Russel went back around the table in the little, make-shift interrogation room and sat back down. He waited for Commander Jordan to pick herself up and sit back down as well. He could smell the blood from her wounds but a few seconds later and they were all healed. She looked a little more comfortable and just by her body language alone, Russel could tell she had a greater respect for him now.

Which was the whole point to his show of power. With a lot of werewolves, a show of outright power and dominance was the only way to gain their trust and loyalty.

“Now that we have that out of the way, Commander, have you seen or heard of anything suspicious with any of your soldiers?”

“Am I not under suspicion?”

“If you wanted to harm this kingdom, you would have had more than enough opportunity to do so in the last six years. And I don’t think you would have been as blatantly hostile to me for taking over as king and killing my father in the process. You clearly respected the man, even with all his…faults.” Russel didn’t go into detail on those faults. He didn’t need to. Carter Polver was a strong leader and had kept the peace during his reign through sheer intimidation but in life, he’d been a cruel person. Everyone knew it. Especially to humans. In the days, months, and years to come, Russel knew there were going to be a lot of people happy with the change but there were going to be a lot that hated him for it as well. He would deal with each in due time.

“I have spent almost my whole life fighting and protecting Oclan. I would never betray it.”

“Then help me find out who did,” Russel said, leaning forward. “They are putting the lives of everyone here at enormous risk.”

“What would you have me do, Your Majesty,” she replied.

“What have you seen? No matter how small or insignificant you think it might be. We need to find this traitor before something worse happens.”

Or they finally do manage to get Lola killed, Russel thought but didn’t say.

Lola sat on the bed in her room, her mind still dazed and shocked over what happened with Nora. She tried to gingerly poke at her memory, hoping to figure out how the Harvenk woman had been killed. And how she had miraculously healed her damaged, broken body. Even now she could still feel the phantom twinges of agony she’d experienced from all the broken bones, slashes, and worse she took in her fight.

It wasn’t so much that she killed that upset her and put her into such a state of unresponsiveness. Nora had been intent on killing her. There was no other way around it at the time. If she hadn’t done…whatever it was that she’d done, then she would be the one in pieces now, not the Harvenk werewolf. The guilt at murdering a thinking, living person was bad and it hurt her to know she had done that, but again, the rational part of her mind still soothed her. The rational part of her mind told her it had been a killing out of necessity. Of self-defense. Even with that knowledge, however, it still felt like part of her had been ripped away.

All of that was bad, but the worst thing was the sheer horror she felt. After everything was said and done, the horror left behind was what truly sent her into a semi-catatonic state. It kept careening through her mind, ripping things apart and crushing her soul. The worst part was that she wasn’t even sure what the horror was really attached to. The image of Nora’s shredded corpse? Knowing that somehow, she had turned into some kind of monster? That she had killed a living, thinking, sentient person?

She had no clue and it was eating away at her. With every second that ticked past, she felt more and more of herself slipping away. The pain of losing everyone she loved in Gloucester seemed so much smaller in comparison and she couldn’t even figure out why.

She suddenly wished Russel were there. The handmaidens had long since gone and she was left alone with the crushing weight of her thoughts and pain. Outside, she knew, were some guards but she didn’t need protection right then.

She needed him.

And she needed to know how she, a human girl, had managed to kill a werewolf.