Chapter 85

(**Irina**)

The feeling that Sebastion is hiding something from me keeps bugging me. I picked up some of his thoughts and emotions last night. However, this morning when I woke up, he had the link between us closed. I was alone in bed when I woke, so I had to follow his scent to find him.

I found him in his office with my father. Both men look at me when I open the door. The expressions on their face confirm my suspicions. They are hiding something from me. I walk into the room, then slam the door behind me.

With swift strides, I march straight to Sebastion’s desk, slap my hands down on the surface and just glare at my mate. “We agreed on no more secrets between us. Why do I feel you are hiding something from me? What does it have to do with Pavel?”

His eyes flash black at my outburst, then they return to his normal color. When he glances at my father, I feel my blood pressure rise. I slap the top of the desk to get his attention back to me. His gaze snaps back to me and he lets out a heavy sigh.

“Sit down. Please.”

The defeated sound of his voice makes me panic. I sit down on the chair in front of his desk. Whatever it is he is going to tell me, I suddenly feel like I don’t want to know. “What did Pavel do?”

“He tried to attack me as I was walking home from the training grounds yesterday.”

Oh, Pavel. Why? Why would you do that? Oh my god, did Sebastion kill him? “Did you kill my brother?”

“What? No. I didn’t kill Pavel. Though, when I am done telling you all that I have learned since then, you may wish I had.”

What?

“Why did he attack you?”

“Pavel was Treadstone’s mole.” My father says.

My head snaps in his direction so fast my neck cracks. What the fuck is going on here? When Treadstone took me from the pack, Pavel was in the tunnels with our siblings. Treadstone didn’t know they were even down there, or he would have used them against me all this time.

“What is going on here, Papa? How did Vicktor even know about the tunnels?”

“According to Pavel, that isn’t where Treadstone found him, well one of his men found him.” Sebastion says.

I turn back to Sebastion as he speaks. He stands up from his chair to walk to me. All the anger I directed at him when I first came into the room is gone now. There is now a swirling ball of dread in my stomach that makes me want to puke.

My own brother.

Why?

Sebastion sits on the corner of the desk and hands me his water bottle. I take it out of reflex, then I am grateful to have something to do with my hands. When I look up into his eyes, they are glittering with anger, but there is a brief flicker of sadness before he glances at my father.

Oh. That is why they were together yesterday when they came into my father’s house. “He is in the dungeon below the pack house, isn’t he? That is why Papa knows what happened.”

“Sebastion summoned me because he wanted my help with Pavel. He wanted to know why your brother would attack him like that.”

“Tell me everything he told you both. I want to know everything.”

Sebastion takes a deep breath, then stands up off the desk. I watch him walk over to the mini fridge to grab another bottle of water. I know he is deciding how to tell me that my brother is now my enemy. The ball of dread in my stomach is growing bigger and bigger the longer they take to tell me what I need to know.

“How did Vicktor know Pavel was alive?”

“One of his men found us in that tiny tourist town where Pavel found Natalia’s design. He offered Pavel a deal. Do what he wants and Treadstone would spare my life.” My father says.

Sebastion walks to my father and hands him the bottle of water he got from the mini fridge. He then walks over to the bar in the corner of the room to pour himself a drink of something much stronger than water. The smell of bourbon hits my senses.

Why does he feel the need to drink?

“What did Vicktor want Pavel to do?”

“Weaken me to the point where I would be easily subdued when Treadstone finds us. Pavel had a silver knife with him yesterday. I was faster than he was, which surprised me considering he is of Alpha blood.”

Pavel was never very strong, or fast enough in combat. He was an artist and always complained about the training our father made us do. Oleg was the warrior of the family. He and Kat excelled at all the combat training papa put us through.

Realization dawns on me. Vicktor used my brother as a backup plan in case I failed to complete my mission. A mission I stopped thinking about the minute Sebastion believed my story. Once I told him everything that I know about Treadstone and the Collectors, there was no going back.

I take a deep breath before I ask the question that I am dreading to hear the answer to.

“Why did he agree to help Vicktor?” I ask my father.

He takes a deep breath before he meets my gaze. The sadness I see in his eyes scares me. However, in my heart, I think the answer is obvious. I already know why and who was at the heart of his anger towards me.

Gustav.

“Papa?”

“Pavel hates you because you were Gustav’s mate. He was obsessed with Gustav in a very unhealthy way.”

“His love for Gustav is genuine.” Sebastion says.

I turn to look at him. He is leaning against the bar with a glass of bourbon in his hand. “That I don’t doubt, but how do you know that?”

Sebastion pushes off the bar, then walks to his desk. He sits down in his chair, then pulls a file folder out of his desk drawer. When he glances up to meet my gaze, the look in his eyes sends a shiver of fear down my spine. Not fear of him, but fear of what is in that file.

“I started thinking after I left your father’s house yesterday. How did Treadstone know that Pavel and your father made it out alive? How did he know they survived? My first thought when your father and I were walking to his house was, Oleg.”

He holds up a hand when he sees the outrage on my face. How could he think that about my brother? Then I realize I might have thought the same thing if I was in his position.

“I briefly thought about it being Kat, but quickly dismissed it. That was when I remembered my father had aerial photos of your pack after the attack. When the council was made aware of the loss. I looked at those photos.”

I glance down at the file on the glossy surface of his desk. Suddenly, the need to know everything isn’t as important to me as it once was. I don’t want to know what is in those photos. I was there that day and will have those memories burned in my memory for the rest of my life.

“No. I don’t want to see.”

“Rinny, we buried the dead. All of them. It was hard, but it was something that we had to do.”

