Chapter 1

On my nineteenth birthday, my fated mate rejected me in front of three hundred wolves—and chose my sister instead.

"I, Alpha Damon Kane of Silvercrest, reject you, Sera Vale, as my mate and Luna."

The words hit me like silver bullets. The Great Hall went dead silent. Three hundred wolves stared at me, waiting for me to shatter.

I stood alone in the center of the ceremony circle, wearing the white dress I had sewn myself, because no one in this pack would waste money on the wolfless omega.

That's what they called me. Wolfless. Broken. The Beta's defective daughter whose wolf never came, not at thirteen, not at sixteen, not ever. A she-wolf with no wolf is lower than a rogue. Lower than dirt.

But the Moon Goddess had given me one thing. One impossible, cruel gift.

At midnight, when Damon Kane turned eighteen and I turned sixteen, the mate bond had snapped into place between us like a golden chain. The future Alpha of Silvercrest, bound to the pack's shame.

For three years, he hid it. For three years, I waited, foolish and faithful, believing that on my nineteenth birthday, he would finally claim me.

Instead, he stood on the dais, reached back, and pulled my stepsister Ivy forward by the hand.

Ivy. Beautiful, silver-furred, perfect Ivy—wearing a gown that cost more than everything I owned, and a smirk she didn't even bother to hide.

"Ivy Vale will be my Luna," Damon announced, his voice carrying to every corner of the hall. "Silvercrest deserves a queen with a wolf. Not a defect the Goddess forgot to finish."

The laughter started somewhere in the back. It spread like wildfire.

My father—the Beta, my own blood—stood beside the dais. He didn't defend me. He raised his glass.

I waited for the pain to kill me. Everyone knows a rejected wolf collapses, screams, begs. I'd seen it once. The she-wolf had clawed at her own chest until they sedated her.

I looked at Damon Kane. At the storm-gray eyes I had loved since I was sixteen. At the man I had secretly patched up after border fights, whose fever I had sat through for three sleepless nights last winter while Ivy partied in the city.

And I felt the bond between us—that golden, glowing chain—waiting for my answer.

"Say it," Damon commanded, jaw tight. "Accept the rejection, and we can all move on."

He expected tears. He expected me to crawl.

I lifted my chin.

"I, Sera Vale," I said, my voice ringing clear across the silent hall, "accept your rejection."

The bond snapped.

Damon staggered.

The Alpha of Silvercrest—the strongest wolf in the territory—grabbed the edge of the dais, his face draining white, a choked sound tearing out of his throat like I had just ripped something out of his chest.

Because I felt nothing.

No collapse. No screaming. No pain.

The hall stopped laughing. Ivy's smirk flickered. Wolves whispered—that's not how a rejection works, the rejected one is supposed to break—

I turned and walked toward the doors, my footsteps the only sound in the Great Hall, while behind me my fated mate gasped like a drowning man.

I made it exactly ten steps into the cold night air before it happened.

Deep in my chest—in the hollow, silent place where a wolf should have lived for nineteen years—something stirred.

Something enormous.

Something that had been sleeping.

And for the first time in my life, I heard a voice inside my head. Ancient. Furious. Awake.

"Finally," it growled. "He's gone. Now they'll all learn what they buried."