It was already dark when I returned to the Nightbane Packhouse and found Alpha Darius in the kitchen—cooking.

The scent of roasted venison, sage, and firewood filled the air. He moved with practiced grace, his large hands slicing meat with deadly precision as if he were gutting rogues, not preparing dinner.

He’d always been obsessed with cleanliness—hated clutter, hated chaos, hated... mess.

I still remember the first year of our bond. I was trying to make stew. He walked in, wrinkled his nose, and muttered, “Is this place doubling as a landfill?”

But when my younger sister, Lexie said she liked his cooking? He enrolled in a culinary course taught by the best chef in the Packlands. For her. Always for her.

“Didn’t you say the patrols were quiet today?” He asked, placing a steaming bowl in front of me. “Why are you home so late?”

Even now, dressed in an apron, Darius Nightbane— the Alpha of Nightbane Pack— looked like he ruled empires with a single growl. That square jaw, those storm-gray eyes, the dark energy that clung to him like a second skin.

The Goddess helped me. He was magnetic. But I’d long since stopped letting that illusion fool me.

I smoothed over my expression. “The new recruits arrived early. I was finalizing their lunar transition briefs.”

He didn’t ask questions. Never did. To him, I was useful, an extension of the pack, not a partner. Not a mate. Not a wife.

“Alright,” he said. “Dinner’s ready. Come eat.”

I sat. He placed a slice of bitter moonroot on my plate. “I remember you like this,” he said with a rare smile. “Made it just for you.”

My throat tightened. A dull, familiar ache pulsed in my chest.

Lexie liked Moonroot.

I was allergic to it.

Three years. We’ve been bonded for three long years. And he still didn’t know. Or worse—he never bothered to remember.

If he'd looked beyond my body—beyond the markless bond we shared—he’d have known I couldn’t eat this without my wolf getting sick. But no. Alpha Darius never looked at me.

Only through me.

“Avelyn? Why aren’t you eating?” he asked, frowning.

I gently pushed the dish away and reached into my bag. “Dinner can wait. There are two agreements I need you to sign.”

His expression darkened. “You know I don’t discuss pack business over meals.”

“I know that… Only this is not pack business… I-it’s personal,” I said simply.

Just as he reached for the papers, his phone buzzed.

He tried to hide it, but too late, I had already seen the name.

Lexie Moonveil.

He stood abruptly, knocking his wine glass off the table. It shattered into sharp pieces. One shard nicked my finger.

Blood dripped onto the stone tiles—quiet, unnoticed.

He didn’t look back. He stepped onto the balcony and answered the call.

I sat there, bleeding, alone, while he spoke softly to the woman who once left him for a foreign Alpha… The same woman he took back with open arms when she returned.

Fifteen minutes later, he walked back in, grabbed his coat, and headed for the door.

“I’ve got something tonight. I won’t be home for dinner.”

“You haven’t signed the papers,” I said, still calm.

He sighed, irritated.

Like I was the one being difficult.

With a flick of his wrist, he scribbled his name across both papers—one rejecting our bond before the Pack council, the other dissolving my ties to the Nightshade Pack as their Luna.

“There. Happy? Can I go now?”

I looked down at his signature. Cold. Final.

“Yes,” I said softly. “You can go.”

And he did.

Without a glance at my hand, it was still bleeding. Without asking what those papers were.

Without a word of hesitation.

As the door closed behind him, a bitter laugh slipped from my lips.

He didn’t even know what he signed.

Divorce. Rejection. Freedom.

I watched the blood dry on my fingertips and let the silence swallow me.

He’d always loved Lexie. The golden girl. My younger sister. The real daughter of our parents.

Twenty-five years ago, my mother, Myra Moonveil, and a Beta nanny gave birth in the same hospital. A mix-up switched the infants. I—Avelyn Moonveil—was the true-born daughter of the Moonveil Pack. But I was raised among servants, while Lexie was draped in silks and praised like royalty.

The truth came out five years later. And still, my parents refused to cast her out.

“Avelyn,” Myra Black, my mother, once told me, “hearts are made of flesh. We raised Lexie as our own. Let the world think she’s the heiress. Don’t take that from her.”

So I stayed hidden. An unwanted truth. The secret Luna.

While Lexie was always seen., I was always necessary.

When she fled to Paris chasing some omega-born aristocrat, the Moonveil Pack asked me to take her place. Marry Darius Nightbane in her stead. A political union. A placeholder Luna of the Nightshade Pack.

Alpha Darius agreed—heartbroken and indifferent. And I… I was naive. I thought I could earn him. Thought I could make him love me.

Then she came back.

And he betrayed me with her in the most humiliating way—leaking videos and images of their intimacy to the High Council. A calculated scandal.

I saw the footage. I heard his voice when he said-

"Avelyn never did anything wrong, but if I just ask for a divorce, neither family will accept it. We need to ruin her reputation so our parents can’t argue."

And I heard Lexie… She asked, “Did you ever love her?”

His answer?

"She’s just a stand-in. I married her to shut everyone up."

I should have shifted then. Should have torn the Nightbane down to ash. But I didn’t.

Instead, I pulled out the small leather-bound notebook I'd kept hidden since our wedding night.

