TRADING MY CHEATING HUSBAND FOR THE LYCAN KING novel Chapter 470

CHAPTER 393: THE NIGHT OF THE AMBER EYE

EMBER’S POV

I blink up at him, entirely disoriented. I swipe a stray tear from my cheek, staring at the moisture on my fingertips in pure confusion.

I try to recall what I just asked to forget. I reach into my mind, searching for the reason my face is wet, trying to grasp the edges of whatever just happened.

Nothing.

There is just a blank, smooth wall in my head. The images are gone. The words are gone. All that is left i an ache in the centre of my chest that I can no longer explain.

“I’m fine,” I whisper, my voice shaky but solidifying as the fog clears. I gently pull Knox’s hands from my face, giving him a tight nod. “At least, I will be. Once she gives me the truth I just paid for.”

I turn straight ahead, meeting Devika’s waiting, exhausted eyes.

Something soft pours into her features, something dreamy and terrible, and for a breath the years fall off her, and she is not the woman who sold me to a monster.

She’s a girl I have never met.

“It all began,” she says, eyes drifting up and away, “on the Night of the Amber Eye.”

Silas goes rigid. “W–What?”

“You remember it, brother. Of course you do.” She’s smiling now, faint and far away, and it turns my stomach. “You loved it as much as I did. Once.”

“What is that?” I look between them. “The Amber Eye.”

Silas‘ voice has gone strange, dragged backwards into something old and tender he clearly hates himself for still holding onto.

“It’s rogue lore. Our people believe that the Goddess blinks once a year. One night. And in the space of that blink the whole world goes unwatched, and every wolf alive, no matter their pack, their rank, their blood or their wars, is free to come together as one. There are no borders or enemies. One night of grace.”

“The most beautiful night in the world,” Devika breathes.

“The one night,” Silas says heavily, “that this mountain opens its gates to the East.”

I straighten in my chair, but it’s Knox’s sudden, absolute stillness that catches my notice.

His eyes lock onto the rogue king’s, and I can practically see the pieces rearranging behind his stare–a rapid calculation that ends with a low scoff of breath escaping his lips.

“At last, it makes sense.” A dark chuckle vibrates in Knox’s chest as he leans back. “I always wondered why a mountain of rogues would open its doors to prestigious pack members and rich heiresses, but so violently draw the line at Alphas. What real difference in blood is there between an Alpha and his wealthy

CHAPTER

THE AMBER EYE

+25 Poin

elders? I found it almost hypocritical that you’d claim to hate everything packs stand for, then turn arour and welcome our high–ranking wolves with open arms.”

Knox tilts his head, a dangerous smirk touching his lips.

“But this is the real truth, isn’t it? The mountain doesn’t close its doors to Alphas out of some bullshit grudge. It closes them because it welcomes the East. You wine and dine with our absolute worst enemi and you simply couldn’t risk an Alpha walking in and discovering the mountain’s most protected secret. that right, Rogue King?”

An impish grin climbs up my uncle’s face.

“Ah, you are one clever Alpha, Volkov.” Silas chuckles, a gritty, dark sound. “You finally have us figured ou No business is bad business. Unfortunately, the East are one of the few that enjoy the finer, exclusive pleasures of life.”

My head spins, struggling to catch up to the magnitude of what they are saying.

“Wait,” I say, my voice bewildered as I look between my uncle and Knox. “The East actually comes here? To the mountain? Why would our enemies cross the border just to drink and gamble in a rogue casino? How do they even get inside without triggering a war?”

“Take a breath, Ember,” my mother interrupts, letting out a long, theatrical sigh. She waves a hand throug! the air, looking utterly exhausted by my confusion. “Goddess, you are easily distracted. If you would just quiet down and let me tell my story, I will explain it to you. All your painfully naive questions will be answered.”

“Fine, go on.”

“Finally. The Amber Eye festival was the only night I could actually breathe,” Devika goes on, that dreadful softness creeping back into her voice. “You have no idea what it means to be born in this rotten mountain My brother likes to dress it up as a legacy. A kingdom. He’ll puff up his chest and preach about the great empire the Blacks carved out of the dirt. But it is a dungeon, Ember. A foul, suffocating pit where the rest of the world tosses its garbage and outcasts. There is nothing honourable about that. This place swallows you alive, chewing on your dreams and ambitions year after year until you are nothing but feral genes and filth. Until you’re a putrid rogue-”

“This is our home, Devika. How can you speak like that?” Silas has gone red to the collar “That is our mother’s legacy-”

“I wanted nothing of her legacy! I told you so when I was nineteen, and you refused to hear me! I told you every single day of my life. I was stuck, I was suffocating, and I was dying! You never once listened. You looked at this pit and saw a throne for your egoistical conquests. I looked at it and saw a graveyard of a million dreams and broken outcasts.” Her breath feathers, and she forces her icy composure back to the surface, shutting off every other emotion that bled through her voice. “The Amber Eye Festival was the only night of the year my world had any colour at all. The East didn’t just bring gold, they brought a taste of a life I was starving for. They smelled of oceans I’d never seen and spices I couldn’t name. They told tales of cities made of glass and light, of luxuries and silk, of a world so beautiful it made my chest ache just to hear about it. For one single night, I got to stand right at the edge of that magic and just breathe it in. I get to pretend it belonged to me. And every dawn, when the festival ended and the Easterners packed up, I would stand there in the bitter cold, watching my entire world ride away without me

“So you found a way to ride away with it,” I say