From Rejected Maid to the Lycan King's Queen

The clerk at the Registry couldn't look me in the eye when she turned the screen around.

My status didn't say "Luna" anymore. It said "Rogue."

My mate, Alpha Jackson, had secretly replaced me on the official paperwork three years ago with his mistress, Candida.

When I returned to the Pack House, Jackson didn't just bring Candida home; he brought a five-year-old boy he claimed was an orphan.

"This is Joey," he announced, his eyes cold and glazed over. "Since you are barren, he will be the future Alpha."

I tried to accept my fate as a servant in my own home, but they wanted me dead.

The boy, looking like an angel, brought me a bowl of soup.

"For you, Mama," he smiled.

But as I reached for it, he splashed the scalding liquid over my hands.

It wasn't just hot soup. It was laced with concentrated Wolfsbane.

As my skin sizzled and peeled, the boy threw himself on the floor, screaming that I had attacked him.

Jackson didn't check my burns. He didn't listen to my pleas.

"Submit!" he roared, using the Alpha Command to force me to my knees.

He made me apologize to the child who had just poisoned me.

That night, listening to Jackson mate with Candida in the room next to mine, the bond finally snapped.

They wanted the Luna gone? Fine.

I dialed a number I hadn't used in years.

"Hamilton," I whispered to the Lycan King. "I need a plane. And I need it to crash."

Chapter 1

Elena POV:

The fluorescent lights of the Registry hummed with a headache-inducing buzz. I stared at the screen the clerk had turned toward me. The pixels blurred, but the word in the status column was sharp enough to slice through my chest.

Rogue.

"There must be a mistake," I whispered, my voice trembling. "I am the Luna of the Blood Moon Pack. Jackson Parks is my mate."

The clerk, a young female Beta who wouldn't meet my eyes, clicked her mouse nervously.

"I'm sorry, Elena," she said, voice low. "Alpha Jackson submitted the paperwork three years ago. You were removed as 'Mate.' Yesterday, the system updated. Candida has been registered as the Luna."

My knuckles turned white against the cold metal counter.

Three years.

For three years, I had been living in the Pack House, playing the maid, managing the accounts, and waiting for him to look at me with something other than disgust. I thought it was stress. I thought it was my fault.

"And the child?" I asked, my throat dry as sandpaper.

"Joey. Registered as the Alpha's son and heir. Mother: Candida."

A low whine started in the back of my head. My inner wolf. She was usually quiet, crushed by the trauma from five years ago, but now she was howling in a grief so profound it made my knees buckle.

I remembered the day my womb was destroyed. Our Mating Ceremony. The jagged silver dagger, coated in poison, aimed at Jackson's heart. I didn't think. I jumped. The blade tore into my lower abdomen. The healers saved my life, but they told me I would never carry a pup.

Jackson had sworn it didn't matter. "You are my mate, Elena," he had said. "That is all that matters."

Lies.

I walked out into the gray afternoon. The city air smelled of exhaust and rain. I realized now why Jackson's eyes had been so cold. It wasn't just stress. It was the Alpha's Command.

He had been using his Voice on me subtly for years. Stay quiet. Don't ask questions. Submit.

Gaslighting backed by magical compulsion.

I drove back to the Pack House. My wolf hearing picked up voices before I even opened the front door.

"It is exhausting pretending to be humble, Jackson," a high-pitched voice complained. Candida.

"I know, baby," Jackson replied. His voice sounded deep, but hollow-like an echo in an empty room. "Just a little longer. The Council is old-fashioned. We have to ease them into it."

"She is still here," Candida hissed. "That barren mule."

"She is useful for the chores."

My heart stopped beating for a second. Useful for the chores.

"Daddy, can we get ice cream?" a child's voice piped up. Joey.

"Anything for you, champ," Jackson cooed.

Then, I smelled it. Pheromones. He was flooding the hallway with a thick, protective scent usually reserved for blood kin. It was overwhelming, masking everything else in the house. I took it as proof of his love for the boy, unaware that the scent was too sweet, too artificial-a mask covering something rotten.

A sharp pain twisted in my scarred abdomen.

I didn't storm in. I went to the garden, hidden behind the rose bushes, and pulled out my phone. My fingers shook as I dialed a number I hadn't used since high school.

It rang once. "Elena?"

The voice was deep, rumbling like thunder. "Alpha Hamilton," I said, strangely calm.

"Call me Hamilton. What is wrong? I feel... a disturbance."

"You always knew, didn't you? That I wasn't just an Omega."

"I knew you were special. Always."

I looked up at the gray sky. "I need a favor, Hamilton. I need a death. I need to die so I can be free."

Elena POV:

I will arrange everything, Hamilton's voice echoed in my mind through the Mind-Link. Just say the word.

