The air in the quad was tense, heavy with the weight of Samuel's confession. Esther looked at the man she loved—the golden boy, the protective wolf—now standing before her, stripped of his easy confidence, vulnerable and afraid.
She thought of Fortune, cold and calculated, offering 'freedom' that was laced with death. She thought of Samuel, sweating under the pressure of his secret, risking his Pack's stability for a love he couldn't deny.
"I choose the truth, Samuel," Esther finally said, her voice steady despite the tremor in her hands. "Not the lie you hid, but the one you just spoke. I choose the love that risked everything, even itself, to protect me."
Samuel let out a breath he seemed to have been holding since the night before. His dark eyes, which had been clouded with pain, cleared with a rush of hope.
"But we deal with the lie now," Esther continued, stepping closer until she was just out of his reach. "You said the stone is weakened if the Keeper dies. You need me alive. Fortune needs me dead to weaken you. This isn't just about love, is it? It's about survival, ours and the city's."
"It always has been," Samuel admitted, his eyes filled with gratitude and renewed determination. "The Pack's job is to protect the Keeper without revealing the role. It keeps the Shadow from identifying the source. Now that Fortune knows, everything changes."
Esther ran a finger over the silver bloom. "My grandmother gave me this for 'protection.' Was she trying to protect me from the Shadow, or from the wolves who needed her?"
"Both, I think," Samuel said, reaching up to gently trace the chain. "The silver is potent. It's what allows you to regulate the stone's power without being drained by it. It's a shield and a key. We need to find out what Madam Chinwe truly knew. She didn't just accept this role; she must have found a way to resist being exploited."
"Her lab," Esther decided instantly. "She kept a private lab and greenhouse off-campus, on the outskirts of Port Harcourt. She called it her 'silver sanctuary.' She had rare botanical specimens, things she claimed were extinct. Maybe the answer to the pact's loophole is in the botany."
"We go tonight," Samuel decided, his protective instincts surging. "But first, we need to make sure Fortune doesn't know where to look. We need a decoy." He glanced across the quad where Obinna and Tunde were still watching, pretending to study their phones. "The Pack will have to play defense."
"Wait," Esther stopped him, a strategic gleam in her eye. "Fortune thinks I'm a target to be claimed or destroyed. We need to use his arrogance against him. Let's not run.
Let's make him think I'm still deciding between you both. We need to buy time, and the best way to do that is to stay visible, right here in the university, but constantly moving."
Samuel looked at her, seeing the strength of the Keeper already emerging. "Dangerous, Esther. But clever. We fight the Shadow in plain sight."