Henry glared at Leon as he injected the antidote for ether into Ella's arm. He was angry with the therapist, but furious with himself for allowing the hypnotic state to continue so long. He should have intervened the first time Ella screamed. Listening to her suffering was horrific. She began by recounting the events, but soon disappeared into the memory, reliving it so intensely that her narrative was punctuated by screaming and crying. Henry despised himself for enabling Leon to torment her in this way.

The antidote took a moment to take effect, but Ella finally fell silent as she returned to consciousness. Her eyes, bloodshot and brimming with tears, opened to reveal grey, tear-stained skin. She immediately lurched forward, vomiting onto the floor.

Henry pulled back her hair and stroked her back, murmuring words of comfort. "It's okay, dear one… You're safe, it's over."

Once she'd emptied her stomach and was only dry heaving, Henry helped her lie down. Leon appeared with a wet rag and a glass of water, and Henry cleaned Ella's face and helped her drink. "I'm sorry," Ella moaned, tears streaming down her cheeks.

"Nonsense," Henry assured her. "If anyone has a right to be sick, it's you. I've cleaned up worse messes with my own boys."

Ella touched her belly, her face contorted with guilt and pain. "He's upset," she whimpered, referring to the baby. "I frightened him… the screaming…"

"Do you want me to call the doctor?" Henry offered. "Just to be safe?"

Ella's gold eyes widened, then closed, and Henry remembered her confessions during her trance: hints of doctor abuse that filled his wolf with rage.

"Will you stay with me if he comes?" she asked in a small voice, clearly worried about her unborn child but unwilling to face an examination alone.

"Of course," Henry promised, ignoring Leon as he gave orders to the guards standing in the doorway. They had rushed in when Ella began screaming and watched in horror as she recounted the priests binding her wolf, severing her connection to her inner animal. In their world, such an act was an atrocity, a crime that shouldn't have been possible, a violation no shifter could survive. A guard ran for the doctor, and Henry turned back to his daughter-in-law. "What can we do for you, Ella? What do you need?"

"We should talk about what just happened."

Leon interjected, his therapist voice betraying his professionalism. "She needs to process this."

"Not today, she doesn't," Henry snapped. "And not without her mate. We never should have attempted this without Dominic."

"Her mate can't change the past," Leon retorted sternly. "This was always going to be difficult."

Henry growled silently, and Ella cowered. "I want my nest."

"Of course," Henry agreed, lifting her into his lap and carrying her to the bedroom. He settled her in her bed, purring and stroking her hair as she wept silently.

After a while, Ella blinked at him, seemingly realizing his actions. "I thought wolves only purred for their mates?" Her voice was raspy from the ordeal, a shadow of its usual velvet tone.

"No," Henry corrected gently. "We also purr for our children, and you're one of mine now."

Ella's lip trembled, and she grasped his hand. "Thank you."

The palace doctor arrived before Henry could tell her she didn't need to thank him. The physician examined the baby and gave Ella a sedative, advising against further hypnosis for at least a week. After he left, Ella, already drifting towards sleep, fixed Henry with a hollow-eyed gaze that pierced his heart. "Why did they do that to me?"

He knew she meant the priests at the orphanage, and wished he had an answer. "I don't know," he confessed sadly. "Before today, I didn't even know such a thing was possible."

"I always thought…" A yawn interrupted her, and she closed her eyes, continuing drowsily, "I always thought I lost my strength because they broke me… the doctor and the matron… I believed they broke my spirit. But it was the priests." She shuddered, tears leaking from beneath her closed eyelids. "They stole it."

Henry continued petting her hair. "They took your wolf, Ella, but they never broke you. You survived despite everything. You cared for your sister and built a life for yourself. You might have been missing a part of yourself, but the woman my son fell in love with—the woman we all fell in love with—was never weak."

To his surprise, a bittersweet smile touched her lips. "Because Dominic brought her back to me. She started waking up when we met. If you'd known me before him…" Her shoulders shook, the sweetness vanishing. "I h-hate them for doing that to me," she murmured, anguish thick in her voice.

"I do too," Henry said. "We're going to get to the bottom of this, okay? You have my word." He spoke with conviction. "For now, just sleep, little mother. When you wake, Dominic will be waiting, and you can face this together."

As soon as Ella fell unconscious, Henry wheeled back into the sitting room. He remained nearby in case she had bad dreams, though the doctor assured him the sedative would induce such deep sleep that dreaming would be impossible. He took out his phone and called his youngest son, cold fury coursing through him.

Sinclair answered on the fourth ring. "Hi Dad, this isn't a good time; we're about to reach the FrostFang capital."

"You need to make time," Henry growled. "Ella just had her first hypnotherapy session, and it didn't go well."

Sinclair's voice sharpened. "Put her on."

"She's sedated," Henry explained, unable to soften his tone. "But you need to know what happened and be prepared to drop everything for her when she wakes."

"What happened?" Sinclair asked, his concern evident in his gruff voice.

Henry recounted the events, pausing for Sinclair's growls and curses. When he finished, he added, "She was frightened from the beginning and didn't want to do it, and we made her. She forced herself to do it because she didn't want to disappoint you, and we didn't know how bad… we had no idea what she'd been through, Dominic. But I have to think you did."

"I knew about the abuse," Sinclair confirmed, his voice raw with emotion. "I had no idea about her wolf. We suspected something kept it dormant, but I assumed it happened when she was an infant—before she was left with the humans. I never would have asked her to do this without me if I'd believed—"

"You shouldn't have asked her to do it without you at all," Henry interrupted firmly. "She needed her mate today, and I was a poor substitute."

"She chose you because she felt safe with you," Sinclair replied, wanting to deny his father's negligence while grappling with his own guilt. "But you're right. I should have been there." He paused, breathing heavily. "But I should be here too, and I should be back in Moon Valley fighting Damon. I don't know how to do it all, Dad. I can't be there for Ella without failing the pack, and I can't be there for the pack without failing my mate."

"But why now? Why was digging into her past urgent enough to risk this?" Henry asked, sympathetic yet frustrated.

"Don't you think it's connected?" Sinclair asked. "Think about what you just told me. Those priests must have been servants of the Goddess, and they told her she was being hidden, that she couldn't join the shifter world until the time was right. Then someone inseminates her with my sperm just before the election, and her wolf awakens just before the war. Call me crazy, but that sounds pretty prophetic."

Had Henry been able to stand, he would have sat down. He considered leaving his wheelchair, feeling so unsteady. He'd been too focused on comforting Ella and horrified by her ordeal to connect the pieces. "I think you're right," he gulped, glancing back at his daughter-in-law. "I think we're seeing the Goddess's plans in action."

Sinclair agreed solemnly. "And they're all about Ella."