LOGINSophia
Checking my reflection in my small mirror, I tuck a few strands of hair behind my ear, which have escaped from my braid. Running my hand over my white dress, I try to smoothen it as much as I can. Honoring the Moon Goddess, all the she-wolves wear white, especially the unmated she-wolves.
This is the only nice dress that I own that I have been wearing for the past few years on the Red Moon. But since tonight is Full Moon Ball, I decided to wear it even though it is not Red Moon because I want to look a bit presentable in front of others.
Wiping my face with the small hand towel, I once again check my reflection before I head out towards the training ground to help others prepare the ground for the Full Moon shift.
All the unmated wolves will try to find their mates during the ball. And later, when midnight strikes, everyone would come outside and shift into their wolves and go for the run. Newly mated wolves will celebrate their unions while the other will run alongside their family and friends.
I join a group of pack members setting up tables and chairs for the post-ball feast. Almost everyone leaves as soon as I join the table, and moves to work on the other table. I can hear their taunts directed towards me and the sound of their laughs that they are having at my expanse.
But not paying attention to their words, I keep my focus on the work at hand; the sooner I finish here, the sooner I can get back into the safety of my room.
I am not allowed to attend the Full Moon ball as per my father's order because he is embarrassed to be associated with me. Joke on him, his blood runs through my veins, even if he want he can never turn his face from this truth.
Just as I finish setting up one of the last tables, I feel a rough shove from behind. I stumble but manage to catch myself before falling.
"Watch where you're going, bitch," a voice sneers.
I turn to see Kane, one of the warriors, glaring at me with a smirk on his face. His smirk identical to Cynthia's a strong giveaway he is her nephew.
Not only look, but it seems like they even share the same mean streak. Maybe it is their blood.
"Sorry, Kane," I say, trying to keep my voice steady. "I didn't see you there."
"Yeah, well, maybe you should pay more attention," he snaps, stepping closer. "Or maybe you are seeking opportunities to get closer to me." His eyes move up and down my body, causing a shiver to run down my spine in disgust.
I feel a surge of anger but force myself to stay calm.
"I am not interested in you." Keeping my face neutral, I look at him, "In fact, if anything, you disgust me."
His smirk falters, replaced by a flash of anger.
You should watch your mouth, Sophia," he snarls, grabbing my throat. "You don't get to talk to me like that."
He closes his fingers around my throat, blocking my airways. Everyone stops doing whatever they are doing and looks in our direction.
It is becoming difficult for me to breathe, and I try to free myself by clawing his hands away from my neck.
"Let go of me, Kane." My voice comes out choked as my vision becomes blurry due to lack of oxygen.
Suddenly, a large gray wolf comes out of nowhere and attacks Kane. I hear screams of horror coming from some she-wolves, along with Cynthia's screams.
My vision turns hazy as I feel myself losing control of my body. I begin to fall down as my eyes shut.
Even before I could fall down, a strong pair of arms wrapped around me while holding me close.
A strange comfort washes over me while my nose registers the most amazing and intoxicating smell I have ever smelled.
I am trying to fight against the darkness and forcing my eyes to open, but I am failing miserably.
