Chapter 1 No.1

On the night before my eighteenth birthday, I baked my heart into a cake for my Alpha, Kaelen. I was sure he was my fated mate, the other half of my soul.

But as I approached his office to give it to him, I overheard his plan. He was staging a fake family with another she-wolf, Seraphina, and a borrowed Rogue pup, all just to make me back off.

Then, a side effect of my impending First Shift let me hear his true thoughts, a roar of contempt that struck me like a physical blow.

"I will not allow a weak, pathetic Omega to be my Luna!"

The cake, my heart, slipped from my numb fingers and shattered on the floor. The agony of his rejection was so absolute it triggered my First Shift right there in the hallway.

The man I believed was my destiny saw me as nothing more than an inconvenience to be discarded.

I fled into the forest, my bones breaking and reforming as I transformed into something I never knew I could be: a legendary white dire wolf. After the pain subsided, I sent a message to my brother, telling him I was leaving the pack forever. Then I walked to my father's old forge and burned every memento, every gift, every last piece of the boy I once loved, until they were nothing but ash.

Chapter 1

Elara POV:

On the eighteenth day since I decided to give up on my mate, Alpha Alaric, I cut my hair.

The long, dark strands that fell to my waist, a symbol of submission and softness, now lay in a heap on the cold tile floor. I stared at my reflection, at the girl with a sharp, chin-length bob and eyes that held a storm I was only just beginning to command.

My fingers, still trembling slightly, dialed the number on the disposable phone. It was a number I had memorized but never dared to use, a ghost from a life I barely remembered.

The call connected on the second ring. A deep, calm voice, laced with an authority that felt both foreign and familiar, answered. "This is Kaelen."

My own voice was a fragile whisper. "Father... it's Elara."

A sharp intake of breath on the other end. "Elara? My little moonbeam. What's wrong?"

The dam I had so carefully constructed inside me threatened to break. "I need to come home," I said, the words catching in my throat.

He was silent for a moment, the weight of years of separation hanging between us. "You told me you wanted to stay," he said gently, but I could hear the confusion, the hurt. "You said your place was with the Blackwood pack. With him."

"He's holding his bonding ceremony," I forced the words out, each one a fresh tear in my soul. "With someone else. I can't stay here anymore."

The pain in his voice was immediate, a father's protective rage echoing across the miles. "I see. He finally broke my little girl's heart. Don't you worry about a thing, Elara. I'll arrange everything. You just tell me when."

"Soon," I promised, my voice thick with unshed tears.

After hanging up, a strange, hollow calm settled over me. I walked through the silent pack house, my footsteps echoing in the vast emptiness. A light was on under Alaric's study door.

Against my better judgment, I found myself holding a folder. Inside was a patrol optimization plan I'd spent weeks developing for the pack, a useless attempt to prove my worth as more than just an Omega.

My knuckles hovered over the dark wood of the door before I finally knocked.

"Enter."

The sound of his voice, that deep timbre that used to be my comfort, was now just a cold, hard thing. I pushed the door open.

Alaric sat behind his massive desk, the air around him crackling with the sheer force of his Alpha presence. He was power incarnate, his shoulders broad, his jaw set, his gaze intense. He didn't look up.

"Alpha," I began, my voice small. "I finished the patrol analysis you requested..."

He held up a hand, cutting me off. His eyes were distant, a faint silver glow in their depths that told me he was engaged in a mind-link. The mind-link was a sacred connection between pack members, a silent way to communicate thoughts and feelings. Alphas could use it to command warriors, mates could use it to share their deepest secrets. Right now, his was a private line, one I was not on.

But I could feel the edges of it, the warmth that bled from his concentration. It was a tenderness he hadn't shown me in a year.

And I knew who he was talking to.

A ghost of his words brushed against my consciousness, not meant for me, but impossible to ignore. "The ceremony will have the finest of everything, Seraphina. Cost is not an issue."

The words were a physical blow, knocking the air from my lungs. My chest tightened, a familiar ache spreading through me.

I remembered when I was eight, newly arrived and terrified in this pack, how he had found me cornered by older wolf pups who were taunting me for being a motherless Omega. Alaric, only a teenager himself, had thrown them off me with a snarl, his Alpha power flaring for the first time. He had stood over me, a fierce guardian.

When I was ten, he gave me a small wolf figurine, carved from a moonstone that glowed in the dark. He told me it would keep the nightmares away. It had.

For years, that protectiveness, that unique gentleness, was mine and mine alone.

Then came my seventeenth birthday. The mate bond, a gift from the Moon Goddess herself, had snapped into place between us. The recognition was instantaneous and overwhelming. His scent-a heady mix of pine after a rainstorm and something wild, like ozone-had flooded my senses. My heart had hammered against my ribs, and my inner wolf had howled a single, possessive word: Mine!

Under the moonlight, I had confessed what I felt, what I knew we were.

His reaction had been swift and brutal. His eyes had turned cold, his voice laced with the terrifying power of an Alpha's Command. "You are an Omega," he'd roared, the force of his words pinning me in place. "Do you think you can destabilize my position with this fantasy?"

And then, he had uttered the words that had shattered my soul. The words of the formal rejection ritual.

"I, Alaric Blackwood, reject you, Elara Vance, as my mate."

I had been too stunned, too broken, to give the required response. But now, standing in his study, watching him plan his life with another woman, I knew what I had to do. I had to accept the rejection. I had to sever the last thread of this cursed blessing myself.

He was still lost in his mental conversation. I didn't exist. Silently, I placed the folder on the corner of his desk and backed out of the room, closing the door on the man who held my heart, and my future, in his careless hands.