Kieran's POV
I feel her the moment she awakens.
The cosmic shift hits me like a physical blow, stopping me mid-stride in my Northern fortress. My shamans collapse around me, gasping. The oldest one—three hundred years old and blind—lifts her head with tears streaming down her wrinkled face.
"The Starborn," she whispers. "After all these centuries, a daughter of the cosmos has finally awakened."
My wolf surges forward, demanding I go to her. Now.
"Prepare my horse," I order my beta, already striding toward the door. "I'm going south."
"Alpha Kieran, the Southern territories belong to the Alpha King. If you cross—"
"I don't care." The words come out as a growl. "Something just shifted in the balance of our world. If Dante Silvercrest has half a brain, he'll already know that."
But as I ride south through the frozen wastelands, pushing my horse harder than I should, I feel something else through my shaman magic. Pain. Suffering. A bond twisted into something dark and punishing.
The Starborn was rejected.
Rage floods through me so hot I nearly fall from my saddle. What kind of fool rejects a gift from the universe itself?
It takes me two days of hard riding to reach the Forbidden Veilwood. My horse refuses to enter—even my powerful northern stallion fears this place. So I continue on foot, following the pull of cosmic energy that calls to my shaman blood like a beacon.
The Veilwood tries to kill me. Shadows reach for my throat. Trees whisper terrible things. Dark magic claws at my mind, trying to drive me insane.
But I push through. I've survived three hundred years by being stronger than the things that want me dead.
When I finally reach the temple clearing, I stop breathing.
She's standing outside the ruins, glowing like a fallen star. Silver-white hair floats around her as if moved by an invisible wind. Her violet eyes swirl with galaxies. The Starborn mark on her chest blazes through her torn dress—constellations that move and shift across her skin.
But what stops my heart is the look on her face. Not triumph. Not joy.
Grief. Exhaustion. The bone-deep weariness of someone who's lost everything.
She's not celebrating her power. She's drowning in it.
Inside the temple, I sense another presence. Male. Powerful. Desperate.
The Alpha King. He's here, trapped behind some kind of barrier, and even from here I can feel his heart stuttering—stopping and starting in rhythm with hers.
So it's true. Dante Silvercrest rejected his fated mate, and the universe punished him by binding his life to hers.
Good. He deserves worse.
The Starborn girl—I don't even know her name yet—suddenly stiffens. Her head turns, those cosmic eyes locking onto me even though I'm hidden in the tree line.
"I know you're there," she calls out, her voice clear and strong despite the grief in her eyes. "Show yourself."
I step into the clearing, hands raised to show I mean no harm. "Forgive the intrusion. I felt your awakening from the North. I had to come."
She studies me with those galaxy eyes, and I feel her power brush against my mind—reading me, testing me, seeing if I'm a threat. My shaman magic rises to meet hers, and for a moment, cosmic fire and ancient earth magic dance together in the air between us.
Her eyes widen slightly. "You're not just any wolf."
"No. I'm Kieran Nightshade, Alpha of the Northern Packs." I take a careful step closer. "And you're Starborn—the first to awaken in over three hundred years."
"How do you know about the Starborn?"
"The North remembers what the South forgot." I keep my voice gentle, sensing how fragile she is beneath all that power. "We kept the old stories. The true histories. We've been waiting for one of your bloodline to return."
Something flickers across her face—surprise, maybe, or hope quickly crushed.
"Well, I'm back. Congratulations." Her laugh is bitter. "Though I'm not sure what good it does anyone. I'm powerful enough to destroy kingdoms, but I can't even escape the bond connecting me to the Alpha King who rejected me."
So she doesn't know yet. Doesn't know that being rejected might be the greatest gift the universe could have given her.
"That bond," I say carefully, "it's not a chain. It's a weapon."
She stares at me. "What?"
"The Alpha King's life is tied to yours now. His heart beats at your mercy. He suffers when you suffer. You could destroy him without lifting a finger—just by living your life and letting him watch you rise." I take another step closer. "Or you could use him. Make him regret ever speaking those rejection words. Make him understand exactly what he threw away."
For the first time since I arrived, I see fire spark in her eyes. Not cosmic fire—human rage. The kind that could topple thrones.
"Who are you really?" she asks. "Why would you come all this way to tell me this?"
"Because the South has been ruled by fools for too long. Because the Alpha King's bloodline built their power on stolen magic and lies." I stop a few feet from her, close enough to see the starlight moving beneath her skin. "And because when I felt you awaken, my wolf recognized what you are. Not a threat. Not a weapon. A queen."
She laughs again, but this time it's less bitter. "I'm no queen. I'm a rejected mate from a disgraced bloodline who everyone wants dead or controlled."
"Then let me offer you something Dante Silvercrest never did." I drop to one knee before her, pressing my fist to my heart in the old way. "Protection. Loyalty. A place where no one will hunt you or try to cage your power. Come north with me. Let me teach you to wield what you've become. And when you're ready—" I look up at her, letting her see the truth in my golden eyes. "—we'll come back south together, and you can show them all what happens when they reject a daughter of the stars."
She stares down at me, shocked. "You don't even know my name."
"Then tell me."
A long pause. Then: "Elara. Elara Moonwyn."
"Elara." I say her name like a prayer. "Will you come north with me?"
Before she can answer, a roar of rage erupts from inside the temple. Dante has heard everything. Through whatever barrier separates them, I feel his fury, his jealousy, his desperate need to keep her close.
Elara looks toward the temple, then back at me. I see her making a choice—stay here, bound to her rejection and pain, or step forward into something new.
"Yes," she says finally. "I'll come with you."
I stand, offering my hand. She takes it, and the moment our skin touches, power surges between us—not a mate bond, but something else. Recognition. Alliance. The beginning of something that could reshape the world.
Inside the temple, Dante screams. His heart stops completely, and through the barrier, I see him collapse.
Elara flinches but doesn't let go of my hand. "Will he die?"
"Not unless you die." I squeeze her hand gently. "But he'll suffer every moment you're gone. Every moment you're with me instead of him. That's his punishment."
She nods slowly. "Good."
As we turn to leave, the barrier around the temple shatters. Dante stumbles out, barely able to stand, his silver eyes wild.
"Elara!" he gasps. "Don't go with him. Please. We need to talk about this. We need—"
"We need nothing." Elara's voice is cold fire. "You rejected me, Alpha King. You banished me. You wanted me gone, and now I'm going. You don't get to change your mind just because it's killing you."
"I made a mistake!"
"Yes. You did." She steps closer to me, and I feel Dante's heart stutter through the bond. "And now you get to live with it. Goodbye, Dante Silvercrest. I hope every moment I'm gone hurts worse than the rejection hurt me."
We walk away together, leaving the Alpha King collapsed in the temple ruins.
As we reach the edge of the clearing, Elara suddenly stops. "Kieran?"
"Yes?"
"Why are you really helping me? What do you want in return?"
I could lie. Could tell her I want nothing. But she's Starborn—she can see through lies now.
"I want to see the South brought to its knees," I say honestly. "I want Dante Silvercrest to understand what real power looks like. And—" I hesitate, then continue. "I want to know the woman who was strong enough to survive rejection by her fated mate and rise anyway."
She studies my face for a long moment. Then she smiles—small, but real.
"Then I guess we both want the same thing."
Behind us, Dante's voice rises in a howl of pure anguish.
And somewhere in the distance, thunder rumbles.
The storm is just beginning.