I stand up from my seat to walk to the sofa where my father is sitting. There is pain in his eyes. He had to bury it mate and his brother. Our Alpha. That had to be hard on him.

“What is so important in those photos that I need to see?” I ask as I sit next to him.

“Have you ever heard the legend of werewolves going into a hibernation like state if their wounds are so severe that they may not survive?” Sebastion asks.

I look up at him in confusion. What does an old legend have to do with what is happening now? There have only been a few recorded cases of that in our history. “How is that relevant to this? This game of riddles is driving me crazy, Sebastion. Just tell me what is going on.”

“Someone from your pack survived. Someone that knew about the drama between you, Pavel, and Gustav.”

My mind goes blank for a moment, then it races with who it could be. Natalia, Kat, and Oleg were in the tunnels and got out safely. Oleg was captured by another Collector, and Kat is in a Russian prison camp. Only my mother and Gustav are confirmed dead.

Wait, momma....

“Momma?”

Sebastion stands up from his seat, then walks to the sofa. He sits next to me, then takes my hand. This is the first time he has touched me since last night when we fell asleep. When I look into his brown eyes, that ball of dread in my stomach hardens further.

“When I showed the photo of the graves to Pavel yesterday and asked him who was buried in the now empty one, his face turned pale. Then when it fully dawned on him, he broke down and cried as he screamed one name over and over.”

No.

That isn’t possible.

I watched him fall.

I felt the bond break when he died.

Gustav is dead.

I need to talk to my brother. Pavel must be wrong. Someone else survived that day.

I tear my hand away from Sebastion’s, then stand up off the sofa. Before I know what I am doing, I race out of the room, then down the stairs. I am out of the mansion and halfway to the packhouse when I feel Sebastion’s arms around my waist.

He pulls me back against his body, but I struggle to break free from his hold. The deep rumbling growl that erupts from his chest makes me still for a second before I scream in frustration. I need to talk to my brother now.

“Even now, after all we have been through, you still love Gustav.” Aries growls through Sebastion’s voice.

Anya howls in my mind. I can feel her pain, but I can feel her anger as well. However, her anger isn’t directed at Aries or Sebastion, it is directed at me. Her pain isn’t for Misha, Gustav’s wolf. Her pain is for what I am doing to Sebastion and Aries.

They both think I am still in love with Gustav.

All the fight in me is sucked away. It was a gut reaction after I connected the dots to what Sebastion was trying to tell me. My reaction was based on memories and feelings that were brought to the surface again. I feel Sebastion let go of me. With his arms no longer around me, I feel cold and alone. I turn around to look at him, to tell him I only love him. His eyes are blank and the link between us is closed tight.

“Sebastion...”

“No. We will address this later. Come on, I will take you to see Pavel.” He walks past me quickly, leaving me to catch up with him.

Gustav’s ghost was laid to rest in my heart when I realized how much of our life was a lie. Any love I felt for him is long gone. Yet, here he is, coming between me and Sebastion. Again. No, he isn’t, not really. I did that all on my own.

I am so lost in my thoughts that I didn’t realize Sebastion stopped walking until I hit the solid wall of his back with my face. He turns around to look at me before pressing his thumb to the keypad next to the door to the dungeon.

“He was furious and broken when I was here last, so prepare yourself for that.”

He opens the door, then walks away before I can say anything. I rush down the stairs behind him. The first thing I hear when I step into the room is the sound of my brother sobbing. I want to be angry with him for all he has done, but I can’t help but understand his pain.

His head shoots up when he catches my scent. The looks he gives me stops me from walking towards his cell. The hatred in his eyes makes my heart break. Gone is my protective, loving older brother. In his place is a stranger who hates me.

“How long have you been hiding the hatred you feel for me?” I ask him as I step up to his cell.

Pavel stands up off the floor and glares at me. His tear-stained face turns red with his anger. I step back when he reaches out to grab me. For as far back as I can remember, I always felt safe with him. I never had a reason to fear him.

Now I know with certainty that if he had the chance, he would kill me.

“I have hated you since the day you turned eighteen. Since that day Gustav came back from the trading post and caught your scent, and he knew you were his mate. The look in his eyes was like he was struck by lightning. He looked at you like you were the only person in the world.”

I remember that day vividly. Pavel and I were walking back to our parent’s house after taking some blankets our mother made to the pack house. I stopped in my tracks when Gustav’s scent hit me, and I knew what it meant.

“He was meant to be mine. I have loved him since I was sixteen. When I turned eighteen and he wasn’t my mate, I was enraged at the thought of him being with anyone else. Then you fucking took him from me!!”

Pavel’s claws came out as he reached through bars again. I jump back, but not fast enough to avoid the swipe of one of his claws. Searing pain flares through my forearm where his claw got me. The howl of pain and the sound of bones snapping make me look up from my arm.

Sebastion has his hands wrapped around Pavel’s throat. The arm Pavel had through the cell bars is broken at the elbow and the bone is poking through the skin. When Sebastion glances over his shoulder at me, I can see the claw marks across his beautiful face.

His eyes are onyx as Aries has taken over.

“Please don’t kill him, Aries.”

“He hurt you. For that, he must die.”

“I hurt him first, even though I didn’t know it until now. Killing him won’t fix that.”

Aries throws Pavel backwards, then gives Sebastion control again.

“Come on, let’s get you to the clinic.”

He rips his t-shirt off then wraps it around my arm. His touch is gentle, but the storm brewing in his eyes lets me know he is holding back his emotions. The damage I have done to him today may be unrepairable.

I will do everything can to make this right for us.

*Author’s Note*
I had a Facebook group made for all those who don’t have Instagram. North Rose Novels. I will post updates there and on my Instagram @northrose28.