🌕 CHAPTER ONE — THE WOLF BLEEDING AT MY DOOR
The night was too still for November. The air hung heavy, tasting faintly of iron and rain as the wind toyed with the edges of Selena Hart's hair. She had just blown out the last candle when she heard it—a low, guttural sound, half-snarl, half-plea. Stepping onto her porch, she froze. A man lay crumpled at the edge of her yard, his body sprawled across the mud as if the earth itself had tried to hold him. Blood shimmered black under the moonlight, slick and endless, pooling around him like a cruel halo. For a moment, Selena thought he was already dead—until his chest hitched, the breath ragged, fragile. Her heart lurched before her thoughts caught up, and she was already moving toward him.
She dropped to her knees beside him, the damp earth soaking through her nightdress, her pulse drumming in her throat. "Hey," she whispered, her hands hovering over him, uncertain where to touch first. His skin was ice-cold, his heartbeat faint beneath trembling fingers. "Can you hear me?" The words came out more desperate than she meant them to. His eyelids fluttered, and a soft, broken sound escaped him—something between pain and warning. "Don't… touch the wound," he rasped, the syllables scraping out like glass. "Silver." The single word sliced through her calm, turning fear into disbelief. Silver only burned one kind of creature. Her breath caught. No… that's impossible.
A werewolf.
The thought alone should have sent her running into the safety of her cabin, bolting every lock behind her. But something inside her refused to move. Instead, a strange, inexplicable ache bloomed in her chest, threading through her fear until all that remained was a pull—ancient, magnetic, and terrifyingly familiar. She should have been terrified of the man bleeding at her feet, yet she couldn't look away. "I'm going to help you," she whispered, though her voice trembled with uncertainty. His lips curved faintly, the ghost of a laugh buried beneath his pain. "I knew… it would be you." Her heart stumbled. "Me? You don't even know me." His eyes cracked open then—storm-gray, piercing—and when they met hers, the world stilled. "Yes," he breathed, barely audible. "I do." And then his body went still, his weight sinking heavily into the mud.
Panic surged through her veins. She didn't think—just acted. Selena slid her arms beneath him, gritting her teeth as she dragged him toward the cabin, her muscles screaming against his weight. The forest watched in silence, the wind whispering something she couldn't understand. When she finally crossed the threshold, a sharp, searing pain flared beneath her sleeve. Gasping, she clutched her wrist, feeling the crescent mark branded there pulse like a heartbeat not her own. The glow beneath her skin was faint, silver and alive, pulsing in rhythm with his shallow breaths. "What's happening to me?" she whispered, voice trembling. But there was no time to question it. His blood was spilling too fast.
She tore open his shirt, freezing when she saw it—the silver lodged deep in his side, burning his flesh in veins of molten pain. The wound shimmered unnaturally, smoke curling from it like the earth itself rejected him. No medicine could save him. But something deeper within her—a knowing she couldn't name—rose from the pit of her soul. Her palms hovered over the wound, her breath unsteady. "Please," she whispered, to no one in particular. "Please don't die." And then, without conscious thought, her hands began to glow. A soft, silvery light unfurled from her skin, spilling across his body like moonfire made flesh.
The light sank into the wound, crackling faintly as it touched the poisoned flesh. The man's body arched, a strangled groan escaping his lips. Then, before her eyes, the silver began to move—pulled outward, unraveling like smoke chased by wind. Selena's breath caught. It was beautiful and horrifying all at once. When the last tendril of poison lifted into the air and vanished, her hands dimmed. She stumbled back, panting, staring at her trembling fingers. "That's not possible," she whispered to the quiet room. "I'm not— I can't be…" But the proof lay before her, breathing stronger now, alive because of her. "What are you?" she murmured. "What am I?"
