members. The elders who whispered when they thought I wasn't listening. I was used to their eyes. But the way the wolves of Silver Ridge looked at me was different. They weren

hat?" He looked at me carefully. "I don't know." I frowned. "You expect me to believe that?" "I expect you to understand that powerful people often hide things from each other." I hated that answer. Because it sounded too much like everyone else. Half-truths. Warnings. People telling me I was close to something but refusing to tell me what. "What did my father find?" "I told you. I don't know." "But you know something." His silence confirmed it. I stood. "Alpha Cedric." He looked at me. "If you know something about my parents, you need to tell me." For a moment, he didn't look like an Alpha. He looked like an old man carrying a burden. "Your mother was not just a Luna." I froze. "What does that mean?" "She was more important than most people realized." I waited. But he didn't continue. My patience disappeared. "Everyone keeps doing this." "Doing what?" "Giving me pieces of information and expecting me to be satisfied." My voice sharpened. "My mother died. My father disappeared. My entire life was destroyed because of something nobody wants to explain." Alpha Cedric watched me quietly. Then he said something I didn't expect. "Maybe because the truth is more dangerous than the lie." --- Later that evening, I walked through the pack archives. Every pack had one. A place where history was kept. Birth records. Treaties. Wars. Deaths. Secrets. Especially secrets. The librarian, an elderly wolf named Mara, looked at me suspiciously when I requested information about my parents. "You're searching for Rowan Thorn." "Yes." She frowned. "Many have searched for him." "And?" "They never found him." I ignored the warning in her voice. "I'm not looking for him because I want forgiveness." "Then why?" I looked down at the old records in front of me. "Because I want the truth." Something changed in her expression. Not fear. Recognition. "You really are your mother's daughter." I looked up. "What does everyone mean when they say that?" Mara hesitated. "Your mother questioned everything." "She was curious." "No