Chapter 576: Nothing Without You
Aside from the electricity cutting out across the North pack again, there had been eight separate electrocution incidents inside the packhouse alone.
Two innocent workers had been struck by stray lightning outside.
Five others were shocked senseless just by reaching for a doorknob.
And the last unfortunate soul had been standing near a power source at the wrong time and learned the hard way what "high voltage" really meant.
Thankfully, no one had died—yet. But it was safe to say everyone in the North pack was praying for the mating fever to be over soon. At this rate, it wasn’t just their nerves on the line. Their lives were at stake.
But that was the least of their problems that night. Alpha Caspian’s arrival alone, paired with the crushing tension in the air, confirmed the situation was not just serious, it was dire.
Ace had no idea what he’d been expecting when he briefed his father and recounted everything that had happened, but the grim, unreadable look on Caspian’s face left him uneasy.
He could count on one hand the number of times he had seen his father truly angry. That alone made the silent elevator ride down to the holding cells deeply unsettling, the seconds stretching out like a noose tightening around his neck.
His father didn’t say a single word the entire ride. The silence pressed heavily between them, so thick it felt suffocating. Ace kept glancing at him, wondering what was going through his mind, but Caspian’s face gave nothing away.
When the elevator finally dinged open, they stepped out into the corridor. The cold, sterile air of the underground cells wrapped around Ace, prickling his skin. They stopped at the last door with two guards standing at attention outside, tense and watchful.
The bitter irony hit Ace like a punch to the guts. Just days back, Alaric had been the one locked behind these walls. Now it was their mother.
What the hell was happening to their family? It felt as though everything was getting out of control.
"I’ll go in alone from here," Caspian announced with a clipped tone.
Ace didn’t protest and obeyed without question. Instead, his gaze shifted to the guards, satisfied that help would be available should things come to blows.
Alpha Caspian went in.
Luna Zara was sitting on the edge of her bed when the door snapped open. Her head whipped toward it, eyes widening at the sight of her husband.
"Caspian!" she gasped, rushing to him.
Zara threw her arms around him, holding onto him as though he were her hero.
"What took you so long?" she demanded breathlessly. "I’ve been waiting for you while these insolent children dared to treat me this way! You have to release me right now!"
But her desperate words fell on deaf ears. Caspian didn’t move, or return her embrace. It was as if she weren’t there at all. His eyes were disturbingly hollow, and there was an uneasy, chilling aura around him.
It made Zara hesitate.
"Caspian..." she pulled away from him, goosebumps breaking out across her arms. "What’s wrong?"
"Why did you do it?" Caspian asked, his voice brittle, as he struggled to hold back his anger.
"What?" Zara blinked, confused at first, but then her expression hardened. "It was the necessary thing to do."
"Necessary?" Caspian scoffed. "You used a Mnemosyne Crown on our son!"
"And so?" Zara snapped back, her eyes flashing. "I thought you, of all people, would understand why I did it! If that’s the case, why did you send him back to the North pack in the first place?!"
"Because I thought you both would talk it out like you used to," Caspian bit out, his fists clenching, "not try to erase our son’s memory!"
"Not all his memory!" Zara shouted, her voice rising. "Just his memory of that witch, Violet." She spat the name like poison. "The North stays together, Caspian! That girl doesn’t even need to step foot in this house and she’s already tearing our family apart!"
Her chest rose and fell rapidly, both of them glaring at each other like enemies rather than the famous romantic couple of the North.
Caspian’s voice trembled with fury as he ground out, "I told you to shut down that project!"
"I perfected the Mnemosyne Crown!" Zara thundered back. "If my traitorous son, Ace, hadn’t pulled that stupid stunt, you’d be staring at the results right now!"
Caspian stared at her in stunned disbelief. "You don’t even understand what you’ve done wrong, do you?"
But Zara only stood taller, her posture radiating defiance. "I did nothing wrong! Everything I’ve done is for this family, for this pack! All of this—" she jabbed a finger at Caspian’s chest, her voice breaking with rage "—because I took charge when you were too much of a coward to move your useless ass!"
Bam!
It was as if an explosion went off inside Caspian’s head. He stared at his wife, his blue eyes so icy cold they could freeze her where she stood.
"What did you say?" His voice was dangerously low.
Zara stared back without a shred of fear, her own blue eyes blazing with fury.
"You heard me right, or do I need to spell it out for you? I have been the backbone of this pack! You couldn’t have done a single thing right even if I let you. Why do you think our parents matched us from the very start? You might have had the brains, Caspian, but not the guts. I am the reason the North Pack is what it is today!" she finished, her chest heaving.
For a long moment, Caspian didn’t speak. He simply stared, empty and shocked, as the woman he called his wife stripped him bare with her cruel words.
"Is that so...?" The words slipped past his lips before he realized he’d spoken. He rubbed his temple, still reeling.
"I couldn’t have done it without you..." he repeated slowly, before his gaze locked with hers, their icy blue eyes colliding.
"We’ll see if that’s true, then."
"What?" Zara was caught off guard by his tone.
Caspian straightened, his eyes hardened like steel, his voice cold and final.
"I’ve summoned the council. You will stand trial for your actions. And afterward..." he paused, letting it sink in, "you can rest assured I’m pressing for a divorce."
"What?!" Zara screamed, the word ripping from her throat like a feral animal.
But Caspian had already turned and started to walk away.
"Caspian!" she called after him, before it rose into a furious shriek.
"Caspian! Come back here now! You do not dare!"
She bolted forward, but the heavy door slammed shut in her face.
"CASPIAN!" Her scream reverberated through the walls, raw with rage and disbelief.