Chapter 85: Chapter 85
Ivy’s Point of View
The next morning, the palace grounds were gripped by a freezing, sudden chaos. I had barely finished my morning tea when Nell burst into my quarters without even knocking.
"Lady Ivy, you need to move right now," Nell said frantically, with wide eyes. "Things are happening in the Luna’s courtyard. There is a big uproar, and the guards are swarming the main hall."
"What happened, Nell? Who is causing problems for my mother-in-law?" I asked.
"It’s Edna, the Luna’s head maid manager!" Nell gasped out. "She was accused of poisoning Luna Helena with the Silvervine root! They dragged her out of the quarters just minutes ago."
I didn’t waste another second. I hurried down the long corridors. This was completely unexpected—we had been looking for the hidden cook, but the traitor was actually the person closest to the Luna’s daily life.
When I pushed open the doors of the main hall, the atmosphere was suffocating. Alpha Alaric stood at the center of the room, he was indeed in rage. Mrs. Margot sat tightly on the side, her arms crossed, while Seraphina and Bastian’s mother, Vivienne, stood right behind her, their expressions a strange mix of shock and hidden fear.
In the center of the stone floor, the maid manager, Edna, was kneeling down. Tears were streaming down her face, her shoulders shaking as she wept. Yet, despite the guards surrounding her with drawn swords, she tightly pressed her lips together and completely refused to confess.
"Speak, woman!" Alpha Alaric roared, his voice so loud. He was obviously angry. "Who gave you the poison? Who paid you to destroy my lineage?"
Edna just shook her head, crying out loudly, but not a single name left her mouth!
Before Alpha Alaric could strike her down, the doors opened, and the Alpha’s Beta, Beta Tomie, walked inside with a grim expression. He held a leather sack in his hands, stepping forward to bow respectfully to Alpha Alaric.
"Alpha, our immediate investigation has yielded terrifying results," Beta Tomie announced, his voice carrying clearly across the hall. So, everyone could hear him clearly.
"We checked the pack borders first. Edna’s children left the territory early this morning under false names, fleeing toward the outer regions. Furthermore, when the guards ransacked the manager’s private room, they found a hidden compartment beneath the floorboards." He reported.
Beta Tomie turned the leather sack upside down, dumping the contents onto the long table with a loud, metallic crash. The elders gasped, and my eyes widened
"The guards found highly concentrated contraceptive powder," Beta Tomie explained, pointing at a small glass vial. "And right beside it, a large amount of gold and silver jewelry. She was paid a fortune to ensure Luna Helena remained completely infertile."
The betrayal inside the house was laid bare. Taking advantage of the sudden distraction as everyone stared at the gleaming pile of gold, the manager’s expression turned into one of pure desperation. Edna quickly reached into her sleeve, pulled out a small black pill, and swallowed the poison before anyone could jump forward to stop her.
Within seconds, her body stiffened completely. She let out a horrific, gurgling gasp, falling backward onto the stone floor. She convulsed violently. Dark, toxic blood began rapidly bleeding from her seven orifices—her eyes, nose, ears, and mouth. The poison was lethal and instantaneous. She died, breathing her last breath.
Alpha Alaric walked over, looking down at her lifeless corpse, his chest heaving with an unbridled, furious wrath.
"This worthless traitor does not deserve our soil!" Alaric growled savagely. "Guards! Drag her rotting carcass to the border lines. Throw her body to the rogue wolf area and let the wild beasts rip her to shreds!"
My mind was analytical. "Alpha Alaric, please, wait," I spoke up, catching his attention "This is a heavily poisoned corpse. The venom bleeding from her orifices is highly toxic. If you throw her into the border area, it will kill the wild dogs and wolves that feed on her, spreading a deadly plague through our local wildlife."
Alpha Alaric paused, his logic overriding his rage as he processed my words. He nodded firmly. "You are right, Ivy. Guards, change the order. Dig a deep pit away from the water lines, dump her inside, and bury it completely."
As the guards dragged the body away, Luna Helena stepped closer to the table to inspect the jewelry. Her fingers trembled as she picked up a ruby-encrusted gold necklace and a silver bracelet. Suddenly, her eyes widened in complete disbelief as she identified the jewelry.
"This... this belongs to our pack vaults," Luna Helena said, her voice cracking as she turned her head. "In fact, many of these pieces were specifically gifted to Mrs. Margot years ago. I recognize the custom crests."
The room went dead silent. Mrs. Margot’s face turned shocked, and Fred’s mother, Lady Otessa, who was standing right next to her, flinched violently.
"Oh, thank goodness you found them!" Mrs. Margot loudly claimed, putting on a fake, dramatic sigh of relief.
"That wretched manager must have stolen these from my chambers months ago! We blamed the manager for being a thief, Alaric! She must have looted my jewelry box while I was away!"
I watched her desperate acting. She thought they could just blame a dead woman and walk away clean. The deep hurt in Luna Helena’s eyes was painful to see—she was realizing her own family was trying to destroy her. I knew I had to push the knife in further while they were scrambling.
I picked up a small leather ledger that had been tumbled out with the jewelry. I flipped through the pages, my eyes catching the messy numbers.
"Mrs. Margot, if she stole these from you, it is quite strange that your personal accounting logs are kept right beside her stash," I pointed out, as I looked at the Alpha. "Alpha Alaric, I took a brief look, and I must point out a severe accounting problem here. The purchase prices for the palace kitchen and the inner house supplies have been inflated for over a year."
Luna Helena snapped her head toward me. "What do you mean inflated, Ivy?"
"For example," I explained, pointing my finger at a specific line. "The cost recorded here for standard grain and medicinal herbs is ten times higher than the actual market price in the lower village square. Someone has been intentionally falsifying the palace books, taking massive amounts of pack funds, and storing the excess wealth right here in this room."
They weren’t just poisoning the Luna, they were actively robbing the Silverside Pack to build their own private fortune.
Luna Helena was completely furious. She slammed her hand onto the table. "Re-check the prices!" Luna Helena ordered the guards. "Bring me every ledger from the past three years! Someone re-check every single coin that passed through the kitchen!"
Lady Otessa, who was Mrs. Margot’s own daughter-in-law and the one managing the household purchases—completely lost her composure. She fell to her knees, bursting into tears as she clutched Alpha Alaric’s robes, begging for mercy on the spot.
"Alaric, please, have mercy! I beg of you!" Lady Otessa cried out right at his feet. She looked up at the Alpha, her voice filled with a both shame and desperation.
"The money given to us by the main house was simply too little! We are part of the royal lineage, but we barely had enough to maintain our noble status in the capital! We had no choice... we had to make some extra money from here just to survive! Please, don’t cast us out!"
Lady Otessa continued to sob loudly against the Alpha’s boots, as she looked over at Luna Helena, hoping her sister-in-law’s soft heart would save them from execution.
Luna Helena stood tall, her arms crossed over her chest as she looked down at the weeping woman with an cold expression. The time for family forgiveness was officially over.
"Your tears won’t solve this mess, Lady Otessa," Luna Helena declared, her voice completely devoid of mercy.
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