Chapter 600
The council all looked at each other as Marcus’s words sank in, and one by one, they joined in his laughter. Theo, his confidence restored, strode over and lifted my chin with a finger. “You are a pretty little thing, though. If you serve me, I might find a use for you.”
I smiled as I leaned into him. The smirk on his face bloomed into a full grin as he thought I was leaning in to kiss him, but my smile faded as I felt my fangs descend. “The only way I will serve you, Theo…is if you are on a fucking platter.” My hand shot out, and his scream ripped through the room as I snapped the finger that was touching me. “Don’t ever fucking touch me. Do you understand?” I shoved him back toward the others.
Theo screamed as he snapped his bent finger back into proper alignment before his bones could fuse that way. “You stupid bitch. I was offering you a way out, but you threw it back in my face.” His face was splotchy, and spit flew from his mouth as he pointed at me with his healing finger. “Now you can die with the other riffraff.”
I snorted. “Riffraff? What century is this?” I shook my head and walked back to the table. “May I?” My father nodded and slid his chair out of the way. I typed away at the textile screen, pulling up report after report. “Theo, by the looks of this, you were the driving force behind killing the Queen and the Princess. Yarrow, you directed the royal guards out of the capital, opening the royal family up to assassination. Evan…” I paused as I read everything in his file and looked up to see his pale face. “You are one sick fuck. Do you know that?” I kept clicking as image after image of his crimes appeared – wolves torn limb from limb in some lab he was working with.
“What the fuck is that?” Marcus furrowed his brow as I paused on one screen.
“I think we all know what that is, Marcus.” I enhanced the image. “Humans…you gave wolves to the humans to experiment on us.” I growled as I looked at my father. “They already know we exist.” I clicked through to the next screen.
“Wait!” Marcus stumbled toward the screen, a noise in his throat, almost like he was choking. "Go back." I glanced up and saw his frantic eyes.
“Why?” I hovered over the button to switch photos.
“Please,” Marcus gasped. “Please, just go back.”
“Marcus, what is your issue?” Theo called out, but he ignored his friend.
Marcus met my eyes, and I saw something there that made me click the back button. It was an older photo. I pulled out the metadata from the photo and displayed it beside the image.
Evan slid toward the door, but I called out, “Where do you think you are going?” I hit the command to lock the door. “No one is leaving this room until I say so.”
Marcus reached out his hand slowly. “Can you zoom in?” His eyes darted to me, and he looked almost crazed.
I nodded once before I pulled the photo into an editor. I zoomed in on the wolf being dissected on the table. My mind bypassed the gore and focused on making the faces of everyone in the room clearer. I worked on the scientists’ faces first, selecting each person and using a combination of editing and AI to rebuild their features as best as I could.
“I don’t care about the men; I want to see the wolf,” Marcus nearly screamed.
I kept working. “I am doing it this way because I want to show you I am not manipulating the faces.” I glanced up at him. “Goddess forbid you try to turn this on me when I am just trying to help.”
Evan stumbled toward me. “Stop.”
Marcus whirled on him, his trembling hand striking Evan in the face. “You shut the fuck up.” He turned back to me. "Please keep going."
I looked at my father out of the corner of my eye and could tell from his face that he had figured it out. I was still in the dark as I turned my talents to the second-to-last face. The man was in the middle of cutting into the woman’s chest. I worked silently until Evan’s face became clear. Theo and Yarrow turned on their friend.
“You helped the humans dissect a wolf?” Yarrow growled. The others crowded the front of the desk as I slowly and methodically unveiled the woman’s face. When the final adjustment went in, and the photo loaded, every man in the office gasped, except for Evan, who knew exactly who it was.
I sat back and looked at everyone’s faces, but it was Marcus’s crazed eyes that waited for my eye contact. He waited until I reached him, and he leaned in. “Do you know who that wolf is?” He watched my face without blinking.
“No, I’ve never seen her before.” I looked down at the picture on the desktop. “She was beautiful, though, and young.” I touched her face and accidentally zoomed in on the photo. It jumped around before settling on her hands – half-shifted fists with her nails digging into the palms. I gasped before I could stop myself.
“What?” Marcus looked from my face to the screen.
I traced her hands, and my mind flashed to my first life. “She was alive when this photo was taken.” I spoke without thinking and heard someone stumble back a step.
“You can’t know that for sure,” Theo tried to argue.
But I shook my head. “I’ve been tortured before, Theo.” Rowan’s eyes flickered for a second. “A corpse doesn’t clench its fists in pain.”
There was a savage growl, and all I saw was a blur. “She was my DAUGHTER!”