Chapter 4

Elara Vance's POV:

His words, dripping with condescension and disgust, hung in the silent air. The crowd watched, expecting me to break, to dissolve into tears or retreat in shame.

They were wrong.

The agonizing pain in my chest, the shock, the betrayal-it all coalesced into a single point of icy, resolute calm. The world seemed to slow down, the murmuring crowd and the rustling leaves fading into a dull hum. All I could see was his face, the handsome features twisted into a mask of righteous deceit.

*Make him feel our pain,* Lyra whispered, her voice not a hot roar of anger, but a cold, deadly hiss.

I took a step forward. Then another. My eyes were locked on his.

He saw the look on my face and for a fraction of a second, a flicker of unease crossed his features. He took an involuntary half-step back before catching himself, puffing out his chest to reassert his dominance.

"Ryker, just make her leave," Seraphina whined, clutching his arm. "She's scaring me."

I stopped directly in front of him, so close I could see the faint stubble on his jaw, smell the scent of his sweat and his lies.

And then I moved.

The sound was like a whipcrack in the stunned silence. *Slap.*

I put every ounce of my grief, my rage, and my shattered love into it. My hand connected with his cheek with a force that sent a shockwave up my arm.

Ryker's head snapped to the side. Five perfect, red fingerprints blossomed on his skin.

A collective gasp went through the crowd. An Omega. I had just struck a powerful warrior, a Gamma candidate, in front of his entire pack.

My hand throbbed, trembling from the impact, but my voice was as steady as stone. "That was for the Moon Goddess," I said, my voice low and shaking with fury. "For blaspheming her sacred rites."

Tears finally welled in my eyes, not of weakness, but of a heart that had been utterly broken.

"You lie," I spat, my voice rising. "Swear on your mother's soul, Ryker! Swear to me right now that our mark is a fake!"

To invoke the spirit of a dead relative in a sworn oath was one of the most sacred, most binding acts in our world. To lie on such an oath was to invite a curse.

The slap had stunned him, but the oath stunned him more. He was momentarily speechless, his perfect lie faltering under the weight of my challenge.

Then the humiliation of being struck by an Omega, of being challenged so publicly, crashed over him. His face contorted, the carefully crafted mask of the noble son melting away to reveal the raging beast beneath.

"You bitch!" he roared, shoving Seraphina aside. "You're dead!"

He lunged for me, his hands reaching for my throat.

"Ryker, stop!" Leo Finch shouted, moving to intervene. "No violence!"

But Ryker was beyond reason. He batted Leo aside as if he were a fly. I tried to scramble back, but he was too fast, too strong.

He missed my throat, but his hand closed around my upper arm like a vice. He twisted, intending to drag me away, to throw me out like trash.

A sickening *crack* echoed in the sudden silence.

An explosion of white-hot agony shot from my shoulder down to my fingertips. A scream was torn from my throat, raw and piercing.

My arm was bent at a horrifying, unnatural angle. Dislocated. The pain was so intense it stole my breath, black spots dancing in my vision.

The crowd gasped again, this time in horror. Even in a world of warriors, this was too much. To so brutally injure a she-wolf, an Omega, over a dispute was an act of inexcusable cruelty.

Ryker froze, his own rage momentarily eclipsed by shock at what he'd done. He hadn't meant to injure me so severely, but his loss of control had led to this.

But it was too late to take it back. He snarled, doubling down on his cruelty to cover his mistake. "You asked for it! Ungrateful slut!"

The pain was a tidal wave, threatening to pull me under. But Lyra, and the core of iron will within me, refused to let me break. I bit my lip hard enough to draw blood, the sharp tang of it grounding me.

I staggered, but I did not fall. I raised my head and met his furious gaze with one of my own, filled with nothing but pure, unyielding hatred.