The Betrayed Princess Rising (Lylah and Ezra) novel Chapter 247

Chapter 247

Ezra’s POV

Finished

I let out a slow breath, forcing the anger coiled inside me back into its cage-for her sake. For Lylah. I wouldn’t let it ruin this moment, wouldn’t let the tension poison the fragile peace we still had.

Even after the meeting ended, she never spoke of Thane or Cora again as we made our way back to the penthouse from Gerald’s estate.

I caught myself watching her again and again.

Those eyes of hers… deep, luminous, holding a quiet kind of truth most wolves spent a lifetime trying to understand. There was no deceit in them. No bitterness. Just something achingly sincere.

As if she had already accepted it all-Cora’s betrayal, the cruelty of fate-as though it had been written long before either of us was born, etched into the bones of the world.

But what Cora did to her in the past life should have been enough. It was enough.

If she dared to touch Lylah again now-

I swore, on blood and fang, I would make her suffer for it.

‘What are you staring at?” I asked, my voice quieter than I intended.

Lylah had rolled the window down, letting the night air curl through her hair. Damon eased the car into a

lower glide. Lunaris city lights blurred past us, but she wasn’t looking at them.

‘The stars,” she murmured, her gaze lifted to the sky. “Among all the souls in Selene’s Kingdom, my parents are there. Watching us.”

A faint smile tugged at my lips.

Goddess… she was too pure for this world. Too precious for those fools who had failed her so completely.

Ezra,

Hm?”

“Do you think…” She hesitated, her voice thinning, fragile as spun glass. “If Jax and Vala were still alive. would they love me?”

Something in my chest tightened.

“Or would they be like Eldric and Daia?” she continued softly. “Would they look at me and see a mistake of a daughter-someone fated to live and fade beneath Cora’s shadow?”

Her scent shifted-grief, doubt, old wounds reopening. It stirred something violent inside me, something primal. Ragnar bristled beneath my skin, claws itching to tear into anything that had ever made her feel

this way.

1/3

12:52 pm

Chapter 247

Finished

“I would love them, Ezra,” Lylah went on, her voice barely above a whisper. “More than I love myself. But would they… love me the same way? Or would they be disappointed that their daughter isn’t Cora? But just someone ordinary like me?”

Ordinary?

The word alone made my jaw tighten.

I didn’t know every detail of what Eldric and his mate had done to her-and I didn’t need to. The scars were there, etched deep into her soul, and that alone was enough to stir the beast within me, claws sharpening beneath my skin.

“It’s not that I want to talk badly about them,” she added quickly. “Eldric and Daia did love me once. I remember it. Orion too. Our home was warm. They laughed with me. It was real.”

Her voice faltered.

“Before that night on my fifteenth naming day.”

The air in the car seemed to shift.

“After that, everything is blank. Or maybe it’s not. Maybe I just stopped living after that. Maybe I’ve only been surviving ever since.”

Cora.

Even her name tasted like poison.

She had taken too much and left too much broken in her wake.

‘Come here,” I said, my control snapping just enough.

I didn’t wait for permission. I pulled Lylah into me, wrapping her in my arms, anchoring her against my chest where my wolf could feel her-real, alive, mine to protect.

‘Listen to me,” I murmured against her hair. “Your parents are not Eldric and Daia. Jax and Vala were honorable wolves with pure hearts. Their love wouldn’t shatter at the sight of another child. It wouldn’t turn cold because of someone as insignificant as Cora.”

I pressed a kiss to the crown of her head, lingering there.

“They would love you, Lylah,” I said firmly. “Deeply. Completely. Without condition. The way you deserve.”

She tilted her face up to me, her eyes shining-not with sorrow this time, but something softer. Something

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