To heal a Rogue

LYSANDER

Julius watched me closely, but I continued before he could interrupt.

”Violence answered with more violence is not justice. It’s a cycle that never actually ends, Julius. It simply changes whose blood gets spilled next.”

I looked toward the elders.

”Generation after generation, we keep calling it order because the same people are always holding the weapons. We keep calling it tradition because nobody wants to admit that something can survive for centuries and still be wrong.”

A few faces hardened.

I expected that.

What I had not expected was how much easier it became to say the words once they were out.

”If the rogues are demanding change, then perhaps we should ask why they believe war is their only way to be heard. Perhaps we should ask what pushed them far enough that dying became preferable to continuing as they are.”

I leaned back against the throne, resisting the strange urge to look toward my uncle’s empty chambers as though he might somehow tell me what to do.

”I won’t order a thousand deaths simply because they challenged a system that was already failing them.”

The silence that followed was heavier than before.

”And I won’t accept for that to be seen as weakness simply because I’m unwilling to answer their anger with my own.”

The elders exchanged glances, several expressions souring visibly as murmurs rippled through the room. Julius’s jaw worked before he spoke again, his tone noticeably sharper than it had been moments before.

”Are you suggesting that we legitimize them by granting an audience at all? That we sit down as equals with people who put a blade to your own uncle’s throat?”

I held his gaze.

”Watch your language, Alpha Julius.” The words were quiet, but they carried.

His expression shifted almost imperceptibly.

”You are speaking to the Regent of this kingdom, whether you agree with my decisions or not. You may challenge my judgment. You may disagree with my orders. But you will not speak to me as though I am some inexperienced pup whose authority you are free to question simply because you happen to dislike the answer.”

I let the silence stretch for a beat before continuing.

”And you will be careful about reducing an entire faction to the actions of whoever killed my uncle. If we are going to solve this, then we need to be precise about who we are dealing with.”

Julius’s mouth tightened, but he gave a restrained nod.

”Over the years,” I continued, ”we’ve lost countless low-ranking werewolves to these rogue factions. Not through force. Through persuasion. Through a promise that is clearly compelling enough that people willingly walk away from everything they’ve built here to join them instead.”

I allowed that to settle, watching several faces shift uncomfortably.

”Top-ranking werewolves, like you and me, aren’t entirely innocent in why that promise sounds appealing to people who feel unheard. We have a stake in understanding exactly what is driving that exodus, rather than simply cutting down everyone who leaves.”

No one interrupted me this time.

”There will be punishment,” I continued, my voice hardening, ”for whoever actually killed my uncle or had a hand in it. That much is not negotiable, and I will not pretend otherwise to anyone in this room.”

My fingers tightened against the armrest.

”But once that matter is settled properly, the higher ranks and I can meet with the moderates among them on equal ground. We can talk properly, face to face, instead of continuing to trade threats through intermediaries while more people die on both sides for no reason beyond pride and stubbornness.”

I looked directly at Julius.

”That is the message I want carried back. Exactly as I’ve stated it. Nothing softened. Nothing added.”

Several elders began arguing at once.

Voices overlapped, rising into a jumble I could barely separate into individual sentences. Weakness. Fear. Precedent. What the packs would think. What my uncle would have done.

The same objections dressed in different words.

”Your uncle,” one elder called over the others, stepping forward, ”built the stability this house currently enjoys precisely by never once showing rogues this kind of consideration.”

The room quieted enough for me to hear him clearly.

”My uncle is dead.”

The words left my mouth before I could soften them.

”Killed inside his own library, inside his own home, by people who clearly felt they had nothing left to lose.”

I looked around the room.

”Perhaps that stability wasn’t quite as stable as we had all convinced ourselves it was.”

That landed harder than I expected.

Silence followed, deeper than any of the arguments had managed to produce.

I raised a hand before anyone could recover enough to challenge me again.

”Last I checked, I am the Alpha King currently sitting in this seat, regent or not.”

My gaze moved from one elder to the next.

”Unless that has somehow changed in the last five minutes without anyone thinking to inform me, my word is law here.”

No one spoke.

”Deliver my message. Bring me their response, whatever it turns out to be.”

I leaned forward slightly.

”And when it comes, I want it delivered directly to me. Not filtered through three different advisors first. If they have something to say to this kingdom, then I intend to hear it myself.”

Silence settled thick and fast after that, the kind that came from people biting down on further protest rather than actually agreeing with the outcome.

Julius bowed, lower this time and longer than his first bow.

”Of course, Your Majesty.”

The elders followed suit, one after another, murmured agreements passing between them even as several expressions made it painfully clear that their minds had not changed. They had simply recognized that arguing further in front of me would accomplish nothing beyond wasting everyone’s time.

”I’ll expect word within the day,” I instructed, rising from the chair that still didn’t feel like mine. ”Whatever their answer is, I want it delivered directly to me.”

”Understood,” Julius replied.

The room began to empty slowly, elders filing out in twos and threes, murmuring among themselves in tones too low for me to catch.

Julius lingered.

He stood at the foot of the dais for a moment longer, studying me with an expression I couldn’t quite decipher.

It wasn’t anger. Not entirely. There was something else beneath it, something closer to calculation.

As though, for the first time, he was no longer looking at the young man who had inherited his uncle’s throne.

”You remind me of him, you know,” he said finally. ”Your uncle. Not in the ways you’d expect. He hated this chair too, during the first few months. Said it never quite felt like it belonged to him either.”

I looked at the throne beneath me.

”Did that feeling ever pass?”

”Eventually.”

Something almost like amusement touched the corner of Julius’s mouth, though it disappeared quickly.

”Though I suspect, given everything happening around this house, you may not have the luxury of easing into it the way he did.”

He bowed once more, then turned and walked away.

I watched him disappear through the great doors before finally allowing myself to sink back against the throne.

And that was when my phone buzzed against my hip.

I pulled it free, grateful for any excuse to look away from the throne, the empty room, and the weight that seemed to settle more heavily around me now that there was no one left to distract me from it.

It was a message from Fia and it said: ”I’m close.”

I read it twice.

Something in my chest loosened, just slightly at the sight of it as I started to type back.