I spent the afternoon preparing the Luna ceremony dinner.

This was supposed to be sacred. The first formal meal shared between newly bonded mates during their retreat—a tradition older than most packs could trace. Sylvia had walked me through it years ago, her hands steady on mine as we folded napkins into the crescent shape that honored the Goddess. She had told me that this meal was when the bond truly settled, when two wolves became one unit before the Moon.

I roasted duck with wild thyme. I set the table with the white linen cloth I had packed specifically for this. I lit the ceremonial candles—seven of them, one for each phase of the moon cycle—and arranged them in the pattern Sylvia had drawn in her journal. The wine I had chosen was from the Harper pack's own vineyard, bottled the year I was born.

Everything was perfect.

Camden came downstairs just as I was setting the last plate. He stopped at the bottom step and looked at the table. For a moment, I thought I saw something shift in his face—recognition, maybe. Appreciation.

Then Rory appeared behind him, still wearing his jacket.

"Wow," she said. "Fancy."

Camden smiled at her. "Maze goes all out."

He pulled out a chair. Not mine. The one to his left—the side where his mark sat beneath my claim.

Rory dropped into it without hesitation.

I stood there holding the wine bottle. My wolf pressed hard against my ribs, confused and alert.

"Cam," I said quietly. "This is the Luna ceremony dinner."

"I know." He pulled out his own chair and sat. "Rory's pack too. She should be part of it."

"It's a bonding tradition. Just mates."

Rory looked up at me with wide, innocent eyes. "Oh, I can go if it's a private thing—"

"Don't be ridiculous," Camden cut in. He reached for the wine bottle in my hand. "Sit down, Maze. You've been on your feet all day."

I sat.

I poured the wine.

I watched Camden refill Rory's glass before mine.

The duck was perfect. The thyme had released its oils just right. The candles burned steady and clean. And none of it mattered, because Rory was talking.

She told a story about a border patrol dispute from two years ago. Then another about a rogue encounter during a training exercise. Then a third about some packmate I had never met who had done something funny at a bonfire I had not attended. Camden laughed at every one. He leaned forward, elbows on the table, his whole body angled toward her.

I cut my duck into smaller and smaller pieces.

When there was finally a pause, I set down my fork. "I prepared a Luna blessing for tonight. It's traditional to—"

"Hey, Ror," Camden said, turning to her as if I had not spoken. "What ended up happening with that northern boundary thing? The one Marcus was worried about?"

Rory launched into another story.

I picked up my wine glass. I drank slowly. I did not taste it.

My fingers found the mark-spot on my neck under the table. The bond was still there, humming faintly, but it felt thin now. Stretched.

The candles burned down to stubs. I never said the blessing.

---

Rory did not leave after dinner.

She helped Camden clear the table—something I had not asked her to do, something that should have been our quiet ritual together—and then she settled onto the couch with a book as if she had always lived here.

I washed the dishes alone. Through the kitchen window, I could see the pines black against the snow. The Moon was nearly full. Sylvia used to say that the Goddess saw everything most clearly in the days before the full moon. That nothing could hide.

I pressed my wet hands against the edge of the sink and breathed.

When I came back into the living room, Rory was still there. Camden was building up the fire. She was talking again—something about winter training rotations—and he was nodding, laughing, his whole attention on her.

I climbed the stairs without saying goodnight.

I heard them talking for another hour. Low voices. Rory's laugh, sharp and too familiar. And then, finally, footsteps in the hall.

I lay in the dark and waited.

Camden came in quietly. He undressed and slipped into bed beside me. His hand found my waist.

"You okay?" he whispered.

"Fine."

"You seemed off at dinner."

I turned toward him. In the faint moonlight through the window, I could just make out his face.

"That was supposed to be our ceremony, Cam. Just us."

He sighed. Not angry. Just tired. Disappointed.

"Maze. She's my packmate. She's been part of my life since we were kids. A Luna doesn't exclude pack from sacred spaces—she makes room for everyone. That's what leadership is."

My wolf curled tight and small.

"I just thought—"

"I know what you thought." His thumb traced a circle on my hip. "But you're thinking like a daughter, not a Luna. You'll grow into it."

He kissed my forehead and rolled over.

I lay awake long after his breathing evened out.

Through the bedroom door, I could still smell it. Rory's musk, heavier now, layered into the air of the cabin like she had marked it.

I pressed two fingers to my mark-spot and stared at the ceiling.

A real Luna makes room.

I told myself that until the sky began to lighten.

But my wolf would not settle. She paced inside my ribs, restless and wary, and for the first time since Camden had marked me, I did not tell her she was wrong.

Camden decided we needed a pack run.

He announced it over breakfast, casual as anything, while I was still clearing plates from the table. Garrett Cole had arrived the night before with two warriors—Finn and Marcus—who were supposed to be here for "extended retreat support," whatever that meant. I had not been consulted about their arrival. I found out when I heard boots on the porch at ten PM.

"Mountain trails today," Camden said, draining his coffee. "Good terrain. We'll run the ridge loop."

Rory, sitting in the chair that used to be mine at breakfast, grinned. "Finally. I've been going stir-crazy."

I set the plates in the sink and turned. "I thought this was a bonding retreat."

Camden looked at me with that patient expression I was starting to recognize too well. "Pack bonds are bonds too, Maze. A Luna strengthens all connections, not just her own."

Garrett nodded from across the table. He was a good Beta—loyal, steady, the kind of wolf who would follow orders even when they made no sense. He would not question why the Alpha's mate was being lectured at her own breakfast table.

