Chapter 1 ROSALIND

"Mother please, stop packing these kinds of outfits in my luggage, what are you thinking?" I shook my head at her.

"You folded your underwear wrong," she announced, like this is a crisis worthy of an intervention. She stepped over the piles of clothes on my bed-combat boots, academy-regulation tops, the single formal dress she insisted I take "in case there's a ceremony or a scandal"-and zeros in on the small mountain of folded things in my travel trunk.

I was halfway through shoving my second combat knife into the side compartment of my duffel when I said, "If the academy inspects my underwear folding technique, I'll happily drop out and save us all the trouble."

She did not laugh, which was how I knew she was building up to something.

She cleared her throat. "So. Before you leave for Norsen... we should talk about a few things."

Here it comes.

"I swear, if you're about to lecture me about shining my boots-"

"Sex," she interrupted brightly.

I blinked. "I'm sorry?"

She squinted at me mischievously. "I'm thinking you are of age now, and you might want to have experiences of your own. You know there will be boys at your academy, and you may even find your mate there."

"For the love of the moon goddess, please tell me we're not about to have the conversation I think you are trying to have right now." I stared at her, hoping my suspicions were untrue.

She clasped her hands together. "Yes, we are. We are about to have the talk. I am going to be telling you how to enjoy yourself without getting pregnant."

I groaned painfully, already dreading the conversation.

"You're going to be surrounded by boys. Young men. Some of them, not very bright. With abs and urges." She clasped her hands together again, like she was discussing table manners. "I just want you to be... safe."

I stared at her. "I'm going to a military academy, not a mating campaign mother."

"Yes, but you're very pretty. And stubborn. And sometimes bad decisions happen on cots or under staircases or-"

"Oh my gods, stop talking."

She kept going. "Do you need-"

"If you say the word condoms I will set myself on fire."

Her lips twitched like she was trying not to laugh. "You could at least pretend you're open to the conversation."

"I would rather spar blindfolded with a starving rabid wolf."

"So dramatic," she muttered.

I threw a rolled shirt at her, and she flicked it off with two fingers like it personally offended her.

"Mother please.. No! I won't be needing any of that lecture, the other girls at your seamstress's school may need your motherly insight to what sex should or should not be." I said, rolling my eyes at her.

Her expression changed, and I knew what was coming. "Do you really have to go? I know you are old enough to do whatever you want, but does it have to be that far away? Peanut, would you stay back home at least for a year, for your mother's sake?"

"Mother, we talked about this. I have to go, and you know why. I said, holding her hand.

Tears rolled down her cheeks. "You don't have to go peanut. You are only about to be twenty-one, you do not have to worry about our lands, we are okay. We have enough warriors that protect us, we are safe, and there are no looming threats."

I knew that, all of that was true. There were no looming threats for now but I could not help but think back to four years ago, when my bright pink world had darkened into something far worse than looming threats. We were a pack of peace loving rogue wolves, we never sought to take what we did not own and expansion was never our purpose but we welcomed every rogue wolf that needed food, clothing and shelter.

We thrived and prospered until one day, when the king of the lycan kingdom of Narth decided it was time for war. Two years of warring with Narth, one of the strongest lycan kingdoms to ever exist and still we could not be subdued, we had no fancy uniforms, no fancy armory, just pure power and the will to live.

Most importantly, we had my older brother Rivan. He led the northern faction into the war fearlessly at nineteen, winning many battles and always bringing peonies and pennies back home for me until one day. I was waiting at the city gates for him as usual and when I saw some of the warriors I knew from the northern faction, I was happy, the moon goddess had heard my prayers and my brother was home safe.

The warriors walked in, one after the other, each one looking more devastated than the last and then I saw him, my brother but this time he did not walk back in with his own feet, he was carried in by a boy around his age. Blonde hair, dark grey eyes, blood smeared across his face and chest. That was the last time I ever prayed to the moon goddess.

I moved closer, the fastest I had ever moved in my whole life, and I saw it clearly, a dagger rested in my brother's chest, and I knew in that instant my life was never going to be the same again. My starry nights were filled with darkness, and my dreams turned into nightmares. Everyone said he was a hero, his blood ended the war, he sacrificed himself for his people but I was never going to see it that way not as long as those grey eyes got to see the rising of the sun everyday while my brother laid in the dirt.

I was never going to forget those ice-cold grey eyes. Aklan Draven.

I was seventeen, he was nineteen, and I remembered the way he looked at me when he dropped my brother's body at my father's feet-not with regret, not with mercy. Just cold, blank duty.

My mother tried a different angle. A softer voice. "You don't have to do this, Rosa. The academy isn't the only way. You could train here. Or take the healer exams. Or study diplomacy with your aunt. You're not weak, no matter what anyone-"

"I need to go," I cut in.

Her eyes searched mine, and I knew she saw it-the steel, the stubbornness, the four-year-old wound that never scabbed over.

"Rosalind-"

"Please don't try to make me stay."

Her shoulders dropped with resignation. "I just don't want to lose my daughter the way I lost my son."

"I'm not Rivan," I said quietly.

"I know," she rubbed her temple, a small smile curved her lips. "He was born with teeth. You were born with fire."

She stepped forward, cupped my face in her hands, and pressed a kiss to my forehead the same way she did when I was five and refused to come inside during rainstorms.

"Come back to me, Rosalind. No matter what you think you owe the dead."

I did not answer. I could not because I was not sure she would be getting her little peanut even if I was able to make it back.

She left without another word, and the room felt heavier when she was gone.

I did not pack for a few minutes. I just stood there, breathing around the ache in my chest. Then I grabbed my coat and slipped out the back door.

Our yard was small, tucked behind the tree line, wild moss and stones and the smell of pine. The grave marker sat beneath the old oak tree-simple, carved with his name and the symbol of our pack.

Rivan Rougeworth. My brother, my protector, my hero.

My knees met the earth before I realized I had dropped to the floor.

"Hey," I whispered, fingers tracing the bark of the tree like it was his hand. "I'm leaving. I'm going to Norsen miltary academy."

The wind stirred the branches above me, whispering in that way that almost sounded like his breath.

"I know you would laugh and tell me not to get myself killed, but I can't stay here, not while he's still walking free."

My throat burned, and I blinked hard, but the tears slipped out anyway.

"I'm going to get stronger," I told him. "Strong enough to carry our name. Strong enough to make the Lycan prince bleed for what he did. I will avenge you, my brother, I swear it."

A few hot tears dropped into the moss. I was going to give myself that much, but no more because I could no longer be soft after this day, and then I stood, tall and ready for what was to come.

I wiped my face with the heel of my hand, swallowed the grief back into its cage, and went inside to collect my things.

My father was already outside by the car, trunk open by the time I got out. The engine was running, exhaust curling into the chill morning air, and my voyage into my new life was about to begin.

I stopped at the path, and looked back at our house.. the worn brick, the windows glowing softly with lamplight, my mother's shadow moving in the kitchen.

I made myself a promise.

If I ever made it back, I would not come back weak. I would not be the girl without a wolf, I would not be the sister that was left behind.

I would come back stronger.

And Aklan Draven would regret the day he didn't die alongside my brother.