Chapter 178: Truths and a Disbeliever
Zane~
My father looked at me with a strange, almost unsettling expression—his eyes glinting with something too unreadable to name. Hope? Worry? Anticipation? It made my stomach twist. He stood there by the fire, bathed in its orange glow, the lines of burden etched deeper across his features than I’d ever seen before.
"Think about it, Zane," he said, his voice low but heavy, the words dragging against the silence. "Really think. If this vision of Owen’s is real... if there’s even the slightest chance that what he saw might come to pass, then I want the Wolf Spirit here. Watching. Guarding. He could tip the balance."
He wasn’t asking. He was pleading in the only way a king ever does—with command hidden beneath desperation.
I could feel it—the shift. The fear in his voice wasn’t just about the prophecy. Not really. It was what he wasn’t saying that made my skin crawl. The way his eyes shimmered, not with faith, but strategy. He was hiding something. Plotting something. And I knew that if I asked, he’d only deny it or twist the truth. He was the king, after all.
But I was done playing his games. I was done hiding the truth because as it stood, things were slowly spiraling out of control.
If we were going to dance this dance, it was going to be with all the cards on the table.
I exhaled slowly and crossed the room, standing before him with my hands in my pockets. "Dad," I said, voice low, steady, "I have a confession to make."
He raised an eyebrow, folding his arms. "A confession?"
"Yeah," I nodded. "You don’t need to be afraid of anything tomorrow. Not the masked attackers. Not the vision. Not even death."
He narrowed his eyes. "And why’s that?"