For a long moment, the cabin was silent except for the soft rhythm of his breathing. Selena fetched water, cleaning the blood from his chest with gentle, deliberate motions. Her eyes caught the scars that mapped his skin—old wounds, healed hard and proud, carved by time and war. But it was the tattoo over his heart that made her pause. A crescent moon surrounded by ancient runes, glowing faintly in the candlelight. "Who are you?" she whispered. His hand moved suddenly, catching her wrist in a grip that was both weak and unyielding. His touch burned, not with pain but with something raw—recognition. "Don't… be afraid," he murmured, eyes fluttering open. "I'm not," she heard herself say before she even meant to. His mouth lifted at the corner, a fragile smile. "Good… because I came for you."
Her heart stuttered painfully. "What do you mean, for me?" she asked, but he was already slipping again, words fading. "You're… the Luna." The title fell between them like a dropped blade. Selena felt her throat tighten. "I don't know what that means." His gaze softened, sorrow flickering behind exhaustion. "You will," he whispered. "Soon." "Tell me your name," she demanded, her voice cracking. "Please." His lips parted, a single name falling through the silence. "Kade… Banished Alpha."
Her breath caught, the title heavy with a meaning she didn't yet understand. "Why were you running?" she asked, though part of her already feared the answer. His voice was barely a whisper. "Because he's coming." Her pulse spiked. "Who's coming?" But his eyes closed again, his body sinking into unconsciousness. Thunder rolled in the distance, soft but threatening, and rain began to tap against the windowpane like the pulse of an approaching storm.
Selena rose, wiping her hands on her skirt, heart pounding. The night outside had shifted—darker, sharper, alive with something more than wind. She moved to the door, peering into the endless shadows beyond the porch. Then she heard it—her name, carried on the breeze, low and magnetic. "Selena Hart," the voice called, rich as velvet and dangerous as sin. "I've finally found you." Her body froze. The instinct to hide battled the strange, pulling calm that anchored her feet in place. Slowly, she stepped toward the door, every breath shallow and unsteady. From the treeline, a figure emerged—tall, graceful, power radiating from him like heat from flame.
Lightning flared across the sky, illuminating a face both beautiful and terrifying. His dark eyes gleamed with knowing, his smile deliberate and slow. "You feel it, don't you?" he asked softly, his voice threading through her like smoke. "Who are you?" she whispered, gripping the doorframe to steady herself. "Malek," he said. "Alpha of the Duskwalker Clan." The name hit her like a forgotten dream. "Why are you here?" she breathed. His gaze flicked past her shoulder, toward the bed where Kade lay still and broken. "To claim what is mine." Her spine stiffened, fear colliding with anger. "I don't belong to anyone." Malek's laugh was low, dark, almost tender. "Not yet."
Rain sheeted down, and thunder cracked above as Kade groaned weakly from inside. Malek's attention shifted sharply toward the sound, his jaw flexing with quiet rage. "It seems," he murmured, "I'm not the only one who found you tonight." Selena stepped back, torn between two forces she didn't understand, her mark burning hotter beneath her skin. The cabin pulsed with a tension so thick it felt alive. Malek's eyes gleamed faintly as he whispered, "You don't understand what you are yet, Selena. But when you do—choosing between us might destroy you." The words sank into her like venom and prophecy all at once.
Inside, Kade stirred, his voice raw and commanding. "Selena… don't let him near you." Malek's head tilted toward the sound, his calm cracking into something primal. "You shouldn't have done that," he said, his tone a growl wrapped in silk. Selena's pulse thrashed. Lightning carved their silhouettes in brief, brutal flashes—one Alpha broken, one burning, both bound to her by something older than reason. The wind screamed through the trees, carrying her name like an omen. "This can't be real," she whispered, trembling. But the night already knew better.
Then came the crash. The cabin window shattered behind her in a burst of glass and rain. Kade roared her name, half-shifted, his body alight with moon-silver fury. Malek moved forward, eyes blazing, the storm bending to his will. Selena stumbled back, her heart slamming against her ribs, her world collapsing into chaos. And just before the darkness swallowed her, she saw their eyes—one gray, one black—locked on her with equal desperation.
In that final heartbeat, Selena realized the truth she could no longer deny.
The war that had once torn the world apart was beginning again—
and she was its heart.