Iris POV
I'm going to throw up.
My hands won't stop shaking as I stand at the edge of the bonfire clearing, watching Damien walk toward the center of the Harvest Moon Festival. Three years. Three years of secret kisses behind the training grounds, whispered promises that we'd announce our relationship when the time was right, stolen moments when no one was watching.
Tonight is finally that night.
Except Damien isn't walking toward me.
He's walking toward my cousin Lyra.
No, I whisper, but the word dies in my throat as he takes her hand. Her perfectly manicured hand attached to her perfectly strong body with her perfectly thick auburn hair that catches the firelight like living flame.
My simple silver dress suddenly feels like a costume. A joke.
The gathered wolves fall silent as Damien raises his voice, projecting across the clearing where both Silvercrest and Shadowpaw Packs have gathered for the sacred moon celebration.
I have an announcement, he says, and my heart hammers so hard I think my ribs might crack.
This is it. He's going to tell everyone about us. He promised.
Lyra Thorne has agreed to be my mate.
The world stops spinning.
We'll complete the bonding ceremony at the next full moon, Damien continues, pulling Lyra close. She beams up at him like she's won a prize.
The clearing erupts in cheers and howls of celebration. Wolves surge forward to congratulate them. My mother's face, I see it across the fire, floods with relief. My father simply turns away, already dismissing me from his thoughts.
Nobody looks at me.
Nobody notices the girl in the silver dress whose world just shattered into a thousand pieces.
Except Lyra. She finds my eyes through the crowd and smirks. A small, satisfied curve of her lips that says everything: I won. You lost. You were never even competition.
My wolf howls inside me—a pathetic, weak sound that makes my chest ache. She's as small and useless as the rest of me. The runt Omega who can barely shift, who's never been strong enough, fast enough, good enough.
Iris? Someone touches my arm. I flinch. It's Mira, one of the younger pack members. Are you okay? You look
I'm fine, I lie, already backing away from the bonfire. Away from the celebration. Away from Damien's arm wrapped around Lyra's waist like she belongs there.
Like I never existed at all.
I turn and run.
The forest swallows me whole, branches catching at my dress, tearing the delicate fabric. I don't care. Tears blur my vision until I can barely see where I'm going. My lungs burn. My weak wolf whimpers with every step, begging me to stop, to shift, to do something other than run blindly into the darkness.
But I can't stop. If I stop, I'll have to feel it. All of it.
Three years of my life, wasted on a man who looked at me and saw nothing worth keeping.
I crash through underbrush, my nice shoes—the ones I saved three months to buy—catching on roots. I stumble, fall, scrape my palms on rough bark. Get up. Run again.
Someone stronger, prettier, better, Damien had said those exact words six months ago when I'd asked why we had to keep hiding. I'd laughed it off, thinking he was joking. Thinking he meant other girls, not me.
I was so stupid.
The Veil Woods close around me, the neutral territory between packs where the air hums with old magic and moonlight filters through leaves like liquid silver. My grandmother used to bring me here when I was small, before she died. Before I understood that being weak meant being worthless.
I collapse near the Moonstone Pool, the sacred water reflecting the full moon overhead. My sobs echo in the silence. Ugly, broken sounds that make my throat raw.
Why? I scream at the moon, at the Moon Goddess who supposedly watches over all wolves. Why did you make me like this? Weak and pathetic and not enough!
The moon doesn't answer. It never does.
I press my forehead against the cool stone, feeling the ancient magic pulse underneath. Wolves worship the Moon Goddess. We pray to her, celebrate her, believe she guides our paths and chooses our fated mates.
But she made a mistake with me. She gave me a wolf too weak to protect me, a body too fragile to fight, a heart too stupid to see when someone was using me.
I'm done, I whisper to the stones. I'm done being weak. I'm done being invisible. I'm done letting people throw me away like I'm nothing.
The words feel hollow. Because what can I possibly do? I'm still the same pathetic Omega I was an hour ago. Saying I'm done doesn't change that.
But something shifts in the air—a sudden tension that makes my skin prickle.
Then the pain hits.
It explodes in my chest like lightning, burning through every nerve ending. I scream, doubling over as invisible fire races along my bones. My wolf howls—not in weakness this time, but in recognition.
No. No no no.
The mating bond. It's snapping into place.
Not now, I gasp, clutching my chest. Please not now
But the bond doesn't care about timing or convenience or the fact that I just had my heart ripped out in front of two entire packs. It pulls, demanding I look, demanding I acknowledge.
I lift my head.
Across the clearing, near the forest edge where Shadowpaw keeps their dangerous wolves contained during public gatherings, golden eyes meet mine.
They belong to something that's barely human anymore. Something massive and covered in dark fur, chained to a silver post that burns its flesh. Something that everyone whispers about in fear.
Kael Blackfang. The cursed Alpha.
The monster.
And the Moon Goddess just decided he's my fated mate.