Chapter 405: Renwick’s Former Problem Solver

Draven leaned back in his chair. The lean was subtle, the posture of a man who had just connected two dots that nobody else in the room had.

"That dagger was mine."

The sentence landed on the table like a coin dropping in a cathedral.

Griffin’s mouth opened. Ryker’s hand was already moving. The preemptive shut-up reflex had become muscle memory at this point.

"It’s the dagger Maria and I used for a blood oath. Maria was holding it for me. When I walked up to them in the corridor the other night, I hadn’t realized that was what it was. Guinevere wasn’t threatening Maria or anyone else with it. She was trying to understand why her father’s wife was upset and holding a bloody dagger and she took it from her."

Reed: Father’s wife. The one that was also dead.

Damon: Also dead. Yes.

Reed: You know what this sounds like?

Damon: Yes.

Reed: His Beta was fucking his wife and he told everyone they died.

Damon: Correct answer.

Reed: How did the Dragon King get Renwick to hand them over?

Damon: Quietly. Which is how you know it was Maddox and not Ashenvale.

Reed: This is the most entertaining intelligence operation I have ever been a part of.

Damon: Reed, I haven’t even told you about Guinevere flicking Nicholas across a throne room tonight.

Reed: I genuinely cannot tell if you’re joking.

Damon: Ask him about it.

Reed glanced over at his Alpha, who looked like a volcano who was deciding whether or not today was the day.

Reed: On a scale of one to ten, how likely is he to kill me for asking?

Damon: Eleven.

While this mindlink was going on, the dragons were having a collective ’oh shit’ moment.

The woman who half the room had privately suspected of attempted regicide had been holding the dagger used for a blood oath prior. And the blood on it wasn’t Landon Solveil’s.

Draven let the table finish their collective mindlinks before speaking again.

"If the evidence was straightforward and concrete, we would most likely have it by now. They’re keeping the details buried because they can’t afford their own kingdom learning their king is in a coma. They also don’t have enough for this to be case closed. There are likely holes in it. That’s leverage. And leverage is something we should be collecting, rather than bypassing."

Maddox’s jaw shifted by one millimeter. The millimeter contained a week of contingency plans, cover stories, and the quiet, corrosive weight of protecting his wife from a crime that had never existed. Every conversation he’d had about handling it quietly. Every glance Kael had given him. Every careful word spoken in a shower.

All of it, every fucking second, had been about a blood oath that he had facilitated and didn’t connect that Maria would be holding THAT dagger of all the daggers.

"So, that changes the calculus," Draven continued. "Whether she did it or didn’t, the question isn’t guilt. The question is evidence." He placed one finger on the obsidian. "Here is my recommendation. Before starting a war with a hidden race of beings who can turn your own dragonfire into a blanket, let’s get information."

Griffin: Did the new guy just roast dragonfire?

Ryker: Yes.

Griffin: That was funny.

Draven looked at Maddox. Then at Nicholas. Then at the table.

"If they are organized enough to read a detailed warrant for her arrest listing charges, then they have due process set up in their government. Due process means we have a right to information. What weapon do they believe was used? What physical evidence do they have linking her to the act? Is there testimony? Is there a witness who saw her standing over Solveil with a weapon, or did a healer walk in and find a comatose king and a missing woman and connect two dots that may have never touched? Whether she is innocent or guilty is irrelevant to the strategy. What matters is whether they have enough compelling evidence to pin it on her in front of a court. If the answer is yes, we have a different problem than if the answer is no."

He paused and took a breath because Draven was a man who knew timing was a weapon and was loading the next round.

"She is in their custody. That is a disadvantage for her and an advantage for us, because they are obligated to provide discovery while she remains in their system. They will share evidence with her legal counsel. They will reveal their case. They will hand us the blueprint of their argument because their own laws require it." He spread his hands. "We make it look like we are playing by their rules. We cooperate. We send counsel. We request formal discovery. We get every scrap of paper they have, and we read it with better eyes than theirs."

The table was his. Every person in the room knew it. The Beta who was the new guy, an unknown variable, was now running the strategy session and the two kings at either end of the table were letting him.

This Beta also had the respect of Damon Tavian, which in the world of wolf politics was a gold seal.

"If their evidence is weak, we dismantle it in their own court and she walks out the front door. Clean. Legal. No armies. No war. No strike team. No international incident. If their evidence is strong, or if they fight dirty, or if they refuse discovery, or if they decide due process is a suggestion rather than a law, THEN we deploy the strike team."

Draven looked at the two men who would decide whether this recommendation lived or died.

"Either way, she is removed from their custody. The question is whether we do it in a way that keeps three continents from going to war, or whether we do it in a way that gives every enemy we have exactly the excuse they’ve been waiting for."