SOPHIE POV
The mirror shows me a stranger.
White silk drapes down my body like water, expensive and perfect and nothing like me. Mom used to say white was a color for girls who had nothing to hide. I'm wearing it anyway because in three hours, I stop being Sophie Wells and become someone else entirely. Luna of the Moonstone Pack. I'll have a name that matters. A title that carries weight. Everything I've worked for since I was twelve years old.
Megan stands behind me adjusting the veil. Her hands shake a little as she pins it into my hair.
"You're nervous," she says. Not a question.
"Happy nervous," I tell her, but the lie tastes wrong in my mouth.
She meets my eyes in the mirror and I watch her decide not to call me on it. That's what best friends do. They let you keep your stories even when they know they're stories.
My stomach twists again. That feeling started this morning when Thomas came to see me before the sun came up. Every alpha visits their chosen mate before the ceremony, some tradition about choosing each other twice. But Thomas didn't choose me this morning. He barely looked at me. He stood by the window with his back to me and said we needed to talk after the ceremony about something important. Then he left.
Something important.
Those words have been sitting in my chest all day like a rock.
"Thomas looked stressed when I saw him in the halls," Megan says, smoothing the back of my dress. She's trying to distract me. I know she is. "His mom was being her usual nightmare self, probably. Eleanor could stress out a stone."
I nod even though I don't care about Eleanor Gray right now. Thomas's mother is always difficult. Always pushing him to be harder, colder, more perfect. She's the reason Thomas rejected his first chosen mate five years ago. Eleanor said the girl wasn't strong enough bloodline. Said she'd weaken the pack. Thomas listened to his mother then and the girl left in shame.
He won't do that to me. We've been together three years. He chose me from all the girls in this pack. Me. The daughter of the head warrior, not born to any special family, not connected to any powerful bloodline. Just me with my training and my grades and my endless need to prove myself worthy.
He wouldn't reject me.
The knock at the door hits like a fist.
One of Thomas's warriors stands in the hallway wearing his formal ceremonial armor. His face is serious in that way guards get when they're carrying messages that matter.
"It's time," he says.
Those two words should make me happy. They should make me feel alive. Instead, my hands go cold.
Megan squeezes my shoulders. "You're going to be amazing."
I turn to face her and force a smile that feels broken even as I'm making it. She pulls me into a tight hug and whispers something in my ear about how lucky Thomas is. I want to believe her. I want to walk down to that clearing and feel like the luckiest girl alive.
Instead, I feel like I'm walking toward something I don't understand.
The corridor is lined with pack members in their finest clothes. They part like water as I walk toward the stairs, their eyes following me, their whispers rising and falling. Some of them smile. Others look hungry in a way that makes my skin crawl. Is it always like this? Did I never notice before?
My father waits at the bottom of the stairs. He's in his ceremonial warrior robes, the armor of the head guard, and his eyes get soft when he sees me. He reaches for my hand and I take it, grateful for something solid to hold onto.
"You look like your mother," he says quietly. "Beautiful. Strong. Ready."
I let him pull me toward the entrance where the night waits outside. The Full Moon ceremony happens once a year, and tonight the entire Moonstone Pack will gather in the Silver Clearing to witness the bonding. Thousands of werewolves. Everyone I've ever known. Everyone who watched me grow up and train and work toward this moment.
The night air hits my face and it's cold in a way that makes me shiver. The Silver Clearing glows with firelight. I can hear the roar of the crowd even from here, thousands of voices mixing together into a sound like the ocean.
My father walks me forward slowly. The white dress trails behind me. My heart pounds so hard I'm worried everyone will hear it.
Then I see Thomas.
He stands in the ceremonial circle, surrounded by fire, waiting for me. For a moment, all my doubt disappears. He's beautiful. Tall and powerful and everything an alpha should be. His eyes are fixed on me and he smiles.
A real smile.
I feel stupid for doubting him this morning. Of course he was distant. The ceremony demands everything. He probably just needed to prepare himself for bonding, to center himself, to become the alpha his pack needs him to be.
I smile back and my father releases my hand.
I walk toward the circle.
Thomas extends his hand toward me. The crowd goes silent. This is it. This is the moment everything changes. His fingers brush mine and electricity runs up my arm. The pack is watching. Thousands of eyes. Thousands of wolves feeling the moment their Luna is born.
Thomas pulls my hand gently and I step into the circle beside him.
For one perfect second, everything is exactly how I imagined it would be.
Then he steps back.
His hand leaves mine like he's dropping something dirty.
The crowd gasps. I hear it ripple through the clearing, confusion turning into something darker. Thomas looks at me and his expression has changed. The warmth is gone. What's left is cold and sharp and looks like judgment.
"Sophie Wells," he says, and his voice carries across the entire clearing. Thousands of werewolves go quiet enough that I can hear my own heartbeat. "For three years, I have considered you worthy to stand beside me as Luna of the Moonstone Pack."
He's speaking in past tense.
My throat closes.
"But I've discovered something I can no longer ignore." He raises his voice like he's announcing something important to the entire supernatural world. "Your wolf is weak. Over the past months, I've felt instability in your form. A Luna must be flawless. Must be strong. Must be everything the pack needs."
The words don't make sense. My wolf has been fine. I haven't shifted in three weeks because I've been stressed about the ceremony, yes, but that's normal. That's nothing.
"I cannot bond with weakness," Thomas says. "I will not compromise my pack for the sake of false love. Sophie Wells, in front of the Moon Goddess and all who witness, I reject you as my mate."
He turns away from me.
He just walks. He doesn't look back. He doesn't offer explanation or apology. He just leaves me standing alone in the ceremonial circle while thousands of people stare at me with pity and judgment and hunger.
The rejection hits like a physical force.
The bond between us, already fragile from his words, snaps.
I feel it break inside my chest like something precious turning to ash.
My wolf screams.
I can't move. Can't breathe. Can't think past the single word echoing in my head: weak. He called me weak. In front of everyone. Everyone who knows me. Everyone who watched me train my entire life to be strong enough for this moment.
Someone in the crowd shouts something I don't hear.
I run.
I run toward the forest because staying there means drowning in a thousand eyes watching me fall apart. I run past my father's reaching hands and Megan's scream and the sound of pack members shifting into their wolves, probably following me out of instinct or curiosity or the cruel need to watch the rejected girl completely break.
I don't stop running.
The forest gets darker and the sounds of the pack fade behind me. I run until my legs burn. I run until my lungs feel like they're ripping open. I run until the Moonstone Pack territory disappears and I'm somewhere I don't recognize, somewhere wild and dangerous and beyond anyone's reach.
I collapse in a clearing surrounded by thick trees, gasping for air that doesn't come.
My dress is torn. My veil is gone. Dirt and leaves cover what was supposed to be the most perfect night of my life.
I have never felt so completely alone.
The moon shines down on me through the canopy, cold and bright and merciless. I lie on my back in the dirt that coated my white dress and I wonder if this is what broken feels like. If this is how fast a life can shatter. One moment you're Luna. The next moment you're nothing.
A sound cuts through the darkness.
Not from behind me. From ahead of me, deeper into the forest. The sound of something large moving through the trees. The sound of something that doesn't belong to my pack's territory.
My body freezes.
The trees ahead part and a massive shadow emerges. A wolf. Black as midnight with silver eyes that only alphas have. The eyes of the alpha of the Ironwood Pack.
Ryker Hayes.
The rival. The enemy. The alpha whose pack wages quiet wars with mine.
He's on my side of the border.
I'm alone.
I'm broken.
And now I'm caught in the most dangerous territory possible.
His wolf moves closer, studying me with eyes that see everything.
Everything.