperate denial. *Tell him!*

But I couldn't. I had no proof, no memories to offer as a shield. My silence was my confession.

Ethan pointed a trembling finger at the closed door of the ICU. "He wants to see his daughter! His pure, honorable daughter, Celeste! The one whose life you ruined! Not some... some *thing* lower than an Omega whore!"

That broke me. I could withstand the insults, the blame for Celeste. But the thought that my father, in his last moments, wanted anyone but me... that was a pain too deep to bear.

My body swayed, and the faces around me blurred. The blood drained from my face, leaving my skin feeling cold and tight.

Dr. Vance stepped forward. "Ethan, this isn't the time-"

"Quiet!" Ethan snapped, his voice cracking with the authority of the next Alpha. "This is pack business. Family business. Stay out of it."

He turned his furious gaze back to me, and for a second, I saw murder in his eyes. "If you hadn't been carrying another Alpha's pup in your belly, the elders would have had you put down like a sick dog ten years ago. Don't think for a second we've forgotten that."

His words ripped open the old wound, the humiliating truth of my survival.

I lifted my head, hot tears finally blurring my vision, and met his hateful stare. "Let me see him, Ethan," I begged, my voice breaking. "Please."

My plea didn't soften him. It was like throwing gasoline on a fire.

His hand shot out, his fingers closing around my upper arm in a brutal grip. The strength in his hand was immense, threatening to crush the bone.

"You think you're in a position to ask for *anything*?" he snarled, his face inches from mine.

I looked past him, at the elders, at my mother, at the doctor. They just watched. No one moved. No one spoke up for me.

In that moment, a cold so profound it felt like death itself settled deep in my bones. I was utterly, completely alone, abandoned by my entire world.

Chapter 3

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