Soon, I replied.

The front door slammed open. Jackson walked in.

The scent hit me first. Rotten peaches and cloying sugar. Candida's scent. It was suffocating the fresh pine smell that used to be Jackson.

He saw me in the hallway. For a second, his eyes flashed with confusion, as if trying to remember who I was, but then a dark film slid over his irises.

"Elena," he said, void of warmth. "Good. You are here."

Behind him, Candida stepped in, holding the hand of a boy who looked about five. Joey.

"This is Candida," Jackson announced, as if he hadn't been sleeping with her for three years. "And this is Joey. I found him... on the battlefield. An orphan."

Liar. The lie was so blatant it felt practiced.

"And since you cannot provide the pack with an heir," Jackson continued, eyes drilling into my stomach, "I have decided to adopt him. He will be the future Alpha."

"Hello, Mama," Joey said. He looked like an angel, but when he tilted his head up, his eyes were dead flat. Grey smoke with no light behind them.

"I am not your mother," I said quietly.

"Elena!" Jackson growled. "Be kind to the boy."

"I am feeling unwell," I said, clutching my side. Being near Candida made my skin prickle, like standing next to a high-voltage wire. "I need to go to my room."

An hour later, there was a knock. Joey entered, holding a bowl of steaming meat soup.

"Daddy said you were sick," the boy said, voice sickeningly sweet. "I brought you soup."

He walked over. My inner wolf growled. Danger.

"Put it on the table."

"Here, take it," Joey insisted. He thrust the bowl toward me.

I reached out. The moment my fingers brushed the ceramic, Joey let go. He shoved it downward.

The hot liquid splashed over my hands.

"Ah!" I gasped.

The pain was immediate and excruciating. It sizzled. Smoke rose from my skin. Wolfsbane.

"Help! Daddy! Help!" Joey screamed, throwing himself onto the floor, wailing. "She burned me! She tried to throw it at me!"

My hands were blistering, skin peeling away in red strips.

The door burst open. Jackson and Candida rushed in. Jackson saw the boy on the floor, then looked at me. His irises flooded with a glowing, angry red.

"You monster," Jackson snarled.

"Jackson, look at my hands," I pleaded, holding them up. The flesh was bubbling. "It has poison in it."

"Don't lie to me!" Jackson roared. "You are jealous because you are broken!"

Candida stood behind him. She looked at my ruined hands, and the corner of her mouth twitched upward.

Elena POV:

My hands were on fire. The Wolfsbane was working its way into my bloodstream, sending spikes of agony up my arms.

Jackson was cradling Joey, checking for injuries that didn't exist. "Jackson, please," I whispered.

He stood up, towering over me. The air in the room grew heavy, dense with his power.

"Silence!" he bellowed. "Submit!"

The command slammed into me like a physical blow. My knees hit the floor hard. My inner wolf whimpered and forced my head down, exposing my neck. I had no control.

"You will apologize to him," Jackson commanded. His voice was robotic, as if the words were being fed to him.

"I... didn't..." I tried to fight the command. Sweat broke out on my forehead.

"Apologize!"

The word vibrated through my bones.

"I'm sorry," I choked out.

"She tried to hurt the future Alpha," Candida said smoothly. "Maybe she has gone Rogue in her mind."

Jackson looked at her, and his expression softened instantly. It was terrifying-one moment a beast, the next a puppet.

"You are right," he muttered. He looked back at me with pure disdain. "Clean this mess up. Then stay in your room."

"But Jackson, the boy is scared," Candida said. "We cannot stay in the guest wing. It is too far from you."

"Take the guest room next to mine," Jackson said. "I will protect you."

He scooped Joey up and left. He didn't look back at his mate, kneeling on the floor with chemically burned hands.

I dragged myself to the bathroom. I had to bite a towel to keep from screaming as I washed the Wolfsbane off. The water felt like acid. I wrapped the raw meat in gauze, shaking uncontrollably.

I curled up on the tiles. I tried to reach for the bond. It was black. Withered.

Then, the sounds started.

The guest room shared a wall with my bedroom.

I heard the bed creak. I heard Candida giggle. "Oh, Alpha... you are so strong."

I heard Jackson groan.

My mate was mating with another woman twenty feet away.

"Candida..." he moaned. "My Luna."

The name tore through me sharper than the silver dagger.

My inner wolf stopped whimpering. She went completely silent. It was the silence of a heart stopping.

Jackson, I thought, but the Mind-Link was blocked by a wall.

I lay there, staring at the ceiling. The bond didn't just break. It dissolved.

I felt lighter, in a terrible, empty way. The love I had held for five years drained out, leaving nothing but cold resolve.

Tomorrow. Tomorrow I would execute the plan.