The Forgotten Pulse of the Bond-Chapter 41: The Wolves Behind the Door 2

"You were right," Magnolia said as she pulled her cloak tighter around her shoulders, the cold wind slicing through the southern archway like a warning. "They’re afraid."

Camille stood beside her, overlooking the moon-washed courtyard where dozens of wolves gathered in silence, no ceremony, no order, just a growing tension that wouldn’t release. "Not of me," she said. "Not really. They’re afraid of what I remind them of."

"The past," Rhett muttered, emerging from the shadows near the torch line, his voice raw with the weight of too much knowing. "Of what they did."

"No," Camille said. "They’re afraid of what’s left."

She stepped forward, the torchlight licking across her boots as she made her way toward the northern gate where the old barracks had long been abandoned. Her steps were quiet, measured, like she could feel the eyes watching her from unseen balconies and cracked windows.

"They’ll never vote in your favor," Beckett said as he caught up with them. "Not openly. Even with the evidence, they won’t put their names on a verdict that rewrites history."

"They won’t have to," Camille replied.

"You’re not making sense."

"I don’t need their vote," she said, her voice calmer than it had any right to be. "I need their silence. I need them to blink."

"And in that blink?" Rhett asked.

"I take the Keep."

The words echoed louder than she’d meant.

They turned the corner and came upon the old hall near the outer ring. It had once served as an infirmary, then a training station, then forgotten. But tonight, it was full. Wolves sat in huddled groups, their backs straight, their eyes fierce. They had come from every fracture in the Keep’s reach exiles, misfits, survivors.

"She’s here," someone murmured.

The room fell silent.

Camille stepped inside without hesitation.

"I don’t have answers for all of you," she began, voice steady, carrying without force. "But I have the truth. And if you came for that, then I won’t send you away empty."

A girl stood from the center ring. Young. Barely shifted. Her mark was raw and still dark, the skin around it red with recent flare.

"My brother didn’t come back," she said. "He was taken to the cradle chamber two winters ago. They told us he failed to bond. That his wolf turned on him. But my brother never turned on anything."

Camille didn’t move. "What was his name?"

"Kael."

"I remember him," Magnolia said softly from beside her. "He was quiet. But his wolf was strong. Too strong for the suppression formula. That’s why they removed him."

"They buried him," the girl whispered.

"No," Camille said. "They tried. But we remember."

Another voice from the back.

"My mate never returned from the third trial. They said she’d attacked the instructor. But her bond never failed. She wrote me a letter the night before. She was afraid, but clear. Focused."

"They used fear as a weapon," Camille said. "Because fear is easy to feed."

"They fed it too long," Beckett muttered. "Now it’s turning back."

Rhett moved to the side and unrolled the newest map they’d acquired an old network of hidden Keep passageways, once sealed off, now re-charted. "If we move on the final vote without the Elders’ interference, we have a chance to control the structure."

"They’ll call it a coup," Magnolia warned.

Camille shook her head. "Not if we don’t raise a hand. Not if we simply fill the void they create."

"The silence you mentioned," Rhett said, catching her meaning.

"They won’t vote in our favor," Camille repeated. "But they may not vote at all. They’re divided. And if they fail to cast a ruling..."

"The seat falls open," Beckett finished. "And precedent shifts."

The chamber stirred again.

The wolves didn’t cheer.

They didn’t rise.

They sat still.

Heavy.

Listening.

Believing.

And that, Camille thought, was more powerful than any war cry.

They would rise when it was time.

She stepped back into the hallway, eyes raised toward the moon just beginning to arc above the eastern tower. "Tomorrow we don’t wait for permission."

"We never did," Magnolia said.

Camille smiled a quiet thing, more pain than peace and turned to face the path ahead.

"They won’t open the gates," Elara said as she entered Camille’s chamber without knocking, her boots tracking wet snow across the floor. "They’ve sealed the inner corridor. Four sentries posted on the roof above the Tribunal Hall. If we walk in without invitation, they’ll call it hostile."

Camille stood at the far window, overlooking the last line of flame-lit guard posts. "Let them call it whatever they want."

"They’ll use it as proof that you were never meant to rule."

Camille turned, slowly, and crossed the room, her cloak dragging over the uneven stone. "I don’t want to rule. I want to end the rule that eats its children and buries the bones beneath record halls."

Elara studied her. "And what happens when the wolves need more than justice?"

"Then they’ll make something new from the pieces."

A knock rattled the outer door, and Beckett stepped in without waiting for permission. "Camille. You need to see this."

Camille followed him through the southern wing, down a passage lined with torches that flickered oddly in the wind. He didn’t speak again until they reached the locked archive the one only Rhett had access to.

Inside, three elders were standing over a shattered pedestal.

"What the hell is this?" Camille asked.

Rhett didn’t answer. He stepped forward and peeled back the cloth that had been draped across the broken base.

Underneath: a cracked journal.

And inside that journal a name.

Not a code.

Not a number.

A real name, hand-written in the old tongue.

Caelia.

"What does it mean?" Magnolia asked from behind them.

Rhett didn’t turn. His voice was low. "It was the name assigned to the first bonded wolf born under the altered cradle sequence. The first girl to survive all three stages of the seal mark without turning feral."

Elara’s face drained of color. "That would make her the template." freeωebnovēl.c૦m

"She was never meant to be found," Beckett said, stepping back. "She wasn’t supposed to exist."

Camille reached for the journal, her fingers brushing the edge of the parchment. "I know that name."

"You’ve seen it?" Rhett asked.

"No," Camille whispered. "I’ve heard it. In dreams. In that river. She speaks to me."

The silence cracked like glass.

"You think it’s... inside you?" Magnolia said, voice barely audible.

"No. I think she was... someone else. Before me. And they took everything she was and built me out of the wreckage."

Elara stepped closer, hands trembling slightly as she reached for the journal. "If that’s true, then it means your existence isn’t just a mistake in their system. It’s the system."

Rhett’s eyes locked with Camille’s. "You’re not the weapon."

"I’m the blueprint," she said.

Beckett closed the book.

Camille turned away.

Magnolia didn’t speak she only moved to her side and placed a hand against the small of her back.

"We have to bring it all down," Camille said quietly.

"And what do we build in its place?" Elara asked.

Camille lifted her head. "Something that doesn’t start with blood."

Outside, the wind howled louder.

And deep in the woods, near the boundary wards, the northern gate cracked open without a key.

Because Camille had stopped waiting.

And the Keep was already listening.