My Werewolf Parents Pretended To Die To Make Me Suffer Chapter 1

Introduction

Seven years ago, my real family faked their own deaths in a disaster at Red Moon Canyon, all for the sake of the son they'd adopted.

They left my older sister behind to pose as the only survivor, watch me, and force me to atone.

She once stood in the bell room and told me, "Your scent will foul the path the dead take through the Moon Gate."

More than a month later, she found me by the Western Sea, barely alive, and fell to her knees begging me to come home.

I turned her own words back on her.

This time, she didn't argue.

She pulled out her enforcer's silver chain, bound our parents, and dragged them out of my sickroom.

She finally understood. This wasn't about punishing them. It was about giving me back the last freedom I had left.

As I carried the last crate of wine down into the cellar, its iron edge sliced my right hand open.

Blood dripped from my fingertips, but I didn't feel a thing.

Faint silver lines were creeping up from my wrist, like a cold snake had slid under my skin. Tucked inside my robe was the note Maeve Doyle had given me, written on feather paper. It said the silver poisoning had already damaged my wolf and that I had to stop working at the border silver mine right away.

But after today, I'd finally have the last bag of moongold I needed to rebuild the Stoneclaw ancestral home.

It was the only thing my sister, Leah Hall, had ever said would make her smile at me again.

"Ronan, they still need a platter of roast venison upstairs," the steward called from the stairs. "Don't keep the Hall family's guests waiting."

It took a moment to sink in. Then I looked up.

"Hall?"

The steward gave me a strange look, like he couldn't see why a porter would care about his masters' last name.

"It's the Stoneclaw Alpha's Winter Solstice feast. The young master is getting his sword tonight too, so every dish has to go out on time."

My head started to pound.

Seven years ago, Leah, my parents, and their adopted son, Kane Hall, were on their way to pick me up when their carriage went over the edge into Red Moon Canyon. The wolf lamps for my parents and Kane all went dark. Only Leah crawled out alive.

She told me I was the one who had killed them, all because of what I'd said.

When I learned the truth about my birth family on a call, the first thing I said was that they should send Kane away.

Kane was so scared he slit his wrist with a silver blade and triggered his moon madness. My parents were racing back to save him when their carriage crashed into the canyon.

So I spent seven years paying for it.

Every day I worked down in the mines, exposed to silver dust, and handed every scrap of moongold to Leah so she could buy back the ancestral home other packs had taken over after the disaster.

And now here I was, standing in the cellar of that same home, the one that was supposed to be in ruins.

I didn't ask the steward anything. I picked up the roast venison and took the servants' passage upstairs.

The closer I got to the banquet hall, the stronger the familiar scents became.

My father, Aldric Hall, smelled like cedar and cold iron. My mother, Maria Hall, carried the dry, bitter smell of herbs. Kane always smelled like white flowers, way too sweet.

For years, those scents had come to me only in dreams. Now they were right there, sharp and real.

I looked in through the half-open servants' door.

Kane was kneeling before the oath fire in a white formal suit. My father held a long silver-black sword in both hands. My mother fastened the gold pack crest to Kane's shoulder, marking him as the heir.

Leah stood behind him. My sister, who was always so cold and hard, was looking at him with a tenderness I'd never seen.

"This sword is called Everoath." She took it from my father and hung it at Kane's waist herself. "The moongold used to forge it came from every bit of pay Ronan has handed over these past seven years. We almost lost you because of him, so consider this sword his way of making amends."

Kane ran his hand over the hilt, and his eyes welled up.

"I don't care about any of this. I just want the four of us to be a family forever."

My mother hugged him, and my father pulled them both into his arms.

The oath fire flickered and threw their shadows onto the wall. They really did look like a family that had never lost anyone.

Near the end of the feast, my mother glanced at the cake.

"It's Ronan's birthday today too." She kept her voice low. "It's been seven years. Maybe we could let him come back."

Kane's fingers twitched, and his glass clinked sharply against the table.

Leah put a hand on his shoulder right away.

"We agreed on ten winters. Ronan doesn't come home until he truly accepts that Kane is Stoneclaw's heir. Not one winter less."

"But he's your own brother."

"That's exactly why I can't let him turn into a vicious wolf."

Standing outside the door, I slowly crushed the note in my fist.

Silver poisoning crawls through your wolf and into your heart. Maeve said I might not make it to the next Winter Solstice.

But right then, I didn't feel sad about that anymore.

I handed the roast venison to a passing servant and went back out through the cellar. Solstice snow landed on my face, and my right hand still couldn't feel the cold.

The bag of moongold I'd been saving for Leah suddenly felt heavy and ridiculous against my chest.

They weren't dead.

They'd been living comfortably on money that had cost me seven years of my life, waiting for me to atone for a crime I never committed.