Betrayed by My Ex, Marked by His Alpha Emperor Brother

Chapter 277

Elara’s POV

"What do you want to do?" Kaelen’s voice was soft. Only for me. "This is your choice."

I looked at his hand—steady, warm, wrapped around mine. I squeezed it once. Drew a slow breath. The damp air tasted of iron and mildew.

Then I turned toward the left cell.

Gareth pressed himself against the wall as I approached the bars. His one good eye went wide. The shackles rattled as he tried to shift his weight, tried to make himself smaller—or perhaps larger. It was hard to tell with a cornered animal.

"Elara." His voice cracked on my name. "Elara, listen to me. I know what they told you. But you have to understand—it wasn’t all me. What we had... what I felt for you back then, it was real! I swear it! But Isolde—she manipulated everything. She was the one who pushed me toward Seraphine’s blackmail. She threatened to ruin me if I didn’t cooperate. I never wanted—"

"Stop."

One word. Flat. Final.

He stopped.

I studied him through the bars. The swollen eye. The split lip with its dark crust. The filthy remnants of what had once been fine fabric. He looked nothing like the prince who had stood in a candlelit garden and told me I was his future.

"You want to blame your wife," I said. "How convenient."

"It’s the truth! Isolde—she’s vicious, you know what she’s like—"

"Isolde is dead."

The silence that followed was absolute.

Gareth’s mouth hung open. His good eye blinked. Once. Twice.

"W-what?"

I tilted my head. Let the words settle between us like stones dropped into still water.

"I killed her," I said. "The same poison she and Malak used on Kaelen. I poured it down her throat and watched her choke on it." My voice didn’t waver. Didn’t rise. "Then I dragged what was left of her into the forest and left her for the beasts."

A sound escaped him—small, strangled, barely human.

"She helped Malak plan the ambush that nearly killed my husband. She helped him wage war against this empire. She tried to have my son murdered." I leaned closer to the bars. "It was retribution for everything she did to me years ago, and for helping Malak. So I ended her. The same way she tried to end us."

Gareth’s chest heaved. His shackled hands trembled overhead.

"You’re—" He swallowed. "You’re a monster."

I smiled bitterly. It felt cold on my own face.

"Am I?" I said softly. "Tell me, Gareth. Who drugged his own brother? Who helped Seraphine crawl into his bed while he was unconscious? Who fabricated a pregnancy to destroy a family?" I paused. "Who looked me in the eye and promised me love while bedding my sister behind my back?"

He flinched at each question as if struck.

"If I’m a monster," I said, "you built me. Piece by piece."

His composure shattered. Tears slid down his bruised face, cutting tracks through the grime. His body sagged against the shackles.

"Please," he whispered. "Please, Elara. I’ll do anything. I’ll disappear. You’ll never see me again. I swear it—"

"Enough."

"We’re family! Kaelen—" He twisted, straining toward the shadow behind me. "Kaelen, I’m your brother! Your blood! You can’t let her—"

"Half-brother." Kaelen’s voice came from behind me. Cold. Precise. Like a blade laid flat against skin. "Bastard half-brother, to be exact. And I gave this authority to my Empress. Speak to her."

Gareth’s face crumpled.

I waited until his sobbing quieted. Until the only sound was the drip of water somewhere deep in the dark.

"Here is what will happen," I said. "Your name is stripped from the Nightfire line. Effective immediately. You hold no title. No claim. No blood-right to this house."

His eye went wide. "No—"

"You are no longer a prince. No longer nobility. You are nothing." I held his gaze without blinking. "You will remain in this cell. No visitors. No correspondence. No sunlight. You will die here, Gareth. Slowly. Without power, without status, without a single soul who remembers your name."

"You can’t—" A sob tore through him. "Elara, please—"

I was already turning away.

His cries followed me down the corridor. Ragged. Wet. Growing fainter with each step I took toward the adjacent cell.

Then I stood before Seraphine.

She hadn’t moved. Still swaying slightly on her feet, both hands cradling the massive swell of her belly. Her prison shift was stained and thin. Every bone in her collarbone stood out like a ridge beneath parchment skin. Her greasy hair hung in limp strands around her pale face. She looked up at me. Those sharp eyes—dulled now, ringed with heavy dark circles of exhaustion—but still watchful. Still calculating, even here.

"You look terrible," I said.

A ghost of a smile touched her cracked lips. "I imagine I do."

Silence stretched between us. Somewhere behind me, Gareth’s muffled weeping continued.

"Why?" I asked.

She didn’t pretend to misunderstand.

"Because I loved him." Her voice was barely audible. Her gaze drifted past me—toward where Kaelen stood in the shadows. "From the first day I entered this court. Every assignment, every task, every smile I performed perfectly—it was all for him. To be seen by him."

Her hands tightened on her belly.

"But he never saw me. Not once." Her eyes returned to mine. Hollow. "It was always you. Even before you came back. Even when you were gone. It was always, only you."

I felt nothing.

No satisfaction. No pity. Just a vast, empty calm.

"Your child," I said. "It’s Gareth’s."

She didn’t deny it. Just nodded once. Slow. Tired.

"The baby is innocent," I said. "Whatever you’ve done—whatever crimes stain your hands—the child didn’t choose this."

Something shifted in her expression. The faintest crack in that exhausted mask. Her arms tightened around her belly, and for the first time, she looked genuinely afraid.

"You will remain here until the child is born," I said. "You’ll receive food. Medical care. Nothing more."

She waited. Barely breathing.

"After the birth, you will be taken to the monastery at the empire’s farthest northern border. You will raise this child alone. No resources from the crown. No visitors. No communication with anyone beyond those walls." I held her gaze. "You will live out the rest of your days in isolation. That is my mercy."

The cell was silent for a long time.

Then Seraphine lowered her head. Her shoulders curved inward. Her voice, when it came, was barely a breath.

"Thank you."

Her whisper was sincere, the genuine gratitude of a woman who had expected death.

I said nothing. I simply turned and walked out of the dungeon cells without looking back.