I dried my hands on a towel. "When do we leave?"

"An hour," Camden said. He was already standing, already moving toward the door with Rory at his shoulder.

I watched them go. My wolf pressed hard against my ribs, restless and sharp-edged.

I went upstairs and changed into running clothes. I braided my hair tight. I laced my boots with deliberate care, each pull of the laces a small act of control in a world that was slipping sideways.

When I came back down, they were all waiting by the door. Camden in front, Rory beside him. Garrett and the two warriors flanking them like an honor guard.

I was the last one out.

---

We shifted at the tree line.

My wolf surged forward, grateful for the release. She was a grey she-wolf, smaller than Camden's but fast, built for endurance. Sylvia used to say I had a runner's wolf—lean and long-legged, made for distance.

Camden's wolf was massive, dark brown with a thick ruff. He shook out his coat and started up the trail without looking back. Rory shifted beside him—a mid-sized brown wolf, unremarkable except for the way she immediately fell into step at his right flank.

The formation should have been Alpha in front, Luna at his side, Beta and warriors behind.

Instead, Rory ran beside Camden. Garrett fell in behind them. Finn and Marcus took the flanks.

And I ran alone at the edge.

My wolf snarled low in her throat, but I pushed her quiet. A real Luna makes room. A real Luna understands pack dynamics.

I told myself that with every stride.

The trail climbed steep through the pines. Snow crunched under our paws. The air was sharp and clean, and for a few minutes, I let myself fall into the rhythm of the run—the burn in my legs, the cold bite of wind, the way my wolf stretched out and found her stride.

Then I caught it.

Camden's scent, drifting back on the wind. Pine and leather, the same scent that used to make me feel safe during winter patrols.

But now there was something else underneath. Something sour. Faint, but unmistakable.

My wolf's ears flattened. She slowed half a step, nostrils flaring.

I could not identify it. But I could not ignore it either.

Ahead, Camden and Rory ran side by side, their strides perfectly matched. They moved like wolves who had run together a thousand times. Maybe they had.

I dropped back another few paces.

The trail opened onto a ridge. The view was stunning—endless pines, the mountains rising sharp and white against a sky so blue it hurt. I should have felt something. Awe, maybe. Peace.

Instead, I felt the weight of running alone while my mate ran beside someone else.

We circled back through a lower trail. The pack stayed in formation—Camden and Rory in front, the others behind, me at the periphery like a straggler they had forgotten to wait for.

When we finally returned to the cabin and shifted back, Camden was laughing at something Rory had said. Garrett clapped him on the shoulder. The warriors headed inside, talking about food.

No one looked at me.

I stood at the tree line in my human skin, breathing hard, and pressed two fingers to the mark-spot on my neck.

The bond hummed there still. But the hum was thin now. Stretched. Wrong.

I went inside alone.

---

I could not sleep.

It was the fourth night. The cabin was dark and quiet. Camden had gone to bed an hour ago, his arm slung across my waist in a possessive weight that used to comfort me and now just felt heavy.

I slipped out from under it and padded into the hallway in bare feet.

I was headed for the kitchen. Maybe tea. Maybe just the act of moving through space that was mine, even if it did not feel like mine anymore.

I stopped halfway down the hall.

Voices.

Not voices. A mind-link, bleeding through the cabin walls, careless and unguarded.

Camden's voice, rough and low. "—can't believe she actually bought the litter-mate excuse. She's so fucking naive."

Rory's laugh, sharp and cruel. "She wants to believe you. That's the difference between a real Luna and a girl playing dress-up."

"When are you going to make the challenge official?"

"Soon. I've been working the elders. They already think she's too soft. Once I establish the scent familiarity bond narrative, they'll back me. She won't even see it coming."

"And the contract?"

"Doesn't matter. I'll have her removed before she can invoke it. You just keep her distracted."

Camden laughed. The sound was ugly. Unrecognizable. "That's not hard. She's so desperate to be a good Luna she'll ignore anything."

I stood in the dark hallway, perfectly still.

My wolf did not whimper. She did not pace. She went absolutely silent, the way a wolf does before a kill.

Something inside me did not shatter.

It crystallized.

I turned and walked back to the bedroom. I did not make a sound. I moved like a ghost through my own life.

I knelt beside my travel bag and found the hidden inner pocket. My fingers closed around the moonstone pendant—Sylvia's pendant, passed down through the Harper bloodline, cool and smooth against my palm.

I sat on the edge of the bed in the dark.

Camden was still asleep, his breathing deep and even. He looked peaceful. Innocent.

I pressed the pendant against my collarbone and reached for Sylvia's journal.

I had carried it everywhere since I was sixteen. A habit from childhood. Sylvia used to read to me from it before bed—stories about the Moon Goddess, about Luna gifts, about the old laws that governed pack justice when Alphas failed.

I found the pages I needed.

The truth-compelling rite.

Its requirements: a Luna of bloodline descent, a moonstone relic, and the presence of at least three witnesses under the Goddess's moon.

Its mechanics: the invocation forced every wolf present to speak their truest intention aloud, their most selfish desire, their deepest cruelty. No lies. No evasion. Only truth.

Its cost: the rite could only be invoked once in a Luna's lifetime. And the Goddess's judgment, once delivered, could not be undone.

I read until the words were solid in my memory.

Then I closed the journal and set it on the nightstand.

I lay back down beside Camden. I did not touch him. I stared at the ceiling and listened to him breathe.

And I began to plan.