Betrayed by My Ex, Marked by His Alpha Emperor Brother novel Chapter 119

Chapter 119: Chapter 119

Elara’s POV

"I’m going back in there."

Brenna was already turning on her heel. Fists clenched. Eyes blazing. I caught her arm and held on.

"Bren. No."

"Did you hear what she said?" Brenna’s voice cracked with fury. She jabbed a finger toward the silk shop behind us. "She called you a— a mortal slut. She called Lyra a dirty half-breed freak. I’m going to rip that girl apart—"

"And then what?" I pulled her further down the street. My voice was calm. Flat. The kind of calm that came from being too exhausted to feel anything properly. "You assault a shop clerk. The city guard gets called. They find out you were defending the Emperor’s companion, and suddenly it’s a scandal. Kaelen’s name dragged through the gossip sheets. The mortal consort who can’t even handle a rude shopgirl without causing a scene."

Brenna stopped pulling. Stared at me. "You can’t be serious."

"I’m completely serious." I shifted Lyra higher against my chest. She was still asleep. Oblivious. Perfect. "We leave. We forget it happened. That’s the end of it."

"That is not the end of it." Brenna’s jaw was tight. "That girl said your baby was destined for— for deformities, Ela. She said you were a pathetic pregnant mortal— she—"

"I know what she said."

I’d heard every word. Each one had landed exactly where it was meant to. Burrowed in deep. Settled alongside all the others I’d been collecting for months like stones in my pockets.

No scent. No aura. No power.

A desperate mortal who thinks sleeping with nobility makes her somebody.

Brittany wasn’t the first. She wouldn’t be the last.

"Please," I said quietly. "Let’s just go home."

Brenna opened her mouth. Closed it. Her eyes were glassy. Not with anger anymore. With something worse. Pity.

I looked away.

The carriage ride back to the palace was silent. Brenna sat across from me, arms folded, jaw working. She kept glancing at me like she wanted to say something but couldn’t find the right words.

I stared out the window. The city streets blurred past. Wolfblood merchants hawking their wares. Noble women in fur-trimmed cloaks. Guards on patrol, their auras shimmering faintly in the afternoon light.

I couldn’t see auras anymore. Couldn’t smell the subtle markers that told wolfbloods who was Alpha and who was Omega. Couldn’t sense danger or lies or desire the way I used to. My world had gone flat. Muted. Like someone had draped a thick cloth over my senses and left me fumbling in the dark.

"Even Val can feel it," I said.

Brenna’s head turned sharply. "What?"

"The other day. He told me I smelled like nothing. Like regular people at the market." I kept my gaze fixed on the window. "He’s just a little boy, Bren. At his young age, he can already tell his mother is broken."

"You are not broken."

"I don’t have a wolf anymore. In a world built on wolves, what does that make me?"

Silence.

Brenna reached across the carriage and gripped my hand. Squeezed hard. "It makes you the bravest person I know. And it makes that shopgirl a worthless coward who picks on people she thinks can’t fight back."

I squeezed her hand in return. But I didn’t answer.

---

The palace doors opened before we reached them. Valerius came barreling out like a small, dark-haired cannonball.

"Mommy! Mommy, you’re back!"

He slammed into my legs with enough force to stagger me. I braced myself, one hand on Lyra’s carrier, the other catching his shoulder.

"Careful, sweetheart. Your sister—"

"I was careful! I slowed down at the end, did you see?" He grinned up at me. That bright, gap-toothed grin that could dissolve anything. "Daddy said I could stay up late if I finished my letters. I finished them ALL, Mommy. Even the hard ones."

"That’s wonderful, Val."

He tugged my hand, pulling me inside. The foyer was warm. Firelight from the sconces threw long, flickering shadows across the stone walls. Kaelen stood at the far end of the hall, arms folded, leaning against the doorframe of his study.

He wasn’t looking at Valerius.

He was looking at me.

Those dark gold eyes missed nothing. They tracked across my face, reading every subtle shift I thought I’d hidden. Then they shifted to Brenna. To the tightness in her posture. The redness around her eyes.

"What happened?" His voice was quiet. Controlled. The kind of quiet that preceded storms.

"Nothing," I said. "Long day. Shopping."

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