Chapter 3

Elara Vance POV:

Five years later.

I still remembered the cold. The way the forest floor had felt against my cheek as my blood soaked into the earth. The distant howls of the rogues fading as they fled from something larger, something that never revealed itself. I had lain there for what felt like hours, drifting in and out of consciousness, my hand pressed uselessly against the gaping wound in my stomach. I was dying. I had accepted it.

Then, a light. A gruff voice. Rough hands lifting me from the dirt. An old hermit-a wolfless outcast like I would become-had found me while foraging. He had no love for packs, but he had a debt to the Moon Goddess he never explained. He stitched my abdomen with fishing line and fed me broth until I could stand. The scar on my stomach was a thick, jagged reminder of that night, hidden beneath my clothes. The scar on my face-a thin, silvery line from temple to jaw-came later, from a low-hanging branch I hadn't seen as I stumbled through the woods in the weeks after, still weak and half-blind with grief. That one, the world could see. It marked me as broken. As prey.

He had died a year later. I had been alone ever since.

The clatter of empty bottles in the dumpster was the soundtrack to my life. I moved on autopilot, my motions numb and mechanical as I cleaned the garbage from the back alley of The Rusty Mug, a dive bar on the forgotten fringe of the Blackwood Pack territory. My eyes were as cold and empty as the bottles I was tossing.

A faint, silvery scar traced a line from my temple to my jaw, a permanent reminder of the day I lost everything. Beneath my stained uniform, a far uglier scar stretched across my abdomen-a testament to the night I should have died. That one I kept hidden. I had survived, but Lyra, my beautiful inner wolf, had not. The trauma of the rejection and the attack had severed our connection. I was Wolfless, a cripple in a world defined by a second soul. The pain of her absence was a constant, hollow ache that never faded.

"Hurry it up, Elara!" a sharp voice barked. Cara Holt, the bar's owner and a distant, bitter cousin of Isolde's, stood in the doorway, arms crossed. "You're not paid to daydream."

She took a twisted pleasure in tormenting me, a daily reminder of my fall from grace. It was her small way of currying favor with the new Luna of the Crescent Moon Pack.

"The Warrior Trials for the Blackwood Pack start tonight," Cara sneered, her eyes glittering with malice. "Don't get any stupid ideas."

A flicker of light in the vast darkness of my soul. The Trials. It was my only chance. A path to strength, to a position, to the power I needed to one day make them all pay.

I kept my head down, my hands continuing their work. Five years had taught me patience. Arguing with Cara would only feed her cruelty. I said nothing.

But my silence was its own offense. Cara's eyes narrowed. She had wanted a reaction, a spark she could extinguish. My refusal to give her one only stoked her fury.

"What's the matter, Elara? Wolfless and mute now?" she taunted, stepping closer. "You think you can just walk into those Trials? You're nothing. Less than nothing."

I straightened slowly, meeting her gaze with a carefully blank expression. "I'm just here to work, Cara."

The words were submissive, but something in my posture-the ghost of the woman I used to be-must have pricked her pride. Her face twisted.

"You don't get to look at me like that," she hissed. "Like you're still better than me." She snapped her fingers. Two hulking dishwashers emerged from the kitchen, wiping their greasy hands on their aprons.

I tried to fight, but without Lyra, my strength was merely human. They overpowered me in seconds, their meaty hands bruising my arms.

Cara dangled a rusty key in front of my face. "Since you're so eager to train, I'll give you a quiet place to 'prepare'."

They dragged me across the alley to an old, dilapidated warehouse. The air inside was thick with the stench of mold and decay.

"I'll let you out when the Trials are over," Cara said, shoving me inside.

The heavy iron door slammed shut, the sound of the lock turning echoing in the oppressive darkness. I scrambled to my feet, my hands running along the cold, unyielding metal. The windows were boarded shut. I was trapped.

A wave of helpless rage washed over me. I pounded on the door, screaming until my throat was raw, but only silence answered. Eventually, I slumped to the floor, the fight draining out of me.

After a few moments, I forced myself to move, to search for a way out. My hands groped through the darkness, touching cold concrete, splintered wood, and then... something warm. And furry.

A pair of luminous gold eyes snapped open in the pitch-black, wide with fear.

I scrambled backward, my heart hammering against my ribs. A sliver of moonlight pierced through a crack in the door, illuminating the corner. A small boy, no older than five or six, was huddled there, wrapped in a tattered coat. He wasn't human. I could smell the faint, terrified scent of a wolf pup.

My breath caught in my throat. A phantom ache shot through my womb. He was so small, so fragile. He reminded me of the child I'd never had the chance to hold. The hard shell around my heart cracked.

I slowed my breathing, trying to appear non-threatening. "Hey," I whispered. "It's okay. I'm not going to hurt you. Who are you?"

The pup didn't speak, just watched me with those huge, wary golden eyes. I noticed he was holding his leg at an odd angle, as if it were injured.

My instincts took over. I tore a strip from the hem of my cheap uniform and slowly, carefully, moved toward him. He flinched when I got close, but he didn't run. He seemed to catch my scent-the smell of rain and forest soil that always clung to me-and his posture relaxed fractionally.

When my fingers gently touched his arm, he trembled but allowed the contact.

In that moment, I forgot about my own desperation. I was no longer a prisoner. I was a protector. And in this dark, forgotten warehouse, there was a life far more vulnerable than my own.

"Don't worry," I said softly, my voice thick with an emotion I thought I'd lost forever. "I won't hurt you. We're going to get out of here together."