FIA
The speech continued. He spoke of Isobel’s dedication to her family, her willingness to fight for what she believed in. He ntioned Hazel’s youth, her potential, the tragedy of a life cut short.
He didn’t ntion all the murders. The fra jobs. The systematic cruelty Hazel had inflicted on anyone who stood in her way.
When he finished, he gestured to soone in the front row.
Father stood.
He looked worse than he’d sounded on the phone. Grief had carved new lines into his face, turned his eyes hollow. He climbed the steps to the podium slowly, like each one cost him sothing.
His gaze found imdiately.
He spoke about Isobel first. Their years together, the family they’d built, the love that had sustained them through pack politics and personal loss. His voice cracked when he ntioned Hazel. The daughter who’d been difficult and headstrong and ultimately dood by her own choices.
"Isobel tried," he said. "She tried so hard to give Hazel everything she’d never had. Safety. Security. A mother who would protect her from the world. But sotis love isn’t enough. Sotis our best efforts still end in tragedy."
He looked at when he said it. The weight of that gaze felt like an anchor.
"And Pauline." He cleared his throat. "I didn’t know her well. But her actions affected my life in ways I’m still discovering. Secrets have a way of poisoning everything they touch. I hope she found peace in the end."
He stepped down. Alpha Dimitri returned to the podium.
"There is one more person who should speak."
The church went silent.
My heart started hamring against my ribs.
"A family mber who has not yet had her chance to honor the dead." His eyes locked on mine. "My surviving granddaughter."
Gasps rippled through the crowd. Heads turned. The whispers exploded into sothing louder, sharper, and impossible to ignore.
"Fia, daughter of my own daughter, Muna. Would you co forward?"
Cian went rigid beside . His hand found my wrist, grip tight enough to hurt.
"Don’t," he said under his breath. "You don’t have to do this. We can leave right now."
I looked at him and saw the protective fury in his eyes, the way his whole body had tensed like he was preparing to physically drag out of here if necessary.
"It costs nothing," I said quietly.
"Fia—"
"I can do this." I covered his hand with mine. "Trust ."
He held my gaze for a long mont. Then his fingers loosened, and I stood.
The walk to the front felt longer than it should have. Every eye in the building tracked my movent. The whispers followed like a physical presence, pressing against my back, my shoulders, my neck.
I climbed the steps. Alpha Dimitri moved aside, giving space at the podium. The three caskets sat below , silent witnesses to whatever I was about to say.
I gripped the edges of the podium and looked out at the sea of faces.
"I didn’t know Luna Pauline," I started. My voice sounded steadier than I felt. "I never t her. Not truly. But her choices touched my life anyway. She was part of a machine that separated my grandmother Athena from her family. That machine destroyed my mother’s chance at a normal childhood. It created ripples that spread wider than anyone could have predicted."
I paused and let that sink in.
I turned to my grandfather to see his reaction. To see if he would be horrified. But he was not at all.
So I continued.
"Pauline did what she thought was right for herself, and I guessed that could be disguised as what was right for this pack. She believed she could maintain that order through secrets and silence. I won’t stand here and pretend to forgive that. My grandmother Athena never got to raise her daughter because of the choices made in that light. Pauline’s actions created ripples that touched lives she never knew—mine included. I stand here today as proof that secrets don’t stay buried, and blood will find its way ho."
The whispers started again. Louder now. People turned to their neighbors, confirming what they’d just heard. Athena’s granddaughter. Every dot seed to connect.
I shifted my attention to the second casket.
"Isobel was my stepmother. She did her best with an impossible situation. A husband who’d loved another woman or at least believed that he did and a stepdaughter who reminded her daily of that ’love’. She tried to build sothing with Hazel, to give her daughter everything she’d never had. I can respect that effort even if I can’t forgive the harm it caused." I took a breath. "Isobel lived her life making choices that seed right to her. She loved fiercely—perhaps too fiercely in so directions, not enough in others. She also hated just as fiery too and the consequences of those choices followed her to the end."
My gaze dropped to the smallest casket.
Sothing twisted in my chest. Not grief, exactly. For , it was sothing more complicated.
"Hazel was my half-sister. We grew up in the sa house, but we might as well have lived in different worlds. She was young. She made mistakes—so small, so catastrophic. In the end, she made a choice that cost her everything. I hope she found peace in those final monts."
I looked back at the crowd and found my father’s face.
He looked a bit disappointed. Not that I cared.
"I honor the won in my bloodline who deserved better—my mother Muna, my grandmother Athena. They didn’t get the lives they should have had. They were pawns in gas they never agreed to play. But I’m here because of them, and I’ll make sure their legacy is more than pain and secrets." I paused. "The goddess has a way of balancing scales. We’ve all seen that now."
I stepped back from the podium.
The whispers exploded into sothing that couldn’t be contained. Half the room looked scandalized. The other half wore expressions of grim satisfaction. People who’d known what I had endured and seen it firsthand, as well as those who’d heard the stories of the fra jobs and false accusations.
Death... as tragic as it was... didn’t change history.
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