Page 100 of The SnowFang Storm

“You suspect Kyle is hiding the wanderer problem, and their five-year plan is actually an escape plan.”

“Truthfully, I have no idea at this point.”

We stood in the drizzle for a few minutes.

Sterling bumped me gently with his arm. “Politics aside, how do you feel about the Chronicler offer? Is that even possible?”

I blew out. My breath puffed in the cold, damp air. “Adjunct? Sure. Elevation to actual Chronicler? Not sure what miracle Kyle thinks he’s going to make come to pass.”

“Unless AmberHowl.”

“Why would AmberHowl nominate me for the job over MaryAnne?”

“Because you’re a better candidate. Are you saying you can’t do it?”

“Of course I can do it.” With a year as an adjunct to learn any ropes I might have missed, not a problem. “I’d be an idiot to refuse. If I somehow managed to become Chronicler and our mating paperwork is still unresolved, I’d be able to fix that. Kyle would probably chortle if I told him what we had on Demetrius if he doesn’t already know. Well. That part, at least. Apharia and the so-called empire would unhinge him.”

Sterling studied the skyline. “If what Kyle said is true and GranitePaw is not aligned with AmberHowl, then AmberHowl is in an extremely precarious position. It also means that AmberHowl is on our side, unless what we suspect about FrostFur is true, in which case, the AmberHowl is merely acting as the Council’s harrier.”

Everything hinged on confirming the arctic empire theory. I sighed. “Demetrius growls at us, but all Kyle’s talk about recruitment, an ark, finances, wanting to expand beyond Manhattan sounds like empire-building to me.”

Empire.

Wait a second—

Sterling’s voice tightened like piano wire against flesh. “My land becomes his land, doesn’t it? He can’t touch my millions. That’s not what he’s after.”

“It’s about your land. He must know about the Mortcombe portfolios!”

“Our land,” Sterling corrected, because it did matter.

“Wait a minute. Marcella actually cared we were married,” I said. “At the time I didn’t—”

You’re only useful to me as a stud dog.

That was why Marcella had cared we were married.

The GranitePaw acknowledged Sterling’s precarious pedigree situation, the fact we weren’t officially mated. They must know everything Jerron wanted them to know, which was the worst version of the truth.

Sterling would be branded a hybrid. My choice would be to renounce him and live or die at his side. Either way: he would die.

If I renounced him, I’d be branded as my father’s manipulated, misguided, sad little puppy. But I’d still be alive, and I’d still be Winter Mortcombe.

I would be worth millions, maybe billions, depending on when it all went to hell.

GranitePaw could probably stall the Elder Council (and AmberHowl) a year or two. If I got pregnant before the hammer fell, those pups would be GranitePaw, and they’d be declared three-quarter breds, and as long as they weren’t dangerous, GranitePaw would protect them, and they’d almost certainly be permitted to live. But they’d be the lowest of the low, and GranitePaw would own us because there would be nowhere else for us to ever go.

I had been trapped in SilverPaw, hopeless and forced to accept the will of the pack, and cling to fragile hope that my father would let me quietly disappear into the shadows, or my mate would reveal himself. But what GranitePaw was offering? There would be no hope. None. There would only be a never-ending nightmare.

Hybrid or not, either way, it didn’t matter to Kyle, as long as I was a GranitePaw at the end of all of it.

Sterling’s tone chilled to the bone. “This is GranitePaw’s prelude to conquest. But if we’re right about FrostFur, GranitePaw’s ambitions will spark a civil war.”

There had not been a full-scale werewolf war in hundreds of years. Not since the last time some Alpha had tried to upgrade himself to King. “Then the real question is is AmberHowl using us to try to win a war, or prevent one.”

Sterling looked down at the city below us. “That was the question all along. It was never about my father.”

“The rook. The swindler, the chess piece, the raven.” My heart started to beat so hard and fast I couldn’t catch my breath around its rabbit-like thumping. I couldn’t swallow, and I couldn’t breathe. I saw Sterling from my dream, where he was scales of flesh, and heard the voice of the Faceless She-Wolf in my dreams, heard the horrible sound of the puppy crushed against the wall.

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