Luna Forsaken (Arya and James) novel Chapter 150

150 Teeth Behind the Throne 3

Lev’s POVCO

Get 28. >

= Menu

My uncle loved power with more discipline than greedier men, which made him more dangerous, not less. He had kept the Union from splintering in years where weaker hands would have turned every border dispute into war. He had held Blackbirth. Built networks. Balanced wolves who hated each other enough to poison banquets and call it politics.

And he had done it while telling himself guardianship justified possession.

Did he care for me? In his way, yes.

Did that erase the risk? No.

“I know,” I said finally.

Maxwell’s shoulders eased by a fraction. He believed me.

Good.

He crossed back to the desk and picked up his drink again. “Then deal with Marcel later.”

It was practical advice.

It irritated me because it was practical advice.

Still, he was right in the immediate sense. A clean execution required timing, positioning, proof, and the right audience. Marcel’s downfall would be more useful if built carefully. More permanent.

I took another small swallow, then set the glass aside untouched after that. I wanted my head clear.

“We can start making his life difficult now,” I said. “Slowly. Quietly.”

Maxwell nodded. “That, I agree with.”

I moved to the fire and rested one forearm on the mantel, staring into the flames while my thoughts.

shifted from one threat to another.

Marcel was rot dressed in velvet.

But Marcel was not the only problem in the room of Arya’s life.

James Nightwind remained a blade left on the table, bloodied, unstable, still capable of cutting

whoever reached too fast.

I did not hate him for the obvious reasons people would assume. Jealousy bored me. Men who

*. Get 28 %

= Menu

<150 Teeth Behind the Throne 3

reduced everything to mating possession often died in stupid ways.

I hated what he represented in this moment: a man who had been given loyalty and used it poorly. A man who had looked at pressure and chosen expedience over truth. A man who had helped build the woman I wanted and then stood by while others tried to break her into something easier to discard.

And worst of all, from what I had seen and what I had heard, a man now finally waking up to the shape

of his own failure.

Regret made men unpredictable.

Maxwell had returned from the earlier call with James looking like he had bitten through old memory to stay civil. He had denied audience while Arya was here. Good. Necessary.

But James would not stop.

That kind of guilt never stopped cleanly. It paced. It rationalized. It turned apologies into strategy and strategy into intrusion.

I turned back to Maxwell.

He was watching me again, reading the shift before I spoke.

“We can deal with Marcel later,” I said. “But James…”

Maxwell’s mouth flattened. “Yes.”

There was a weight to that one syllable. Not contempt. Weariness. Old disappointment sharpened by

recent events.

I moved away from the mantel and sat finally, leaning forward with forearms on my knees.

“He requested audience again?”

Maxwell gave a single nod. “He did.”

“And you refused.”

“I did.”

A pause.

“For her.”

“For my house,” he corrected first, because he was Maxwell and refused to let even truth sound

sentimental in his own study. Then his gaze hardened. “Also for her.”

< 150 Teeth Behind the Throne 3

I almost smiled at that.

Almost.

Get 28

Menu

Maxwell took his seat this time, lowering himself slowly, the movement of an older Alpha whose strength had not left him but had learned economy. He swirled the amber in his glass without drinking.

“He says he wants truth,” Maxwell said.

I held his stare. “And?”

“And he wants to see her.”

Fact, not question.

Of course he did.

I sat back, one hand flexing once against my thigh.

My wolf lifted its head at the thought, not threatened, but alert. Territorial instinct threaded through me, sharp and deliberate. Not because Arya was property. Because she was wounded ground and I did not trust the footsteps approaching it.

Maxwell saw enough of my face to understand where my mind had gone. “If he comes here pushing,

I’ll handle him.”

“I know you will.”

He grunted.

The fire crackled again. Wind moved at the shutters. Somewhere down the corridor, a servant’s soft steps passed and faded. Dragonclaw slept around us in layers of stone and watchfulness.

My thoughts did not.

I thought of Arya in the training yard, tears she hated, anger she wielded like a blade too hot to hold, the way she had told me wanting anything felt like betrayal to the woman she had been before all this. I thought of James trying to claw his way toward truth now that the lies were breaking open. I thought of Marcel, Rebecca, Leah, Silverfang, the Union, my uncle, the lines of blood and power tightening

around all of it.

None of this was simple.

That was exactly why it needed to be done correctly.

Maxwell set his glass down and leaned forward, forearms on the desk. “If you move on Marcel, move

with proof. If you move on Union politics, move with patience. If you move on James…”

Get 28

Menu

150 Teeth Behind the Throne 3

He let the sentence hang.

I looked at him steadily. “I don’t plan to challenge him over her.”

Maxwell’s brow lifted. Testing.

“I plan to stop him from causing more damage,” I finished.

A silence followed that felt like measure, not doubt.

Then Maxwell nodded once.

“Good.”

He studied me another moment, and something like old approval settled in his expression. “You’ve

grown.”

I let out a quiet breath that might have been a laugh in another room. “You sound disappointed.”

“I’m suspicious,” he said dryly. “A younger you would have broken two doors and called it strategy.”

“That younger me also thought winning the room meant speaking first.”

Maxwell’s mouth twitched. “I taught you better.”

“You did.”

The admission sat between us without discomfort.

Whatever else the world believed about men in power, none of us got there alone. Some of us simply had the sense to remember who had corrected our posture before we learned to stand in front of

councils.

Maxwell leaned back and rubbed once at his jaw. “She’ll fight you.”

“At every step.”

“She’ll accuse you of control.”

“Likely.”

“She’ll want blood first and healing later.”

I looked toward the door for a moment, as if I could see through wood and corridor and stone to where

VERIFYCAPTCHA_LABELVerify