The tension in the clearing snapped.
Kaelen's roar was the signal. The pack surged forward as one—a wave of muscle, fur, and righteous fury. But they were no longer just charging Lucien; Luna was now a primary target, a traitor to be punished.
Lucien moved to meet them. He was a whirlwind of claws and fangs, a symphony of violence. He was not one creature, but two, fighting in horrifying harmony. He moved with the vampire's preternatural speed, a blur that dodged snapping jaws, while his wolf-born strength sent bodies flying with every swipe of his powerful arms. A young wolf lunged for his side; Lucien twisted, his crimson eye flashing, and caught the wolf by the throat, not with teeth, but with a hand. He didn't crush the windpipe. He threw the beast, yelping, back into the pack. It was a warning. A restraint that cost him dearly.
Fenris, enraged and humiliated from the moonfire burn, saw his opening. He ignored Lucien entirely and launched himself at Luna.
Luna stood her ground, her feet planted on the earth that fed her power. Her hands wove through the air, and this time, the moonfire did not form a whip. It erupted from the ground around her in a circle of glowing, silver flames—a barrier of pure celestial energy. Fenris hit the wall of fire with a sickening hiss and a scream of pure agony. He was thrown back, his snout blackened and smoking, rolling on the ground in pain.
But the barrier was a drain. Luna gasped, the color leaching from her face. Maintaining such a potent, large-scale spell was like bleeding her own life force onto the ground. She couldn't hold it forever.
Kaelen watched, his cold intelligence assessing the battlefield. He saw Lucien's unnatural restraint. He saw Luna's weakening barrier. He didn't join the chaotic attack. Instead, he circled, his ancient eyes calculating. He was waiting for the perfect moment to break them.
Lucien, distracted by the need to keep the pack from overwhelming Luna's flickering shield, missed the Alpha's maneuver. Kaelen moved not like a beast, but like a general. He didn't charge. He flowed through the chaos, using his own pack members as cover. His target wasn't Lucien's heart or throat. It was the back of his leg—a crippling blow.
The Alpha's fangs, honed by centuries of battle, sank deep into Lucien's hamstring.
A roar of pure, undiluted agony tore from Lucien's throat. It was a sound of shattered bone and severed tendon. His leg buckled. The pain was blinding, a white-hot fire that consumed all thought, all strategy. The careful control he had been exerting over the beast within him vaporized.
The Instinct took over. Completely.
His gold eye seemed to swallow the crimson one, flooding both orbs with a unified, raw glow. The man was gone. What remained was the primal core of the hybrid, a creature of pure, survivalist rage. He turned on Kaelen, his movements now devoid of any restraint. He was no longer trying to disable; he was trying to destroy.
He slammed into the Alpha with the force of a meteor. Claws that had held back now raked deep furrows across Kaelen's shoulder, drawing first blood. Not a warning shot, but a grievous wound that splattered the moss with dark, arterial crimson. The Alpha howled, more in shock than pain, stumbling back.
Seeing their Alpha wounded, the pack's attack redoubled, becoming a savage, desperate mob. Two wolves broke through Lucien's defense, their fangs aiming for his vulnerable throat.
"NO!"
Luna's voice was a raw, desperate thing. She saw him about to be overwhelmed. She saw the raw light in his eyes, the loss of the man she had glimpsed. Her barrier of moonfire vanished as she redirected every ounce of her power.
She didn't create a wall. She forged a spear.
A lance of solidified moonlight, so bright it was painful to look at, shot from her palms. It wasn't aimed at the wolves, but at the ground between them and Lucien. The impact was not an explosion of fire, but of pure, explosive force. The earth itself erupted in a spout of soil, roots, and blinding silver light.
The blast threw the attacking wolves aside like ragdolls. It also caught Lucien, who was already off-balance.
He was flung backward, crashing through the undergrowth. As he fell, one of his wildly slashing claws, still extended from his attack on Kaelen, caught Luna across the arm.
It was not a deep cut. It was a glancing blow, a searing line of fire across her upper arm. But it was enough.
First blood.
Her blood.
The moment his claw tip sliced her skin, a shockwave, silent and invisible, passed between them. It was different from the harmonious connection of before. This was a violent, painful merging. Lucien, lost in his wild state, felt the echo of her pain as if it were his own. It was a jolt of clarity in the red haze of his rage. He saw her stagger back, clutching her arm, her silver eyes wide with a pain he had caused.
And Luna, through the stinging agony of her wound, felt the surge of his raw rage, his blinding pain, his utter isolation flood into her. It was a tsunami of raw emotion that stole her breath.
The spell was cast. The blood was drawn.
The battle froze for a single, suspended heartbeat. The pack was stunned by the thunderous blast. Kaelen was bleeding heavily. Fenris was whimpering. Lucien was on the ground, the raw light in his eyes receding, replaced by a dawning, horrified comprehension as he stared at the thin line of crimson on Luna's arm.
They had clashed. Her spell had burned. His claws had drawn blood.
And in the aftermath, the world had shifted on its axis. They were no longer just two beings caught in a conflict. They were bound, now, by violence and pain, their fates irrevocably intertwined by the first spell and the first blood they had shed upon each other.