Sophia’s fingers tightened around the phone the moment Kael’s voice came through.
"Well?" She sat up slightly against the pillows, careful to let her voice waver. "Is she coming?"
There was a pause on the other end.
"No." The single word landed like a slammed door.
"What do you mean, no?" Her voice sharpened despite herself. "Kael, I am dying in this bed while you—"
"I have to go." His voice was clipped, distracted, already moving on to something else. "Alpha Lucien is leaving. I need to catch him before—"
The line cut off before she could finish her sentence.
Sophia stared at the phone in her hand for a long moment, disbelieving.
Then she hurled it across the room. It struck the wall and clattered uselessly to the floor.
"Useless," she hissed. "Absolutely useless."
Sophia’s breathing grew heavier as she stared at the shattered phone lying across the room.
Even after dragging the Supreme Alpha into this mess, Evelyn still refused. A bitter laugh escaped her lips.
"Of course she refused. That woman thinks she’s untouchable."
Sophia had expected anger. She had expected tears. She had expected Evelyn to break after everything that had happened.
But this? This was worse.
Evelyn had walked away. She had taken the one thing that made her valuable and left them all scrambling behind her.
Weak. That was the only word she could use to describe Kael.
"How can he be this weak?" Sophia muttered.
He’s an Alpha. He has an entire pack behind him. He has power. Authority. And yet he still can’t make one woman return?
A man who couldn’t even command his own wife to heel, who had to go chasing after another Alpha’s coattails instead of simply ordering Evelyn back the way any real Alpha would have.
"Kael really is pathetic."
And Evelyn, she would be sitting comfortably in her cousin’s estate, likely laughing at all of them, likely savoring every second of watching Silver Creek crumble without her.
"Enjoy it," Sophia muttered under her breath. "Enjoy it while it lasts."
The door opened quietly, pulling her attention away.
The chief healer stepped inside, carrying a small wooden tray. Her expression was carefully controlled, but Sophia noticed the hesitation in her movements.
Good. At least someone in this place still understood fear.
"Finally," Sophia said.
The healer lowered her gaze. "You called for me, Luna."
Sophia looked at her for a moment before slowly sitting up.
"Bring the antidote."
The healer froze midway. "Luna, I don’t think it is wise that—"
She didn’t finish speaking as Sophia grabbed one of the trays beside her and flung it hard at the woman.
"Did I ask you to think?" She snapped angrily. Why must everyone in this damned place test her?
The healer crouched slightly, her eyes wide with fear and shock. She looked back at Sophia.
"L-Lady Sophia." She stammered, then shook her head before leaving. Kael had forced them to start addressing Sophia as Luna.
"Luna," she corrected.
"Bring me the antidote and stop standing there like a fool." Sophia snapped. She could feel her insides growing weaker.
Who would have thought the sickness she made the chief healer inject into her body would eat away at her so soon... all of this just for Evelyn not to come.
She hissed loudly, irritated to her bones. She had even suggested to Kael that he take Alpha Lucien along. At least Evelyn wouldn’t be able to refuse the Alpha she thought she respected.
But Evelyn, that wench, always had a trick up her sleeve.
The chief healer returned moments later, carrying the small vial in her trembling hands.
She had served Silver Creek for decades. She had treated warriors after battles, watched children take their first breaths, and stood beside dying elders as they passed into the Moon Goddess’s embrace.
But never had she seen someone willingly walk toward death.
The chief healer knelt beside the bed, careful to keep her hands steady even as her stomach turned. Whatever she felt about Sophia—and there was little left in her but disgust—a patient was still a patient. That, at least, she could not unlearn after forty years of healing.
"Drink slowly," she said, holding the vial out. "Too much too fast will—"
"I know how antidotes work," Sophia snapped, snatching it from her hand.
She drank in small sips, her face twisting with each one. Whether it was from the taste or the wolfsbane already working its way through her blood, the healer couldn’t tell anymore. Perhaps it was both.
When she lowered the vial, some color had returned to her cheeks, though her hands still trembled faintly against the sheets.
Sophia shut her eyes for a moment, the noise and ache she had been feeling all day finally gone with just a pint of the antidote.
"Better," Sophia murmured, more to herself than to the healer. "Not enough to look well. Just enough to survive until the next dose."
The healer said nothing. There was nothing to say that wouldn’t cost her something.
The chief healer lowered her eyes, but Sophia noticed the silence.
She always noticed everything.
"You’re judging me." She huffed.
The healer’s fingers tightened around the empty tray. "I would never—"
"Don’t lie to me." Sophia’s voice was low. "You’ve been doing that a lot lately. Standing there with that pitiful expression like you’re better than everyone else."
Sophia leaned back against the pillows, studying her carefully.
"For forty years, you’ve served this pack." Her lips curved slightly. "You’ve healed warriors. You’ve treated nobles. You’ve carried yourself like some great woman of virtue."
"But I know what you’ve been doing."
The chief healer looked up slowly. "Luna?"
Sophia smirked. "The healing vials."
A flicker of fear crossed the woman’s face.
"The healing vials that disappear from the storage every month." Sophia tilted her head. "The ones you give away to widows and orphans."
The healer’s face paled.
"I wondered why the numbers never matched," Sophia continued. "Why supplies meant for the pack always seemed to run short."
"That medicine was given to those who needed it," the healer said quietly.
Sophia laughed softly. "Needed it?" Her eyes narrowed. "You mean those filthy people outside the pack house? Those who contribute nothing? Those who have no status, no wealth, no bloodline worth protecting?"
The healer’s jaw tightened. "They are still members of this pack."
"And that gives them what?" Sophia snapped. "The right to drain resources from people who actually matter?"
Sophia tsked. "You’ve convinced yourself what you’re doing is righteous and clean, but you deny hundreds of warriors who fight to save this pack their right to live. You give the vials meant to heal them to poverty-infested rats meant to uphold the population of the pack."
She tilted her head. No matter how weak or sick she was, her brain was always calculating.
"What do you think Alpha Kael would say when he finds out what you’ve been doing?"
The healer stared at her, disgust flashing openly now. "I have done nothing wrong. The Alpha will—"
"Throw you in the dungeon. You already know what happened to thieves, especially those who take from the pack’s reserves. Those in positions of power who misuse them."
Sophia hummed, shaking her head. "I’m sure you don’t want that, do you? To be thrown in the dungeon and have your family banished from the pack. Your precious children treated less than slaves."
The horror in the chief healer’s eyes had Sophia smirking.
"I thought so." Sophia closed her eyes, exhaling slowly. "Tell Kael my fever broke slightly this morning, then rose again by evening. Tell him I’m fighting it. Tell him whatever keeps him believing this is real for as long as it needs to be."
With that, Sophia shut her eyes. Even if Evelyn didn’t come, at least this whole situation gave her what she needed: time. Now, Kael wouldn’t be able to ask her to heal anyone, and this way, no one would find out just how disastrous her healing abilities were.
The chief healer stood at the door, her eyes fixed on the woman intently. She couldn’t understand how a person could be so evil.