Scarlett's POV
"Lennox! Levi! Louis!" my father roared as the guards forced him to his knees. "Why are we in chains? What is the meaning of this?"
Alpha Lennox stepped forward. He looked like a man on the brink of collapsing, but as an Alpha, he had to stay strong. "Last night, assassins broke into our chambers," he growled. "They slaughtered our Luna in her sleep. We killed two. The third we captured."
Alpha Levi pointed to a man kneeling on the floor. His face was swollen, blood crusted around his mouth.
"Speak," Alpha Levi commanded.
The man looked up trembling. "Beta Zane paid us," he rasped. "He promised gold. He said once the Alphas and the Luna were dead, he would take control. He serves the new Rogue King."
"That is a lie!" my father roared. "I have been loyal to this pack for years!"
"Silence!" Alpha Louis thundered, holding up the photographs. They showed my parents meeting a strange man in the dark woods. "Our guards have been watching you. That man is the new Rogue King, and you have been selling our secrets!"
Everyone in the hall started screaming. They were all so angry.
"No! Someone is tricking you!" I screamed. I ran past the guards. I ran to the triplets because they were my best friends. "Liam! Leon! Leo! Please help us!"
I tried to grab Liam's hand. This was the same hand that had touched me kindly only a few hours ago. But he pulled away like I was trash.
"Please," I sobbed, collapsing at their feet. "You know my parents. You know they would never do this. Say something. Please."
Leon looked down at me and glared at me with pain-filled eyes. "Touch me again," Leon said quietly, "and I'll have you buried beside my mother."
Fear gripped me so tightly I could barely breathe. My heart ached, shattering into a million jagged pieces as I looked at the three boys I had trusted with my soul.
Alpha Levi, whose eyes were bloodshot and filled with raw, agonizing pain, turned to the triplets. His voice was thick with grief as he addressed them. "Sons, you are Alphas-to-be. It is your right. Give the judgment."
The weight of those words crushed the remaining air from the room. My father didn't stop fighting; he thrashed against the silver chains, his voice raw and loud. "I deserve a trial! I have served this pack for ten years! You cannot do this without a trial!"
I looked up at Liam, Leon, and Leo, my eyes pleading, searching for even a flicker of the boys who had climbed through my window at midnight. Surely, for the sake of me—for the years we spent inseparable—they would pause. They would look into it. They would see the holes in the story.
But there was no mercy in their faces. Only a cold, terrifying anger.
"We have made our decision," Leon said, his voice dropping to a rumble, echoing with the power of a future king. He didn't even look at me; he looked over my head.
"Our decision is..." Leon started, his gaze hardening.
"That they are to be hanged," Liam finished, his voice echoing through the hall like a guillotine blade. "Hang them. Now."
The crowd erupted in a bloodthirsty roar. I felt the floor fall out from under me as the guards grabbed my parents, dragging them out of the hall.
"Liam, no!" I shrieked, reaching for the hem of his pants, but he stepped back. "Leon! Leo! Look at me! Please!"
Leo was the only one who met my eyes. For a split second, I saw a flash of the boy I loved, but then he masked it back to that stone look.
"Don't worry, Scarlett," Leo whispered, leaning down so only I could hear him over the screams of the pack. "We aren't going to kill you. We're going to make sure you live long enough to regret every breath your family ever took."
My eyes widened in fear, but I had no time to dwell on it as I ran after my parents, my heart hammering against my ribs. The guards dragged them toward the execution center in the middle of the pack square. I tried to reach for my mother, but a guard grabbed me, wrapping his thick arms around my waist to hold me back.
"No! Please, no!" I sobbed, kicking and screaming.
My father never stopped shouting. "We are innocent! Please, listen to me!" But his cries were drowned out by the angry crowd. Nobody wanted to listen.
"Once a rogue, always a rogue," someone sneered behind me.
The words felt like ice in my veins. My blood drained from my face. My parents had worked so hard to be part of the Full Moon Pack, but to these people, we were still outsiders. We were still just dangerous rogues. No wonder they were so quick to believe those fake pictures and believe we were traitors.
The guards forced my parents to stand on the wooden platforms and placed the thick, rough ropes around their necks.
My eyes met my mother's. She was pale, her face covered in tears. "Scarlett," she sobbed. "Don't look, baby. Look away!"
"Mother!" I shrieked, my voice breaking. I couldn't look away. I couldn't leave them.
I looked up at the platform where the Alphas should have been, but they were gone. Only the triplets stood there. They were the judges now. I looked at them, my eyes blurred with tears, begging for a miracle.
"Liam! Leon! Please don't do this! Please!"
They didn't move. They stared back at me with eyes filled with anger and pain. Liam didn't look away from me as he slowly lifted his hand. With a sharp, cold motion, he dropped it—the signal for the executioner to pull the lever.
"No!" I screamed.