I watched Julian collapse on Violet's bedroom floor, his proud shoulders shaking with sobs. For five years I'd imagined this moment—the mighty Alpha King finally breaking under the weight of his neglect. Yet now that it was happening, I felt strangely hollow.
"Julian," I said softly, the anger draining from me. "We can't bring her back."
He raised his tear-streaked face, amber eyes swimming with grief. "I know."
His voice sounded different—raw and vulnerable in a way I'd never heard before. For a moment, I glimpsed the wolf beneath the Alpha, the father beneath the king.
"But there's something..." I hesitated, then reached into my pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. "Something I've been keeping."
Julian's eyes fixed on the paper as I carefully unfolded it. Another drawing, but this one more detailed than the stick figures in her diary.
"Violet drew this a week before she... before the end." I handed it to him with trembling fingers. "It was her dream."
