Chapter 230: Cadelaria on her knees!!!
Jesse gestured, and an attendant stepped forward carrying a lacquered box. He opened it himself, revealing three rolled deeds stamped with the seal of the fox council.
"A meeting gift," he said simply.
When they landed in Sienna’s hands, her breath caught. It was property!
Jesse said calmly, "Three shops in the city. Yours to manage or pass on to your children. Consider it a welcome into the family."
Sienna’s fingers gripped the edges of the box hard. Shops? Three shops? This was no trinket, no cheap gift passed on for the sake of tradition. It was power, independence, a gesture of trust. She bowed again, more deeply this time, her bones burning with cautious respect.
"Thank you, grandfather Jesse," she whispered.
Jesse nodded, satisfied. "Go now. My attendants will take you to meet my wife Jess, your grandmother. She is waiting."
Sienna looked at her Elias, who gave her a reassuring look, mixed with an apology, as he would not be going with her. For a moment, it enveloped her curiosity about the old couple calling themselves Jesse and Jess!
The attendants flanked her, guiding her down another corridor, their footsteps echoing against polished stone. The air grew thicker as they approached a chamber draped in silken curtains. Sienna’s senses tingled--something was off. The servants coming out looked panicked or scared.
The attendants who delivered her pushed open the doors.
Inside, the atmosphere was thick with incense. A woman sat upon a raised dais, her figure cloaked in two layers of embroidered fur cloaks. Her white hair was pinned high, her silver fox ears adorned with jade ornaments. Her eyes were sharp, assessing, yet her smile was faintly amused.
Sienna’s gaze shifted and froze.
At the foot of the dais, kneeling on the cold marble floor, was her mother-in-law. Tears streaked her face, her shoulders trembling as she sobbed openly.
Sienna’s breath hitched. Her mother-in-law, the proud, venomous woman who had tormented her, was kneeling like a criminal before Jess. It seemed sad! Like watching the mighty lion, a king of the jungle, have his fangs pulled out.
The attendants in the chamber bowed low, announcing, "Grand Lady, we have brought young lady Sienna."
Sienna turned her head. Grand lady and young lady! She recalled Mrs. Abernathy talking about this in her lessons. How ladies were differentiated in a family, according to power ranks. Lady Cadelaria was Senior Lady, Ali was young mistress.
Grand Lady Jess’s eyes flicked toward her, gleaming with curiosity. "Ah...so this is the human bride my grandson snagged himself. A little chubby, but nice looking. I can see the potential because I have seen old pictures."
Sienna’s heart raced. She barely heard the words. Her gaze locked on her mother-in-law who lifted her tear-streaked face just enough for Sienna to see the desperation in her eyes.
Why was she kneeling? Why as she crying?
Sienna’s instincts screamed for her to flee the room before she was also forced on to her knees.
Grand lady Jess leaned forward, her voice calm yet edged with steel. "Sienna, child....you have arrived at an interesting moment. Your mother-in-law has much to confess."
Sienna’s stomach jumped. "Confess?"
Lady Cadelaria’s sobs grew louder, echoing through the chamber.
Grand Lady Jess patted the books sitting at her side. "These are household records." She opened the first handwritten ledger with deliberate care, he fingers tracing neat columns of ink. "Sienna, Cadelaria here should have started teaching you about this as soon as you married into the family. Another duty she chose to deliberately ignore in my absence. You need to understand these books to understand how this great family works. These ledgers have been kept for decades, each future matriarch taking over for the last one."
Sienna bravely approached the dais, and she knelt beside the Grand lady, peeking into the ledger. Jess turned the pages. revealing lists of expenditures, inventories, sales, transfers.
"Here," Jess said tapping a line. "Three antiques that were sent to Elias from the Southern Brown bear tribe. A vase, a scroll and ceremonial cup. All were transferred out by within a week, under Cadelaria’s authority."
Sienna’s stomach tightened.
Jess flipped another page. "And here--family heirlooms. Jewels belonging to our Veythar family for generations. Yet they are no longer in our vaults. I saw a picture of her mother Mona Twindell in the news two weeks ago, wearing the Veythar crown ruby ring on her finger. That was when I realized that Cadelaria is sending our heirlooms back to her family."
Sienna’s gaze snapped to her mother-in-law, who was trembling, her tears dripping onto the marble floor.
Jess’s voice grew colder. "I have always turned a blind eye when she used our funds to subsidize her family, after all, they are not the most successful branch of the Twindell’s. But, I didn’t think she would become so brazen to stretch her fingers to the legacies of the Veythar family. She has misappropriated funds. She has stripped the estate of treasures, sending them to her kin. She has failed in her important duties as a matriarch in every position of power she holds. I have heard that you found a big mess in the office of women and cub affairs for the tribe as well."
Sienna nodded. "I did. I can’t cover for my mother-in-law on that end. One of the women she failed held her husband’s family hostage with a gun and knife just this morning, demanding to see me or she would kill everyone. Her case was terribly mishandled in the past."
Jess slapped the table. "How did Marius marry an idiot like you? You used to be sensible in the past. You had self preservation. It seems you lost all of it when I traveled and left you in charge. Your actions are not just betrayal, they are downright criminal."
Sienna held back her smirk. The though she had hidden in the back of her mind for a while now was said directly by grandmother-in-law.
Cadelaria shook her head violently, her voice breaking. "No...no, I did not commit any crimes. I didn’t steal from the vault, I just lent these things out. They were just sitting there...I thought..."
Jess slammed the ledger shut, the sound reverberating like a gavel. "Lent them out? Under whose authority? Did you check with me, Jesse, Marius or Elias? This is not all I found, that drunk brother of yours sold some of our antiques in shady dealings under the name of a fake company. Do not insult me with lies."
