“Okay.” She stood up, frowning. “I’ll leave you alone.”

She went after Mason and Nev.

“Ethan, can you give us a minute?” Connor asked, crouching next to me.

“Sure,” he said. He was already watching Sabine, who had risen, moving slowly away from us. But unlike Bryn, she didn’t follow the other wolves, instead stumbling to the edge of the roof, alone. Ethan trailed after her, keeping a respectful distance.

Connor watched me intently. “Monroe told me you and Ren were close.”

The thickness in my throat was painful, but I managed a nod. How could this get any worse? I didn’t think I could bear any more questions about Ren and me.

“You heard what Emile said,” Connor continued in a low voice. “Just before . . .” He couldn’t finish, looking away from me. I watched him swallow grief.

“Yes,” I said numbly, not knowing why it mattered.

Connor cleared his throat a couple of times before he could speak again. “I’m asking you not to say anything until I have time to talk to Adne.”

Say anything about what? Ren was lost. So was Monroe. Half the pack had turned to the Keepers. Those we’d saved thought our losses were my fault. But what could I do to change that? After all, it was true.

“People know,” he said quietly. “Or even if they don’t know, they talk. It’s not a secret that Monroe loved Corrine. But no one knew about the child.”

The child.

I thought my heart would splinter into a thousand pieces as the truth seized me. Monroe’s endless questions about Ren. The incredible risks he’d taken, all trying to save Ren. The way he’d laid down his weapons before the advancing wolf.

How Ren looked nothing like Emile, but he did look like Monroe. That was why the Guide had always seemed familiar when I spoke with him. Hair dark as coffee, the chiseled angles of his cheeks and jaw.

I won’t hurt the boy. You know that.

Monroe was Ren’s father. Corrine had asked him to kill her because she’d been ordered to have a child. And she’d fallen in love with Monroe while they’d spent months planning a revolt . . . a time in which her body had been unbound by the Keepers’ enchantments.

“Oh my God,” I whispered, feeling tears spill out of my eyes. “Ren.”

Monroe’s son—not Emile’s—and yet a Guardian. The mother’s essence always seems to dominate, determines the nature of the child.

“We can’t do anything for him now,” Connor said. “I wish it were otherwise. But Monroe wanted Adne to know the truth. Even if he didn’t make it back. I’ll tell her, but now isn’t the time.”

Though it was painful, I swallowed the thickness in my throat. “But . . . how? What aboutAdne’s mother?”

“It was before my time.” Connor kept his voice low. “But I’ve heard things. After the alliance, when the Searchers were ambushed and Corrine died, things were bad. Really bad. And nobody was in worse shape than Monroe. We’re talkin’ not-coming-back-from-the brink worse. I think he was hitting the bottle hard. Reckless on missions. Looking to get himself killed.”

“What changed?” I asked. It was too easy to imagine how much blame Monroe would have put on himself.

“There were so many losses that positions were shuffled all over the place after the Vail catastrophe,” he said. “Diana—Adne’s mother—was a new Striker assigned to Haldis. She befriended Monroe . . . was the only one who got through to him, saved him from himself. And eventually there was Adne.”

“Did you know Diana?” I tried to envision a woman with Adne’s mahogany tresses and bright amber eyes. In my mind’s eye she was trading sword blows with Monroe and they were both laughing.

He shook his head. “I was her replacement,” Connor said, shifting his gaze away from me to watch Adne. She stood at the edge of the roof, head bowed. “Whether Monroe ever told Diana about Ren, I guess we’ll never know.” Then his eyes were back on me. “Can you keep this secret?”

I nodded, overwhelmed by cataclysmic revelations that kept coming, each new secret throwing my world into chaos.

“Thank you,” he murmured. I watched him rise, wondering how he would tell Adne she had a brother she’d never known and likely would never know except to kill him.

As Connor walked away, my attention was drawn to Ethan and Sabine’s voices.

Ethan was leaning away from her outstretched arm. “I said no.”

“Stop being a baby,” Sabine said, and I saw blood dripping from her arm onto the ground.

“I’m not drinking your blood.” He tried to scoot back but faltered, unable to put any weight on his mangled arm.

“Think about how much it will hurt to let that heal on its own,” she said. “It will take forever. This will fix it instantly, plus you won’t have any scars.”

“I don’t mind scars,” he growled.

“I’m sure you don’t, tough guy.” She laughed. “But macho points aren’t worth much if your arm is in a sling for the next month. You really think you can fight like that?”

“But I . . . ,” Ethan sputtered.

“And I know you’re still bleeding from that shoulder wound too,” Sabine said. “Why won’t you let me help you?”

“Just leave me alone,” he said, sounding like a petulant child as he turned his face away.