Lahat ng Kabanata ng Bound to the Enemy’s Bed: Kabanata 71 - Kabanata 80

The drums did not stop. A terrible reminder that the sun was slipping toward its demise, they pounded across the stronghold like a second heartbeat, each blow echoing through stone and marrow.In their chamber, silence pressed down heavier than the noise outside. Because her hands needed something to do, Elaria perched on the side of the narrow bed with her healer's kit open in front of her, not because she would be permitted to use it in the circle. She sharpened blades, lined up herbs, and rearranged and rearranged until the crushed leaves' bitter tang irritated her nostrils.Draven watched from the doorway. He had been silent for a few minutes, his presence a threatening tempest confined to the little room. Every time he moved, his golden eyes caught the little light that came in from a window's high slit and glinted like molten metal.After hours of stress, he eventually stated in a low voice, "If you keep turning those vials, you'll wear grooves into them.”She didn't raise her

Long shadows were formed on the chamber walls by the modest fire in the hearth. Elaria wore a flimsy robe that slipped off one shoulder as she sat at the edge of the bed with her hair unfastened. After the Circle's trial, her body pleaded for her to sleep, and the pain in her bones was constant, but her thoughts wouldn't stop.Beside her, Draven slept fitfully, his face turned to the open window where the moonlight flowed in, his breath heavy. His body was tense even when he was at rest, and his hand was curled as though it were about to grasp a weapon. She understood that the Circle had shook him, even though he would never acknowledge it. The bond had tested them both, dragged them to the edge of breaking, and though they had survived, Rhovan had twisted survival into accusation.Elaria reached for the small table at her side. Scribbled notes from rushed study nights, shreds of parchment etched with laws older than memory, and scrolls were all over the place. She read the words

The chambers were still lit when Elaria rose.Beside her, Draven slept, his wide chest rising and falling in a steady beat, as if his body had been aching for a break after too many days of stress. In the firelight, a tiny shine appeared on the scar across his ribcage. His hand still groped for her where she had been, even in sleep.She stayed for a while, seeing the wolf that had turned into her fulcrum. Curling into the warmth and losing herself in the delusion that the world outside these walls no longer pressed in was the allure of slipping back under the furs.But illusion would not save them.The council would reconvene in two nights. Rhovan would come armed with more than words. The weapon he had been implying, the blade he had not yet drawn, was somewhere in his arsenal. Getting him out in the open initially was necessary if she hoped to have any control over what happened.So she pulled her cloak around her shoulders, quiet as a shadow, and left Draven’s side.The corrido

The chamber of the High Council was never quiet. It pulsed with the weight of authority, with eyes observing and judging, of millennia of law enshrined in stone, even when no voices spoke.That hum wasn't just background this morning; it was a storm brewing beneath the marble floor, slithering through the air like static and whispering across the arched ceiling. Every wolf in attendance felt it. Some relished it. Some feared it. None could ignore it.The council chamber was a circle, polished obsidian tables ringing the floor where the dais stood, each seat occupied by alphas or their chosen envoys. The banners of their packs hung behind them—colors and crests that represented entire bloodlines, legacies of pride, and in more recent years, grudges.At the center stood the raised circle where Draven and Elaria would be summoned, the eye of the storm.The doors opened with a weighty groan.Elaria felt the air shift before her eyes even adjusted to the blaze of braziers. The councilors l

The decree still echoed in her skull, hammering with every heartbeat.The Rite of Purity is decreed.Elaria had heard countless judgments in that chamber—laws twisted, punishments weighed, edicts pronounced in voices that dripped with authority. But this… this had been different. This had not been politics, nor governance, nor law. This had been a death sentence dressed as ritual.The corridors of Kaelith Keep swallowed her and Draven whole as they left the council chamber behind. The long stone halls, lined with ancient banners and iron sconces, seemed to hum with silence. No servants whispered in corners, no guards muttered between shifts. Eyes followed them—wolves, attendants, allies, spies—but no one dared speak. Everyone knew tomorrow would decide everything.Draven walked at her side, tall, unyielding, every line of his body hard as carved obsidian. His silence was not absence—it was a shield, the weight of an Alpha carrying his fury like a sword sheathed just beneath the skin.