Chapter 213

When I exited the bathroom, the importance of the day hit me in full measure. Today I was going to court. What and God's name was I supposed to wear?

Someone knocked on the door, and I wrapped my towel tighter. “In a few minutes,” I called.

“Elena?” I recognized Gwen's voice. “I brought you a suit for today. May I come in?”

“Yes,” I said.

She opened the door and entered the bedroom.

“I'm just fresh out of the shower.” I bit my lip, feeling foolish. As if she couldn't gather that by my wet hair. But I seem to need something to fill the silence.

She held up a garment bag. “You'll want to look your best today,” she said.

I let Gwen dress me, taking comfort in the fact that she knew her way around important functions as a luna. When she finished, she grabbed my face and gave my forehead a kiss.

“Do exactly what the lawyers, Charles, and I tell you to,” she said. “I don't want you to leave my son a widower before he's even officially married.”

I patted her hands, which still rested on my cheeks. “I promised to follow all of your advice,” I said. “I can't tell you how much better I feel just having you here prepping me this morning.”

She accompanied us to the courthouse, and with the additional four guards that the judge had provided, it was more than enough to fully surround the three of us. And we needed every single one of the guards, too. They got us through the paparazzi.

That morning, the main entrance to the courthouse was a zoo, but both Charles and his mother insisted that we go in that way and not slink through some back door. Otherwise, the press would be looking for the way that we were taking to and from the courthouse. And inevitably, someone would find it, and then we'd have no way to escape if we needed to.

The judge started the proceedings. And, whether it was tradition or not, the king's lawyer got to present his evidence and call his witnesses first. Presumably, because that was the benefit of being the King.

I tried hard not to gaze at the jurors’ box. It was an assembly of all of the most powerful werewolves in Orlune. But Charles was not up there with them. Had recused himself very publicly in a press release, stating that he wanted no question when the verdict was returned, that he had not influenced anyone in my favor, and that he was going to do his best to support me from my side as my fiancé.

After two days of the king presenting his evidence, it was finally my lawyer's turn. He called witnesses and refuted the king's evidence. Thankfully, in all that time, we'd gotten back statements from reliable tech sources that said that my recording was indeed the original and had not been altered in any way. We also had several doctors who presented evidence that I was indeed blood-related to both the king and the late queen.

I settled into my seat, feeling like the only way the jury wouldn't back me was if they somehow felt threatened by the king. The one person who didn't show her face at all was Queen Yarrow. I wondered where she was and if she was watching this on television.

Then we had a weekend off, and on the following Monday, it was time for our closing statements.

The king took the stand and started to make his own, painting his life in such a manner that even I started feeling sorry for him. He explained the tragic loss of his first wife, the trouble finding a second wife, no heir to follow him until a blood test showed a stranger to be his child, and then nothing but questions about why the late queen would keep something so monumental from him and from all the people of Orlune.

While he spoke, I watched the jurors. It didn't take a genius to figure out that they were eating this up. It was the same with everybody in the gallery.

My heart lodged in my throat. How was the king getting everyone to believe what he was selling when the evidence was obvious? And if he was threatening anyone's family, how was I ever going to compete with that?

The judge called me up to give my closing statement, and I squeezed my way past Mr. Wilcox, holding my breath so I wouldn't have to breathe in his pine sap smell, which seemed to intensify the more nervous and sweaty he got.

I tried to ignore the disapproving stares from the jury and took my seat at the front of the courtroom beside the judge. Mr. Wilcox and I had been over and over what I needed to say while I was up here, but staring down the barrel of my own failure, all of those smart-sounding phrases and words sounded stupid in my head and worthless against whatever the king had managed to convince the jury of.

I stared at the jury, keeping my chin high and trying to meet their gaze. “I fully acknowledge that I was not raised with the knowledge of who my birth parents are, and therefore, I am an outsider in alpha circles. Ever since I started dating in alpha, I began to see inside that world and what a close-knit group it is.”

I stared at them, appealing to their common sense. “This is not the time for you to be suspicious of an outsider. Because my intention was never for personal gain. I ended up with Charles because I love him. And because he loves me. And I would love him the same no matter who he'd been born to.”

“And through that acceptance,” I continued, “I was going to become part of an alpha family. I was going to become his Luna. I had no need for grasping schemes or anything else that the king's going to try to convince you of.”

“If any of you research my history or read from my reporting, you will easily see that I have done nothing but try to better our nation of Orlune. I only want what's best for werewolf kind. I only want the truth.”

“I see justice and show it to the people when lies have left people wronged. So why would I change how I operate here and now?”

The jury still frowned in my direction. I was losing them. My emotional appeal wasn't having the effect that I had hoped.

Mr. Wilcox had his face in his hands, and he was shaking his head. I was disappointing everybody. Desperation started to clog my throat. I turned to the jury for one last emotional appeal.

“Don't you understand the position that I am in?” I asked. “Why would I choose a course of action that would put me in harm's way? I'm not even guilty of any of the things that I've been accused of, and you're still ready to hang me out to dry.”

“Imagine if I really was guilty? Why would I choose a course in life which would get me banished, or jailed, or worse?”

This time, Mr. Wilcox let out an audible groan. Tears stung the back of my eyes. I was about to lose my composure in the middle of the courtroom in front of everybody. And if I thought the tears would help my case, I'd just let go. But judging by the disapproving looks on everyone's faces, the last thing I needed to be was any more emotional.

But I already was. I bit my trembling lower lip and watched the judge raise her gavel to dismiss the jury to decide our fate. I thought I might faint. If they left now, no one was going to convict the king.