Third Person POVNeither of them speaks on the way back.There is nothing to say. Jake has June and Lucas has Caleb, and the forest moves around them in the dark while both brothers run with everything they have, and the silence between them is not comfortable or familiar the way their silences usually are. It is the kind that comes when words would make something more real than either person is ready for it to be. They had felt him forty minutes ago. There is no better word for what happens when Caleb's wolf reaches through the bond between the three of them. It is not a howl. It is not a call. It is more like a hand thrown out in the dark, desperate and without direction, just reaching, just broadcasting existence the way an animal does when it is too far gone for strategy. Jake is mid-sentence when it hits him, standing in the packhouse with a map spread across the table, studying the surrounding territories for any clue about where his brother might be. He does not finish the
CalebI have never believed I could lose.That is not arrogance exactly, or maybe it is, but it has never felt like arrogance from the inside. It has always felt like fact. I have been the strongest person in every room I have walked into since I was seventeen years old. I have fought things that should have broken me and walked away from every single one of them, and somewhere along the way that stopped feeling like luck and started feeling like the natural order of things. Like the world had simply agreed that Caleb does not go down.I believed that completely.I still believe it.But something shifted when I found her.My vision blurs at the edges and I blink it back, pressing my palm harder against the wound in her chest, and I keep talking because talking means I am still here and she is still here and this is not over."I used to think it was just me," I say quietly into her hair. "That the reason I never quit, never stayed down, never let anything finish me off, was because of
CalebShe is still smiling.That is the thing that breaks me open completely. June is sitting in my arms with a silver dagger buried in her chest and her eyes half-closed and her heartbeat stuttering under my hands, and she is smiling. That small, real, private smile that I have spent months learning the difference between. The one that means something to her. The one she does not give out easily.It is the most wrong thing I have ever seen in my life.I pull her closer and my eyes tear through the cell looking for anything, anything at all, some solution sitting in the corners of this rotting place that my mind has missed. There is nothing. Stone walls. A dying lantern. Blood on the floor that belongs to too many people now. My gaze keeps moving anyway because stopping means accepting what I am feeling through the bond and I cannot do that. I cannot.Her heartbeat slows by another degree.I feel it the way I feel everything from her now, directly, like it is happening inside my own c
JuneI take a step toward her.And then another.Tanya watches me close the distance between us and something shifts in her expression, the satisfaction flickering, recalibrating, trying to decide what my movement means. She holds her ground. Her chin stays up. She is still operating inside the version of this where she has already won.My fist connects with her jaw before she finishes that thought.The crack of it fills the cell and Tanya's head snaps sideways and she stumbles hard into the stone wall, one hand flying up to her face. She makes a sound that is more surprise than pain, like she genuinely did not expect this, like she thought I would stand there and argue with her about what she deserves and what she does not.I do not argue.I reach for her and she swings back, wild and off-balance, her fist catching my cheekbone hard enough to make my vision blur for half a second. She is not trained. I feel that immediately in the way she moves, all desperation and no form, throwing
JuneSomething moves through me from the top of my skull down to the soles of my feet like cold water finding every crack, filling every space, settling into me until I am absolutely, completely, terrifyingly calm.The mark on his neck is wrong in a way that I feel before I fully understand it. The skin around it is bruised dark, purpling outward from a center that looks infected and angry and rotting at its edges. It does not look like something that was given. It looks like something that was taken. Forced into skin that never consented to it, that has been fighting it ever since, and losing the fight slowly in the most awful and visible way.Someone put their mark on him.On my mate.I stare at it for a moment that stretches longer than it should.Somewhere underneath the cold that has settled into me, something is burning. I can feel it distantly, the way you feel a fire in another room, present and real but separate from where you are standing right now. Rage, probably. The kind
Caleb Tanya steps closer again. Slowly. Like she already belongs in my space. The lantern light flickers across her face while she crouches in front of me, her eyes fixed on mine with that same obsessive softness that makes rage crawl beneath my skin. “You still look at me like you hate me,” she murmurs quietly. I pull harder against the silver chains around my wrists. Pain slices through my skin instantly. “I do hate you.” Instead of anger, she smiles. Like hearing that means something to her. Like even my hatred is enough attention to make her happy. “You’ll stop eventually,” she whispers. “Once you understand that I love you more than she ever could.” The bond inside my chest burns harder at her words. Like she is somewhere close. My June is close. I know she is near. My wolf stirs violently beneath the silver poisoning our system, reacting to her presence instinctively. Tanya doesn't notice the change in me... that my wolf is fighting against the effects of silver
SophiaPain courses through me as Mikhail’s teeth sink into my neck, but there’s a strange comfort in it. It’s the pain of the bond being sealed, the pain of finally belonging somewhere. The sharp sting turns into a wave of warmth that spreads through my body.As he holds me close, his teeth retractin
SophiaYou will fulfill all the duties of a mate because that is what you are required to do. You will give my wolf what he wants from you.His words keep echoing in my mind, but my heart refuses to acknowledge them because it still believes there will be more to this mate bond. Maybe if I continue to
MikhailThe pack members settle into their seats, utensils clinking against plates and low murmurs filling the dining hall. I can't see their faces, but I can feel the change in their feeling as the grief is slightly lessened by the comfort of knowing their brothers are in the company of the Moon God
MikhailI could feel Sophia's joy when Alexei was here.And I don't like it, especially my wolf.I don't want her as my mate, but until she is, I don't like whatever is brewing between her and Alexei,So, will it be okay for her to be with him after I reject her?This thought doesn't sit right with me."W