99 chances, I had written. If I’m disappointed 99 times, I will leave.

Tonight was number ninety-nine.

I walked to the safe and placed three things into a carved obsidian box, my wedding band, my Luna pendant, and the sealed rejection rune, a bond severance etched in my own blood.

My last anniversary gift.

He wouldn’t open it.

But when he did… he’d understand what he lost.

With trembling fingers, I picked up my phone. I hadn’t called him in three years, but I knew he’d answer.

“Riven,” I whispered.

His voice on the other end was a growl of recognition. My mate. The one I should have chosen.

“My divorce cooling-off period ends in one month,” I said. “Come for me. Then.”

Outside, the wind howled. Inside, my wolf finally stirred, her eyes glowing in the dark reflection of the window.

I didn’t expect him to answer right away.

In fact, I thought it would ring a few times—maybe go to voicemail. That would’ve given me time to breathe, to regret calling, maybe even hang up.

But the line connected to the first tone.

“Avelyn,” Riven Ashton’s voice came through, low and sharp, like a blade unsheathed. “You’re not screwing with me, are you?”

I stayed silent.

Sometimes silence was safer than the truth. Safer than the ache clawing at the back of my throat.

“I’ve been chasing you for as long as you’ve been wasting your soul on Darius Nightbane,” he snarled. “You—cold as a diamond for three years—and now, suddenly, you’re calling me like nothing happened? What the hell changed?”

Riven Ashton. My once-lover. My almost-mate.

Riven wasn’t just an Alpha—he was a force of nature. The rightful heir to the Ashton Pack, yet he walked alone. An Alpha of the most powerful, feared pack, carved from ancient bloodlines and forged in the wild, untamed lands. He answered to no council, swore loyalty to no throne. Unshackled by politics. Feared even by those who ruled. One of North Carolina’s most dangerous few—he ruled a rogue pack not by banishment, but by deliberate, ruthless choice.

He had hunted me for years—not with claws, but with a gaze that pierced deeper than fangs ever could. Always watching. Always waiting. A storm cloaked in the body of a man, his presence thrumming with barely restrained violence and desire. And once—just once—I almost gave in. Almost let myself be claimed.

But then Alpha Darius gave me hope.

Or rather, what I thought was hope. A cruel mirage I clung to with bleeding fingers.

So I turned from Riven. I left him behind.

Now, with his voice scraping down my spine and my heart too hollow to shield, I closed my eyes and whispered, “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking clearly. Forget I called.”

There was a long pause. Then a crack—the violent sound of something heavy hurled against stone or glass.

“You think I’m someone you can summon when you’re lonely and toss aside when you’re not?” His voice deepened, rough, guttural. His wolf was near the surface now—snarling just beneath his skin. “You chose me this time, Avelyn. Don’t even think about running again.”

My pulse stuttered.

“I’m giving you one month,” he snapped. “Handle that bastard. After that, I’m coming. And I’m not asking next time. I’m taking what’s mine.”

Then silence, too quiet enough to make my breath hitch.

The line went dead with a cold, decisive click.

I stared at the screen, the ache in my chest dragging me into memory. And then a bitter smile curled my lips.

He hadn’t changed. Still all storm and steel.

That night, Darius didn’t come home.

But I didn’t wait for him.

I moved through the pack house like a shadow, ghosting from room to room—my body here, my soul already gone. I packed in silence, folding his forgotten gifts one by one. Trinkets from past battles. Apologies dressed in expensive silk.

They are all useless now. Meaningless.

My wolf didn’t stir. She was tired. She didn’t cry anymore.

When the first light of dawn spilled across the hardwood floors, the front door creaked open.

He stepped in.

Same shirt. The same scent of stale lust and sweat. No shame. No guilt.

“What are you throwing out?” he asked casually, his eyes landing on the boxes stacked by the entryway.

I flinched, just barely.

Then I forced myself tall as I tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear, and said evenly, “Just some garbage.”

He approached and peered into the nearest box. His eyes darkened.

It was filled with everything he had given me.

“You call these… garbage?”

“Old clothes. Old gifts.” I kept my tone light, almost sweet. “They take up space. Thought I’d donate them under your name. Might earn you some good press—Alpha donates to winter orphans in the mountains.” I flashed him a tired, hollow smile.

His lips curved faintly. That familiar smirk. Empty as always. “You always did know how to make me look good.”

But I knew better.

He didn’t believe a word of it.

He just didn’t care enough to question me.

Then came the crash. A loud, echoing shatter behind me.

I turned, dread crawling up my spine.

And there she was.

Lexie. My sister. The golden wolf. The one everyone loved without effort.

She stood near the shelf, her eyes wide, a broken sculpture at her feet. Her expression was soft, innocent—the kind that could fool gods if she smiled long enough.

“Oops… sorry, Alpha Darius. Sorry, Avelyn. I- I didn’t mean to.”

As always, Alpha Darius didn’t even glance at the shattered marble, instead, he brushed right past me.

Straight to her.

His scent shifted—no longer sharp with irritation, but filled with concern. Urgency.

He cupped her face and looked her over. “Are you hurt?”

She shook her head, her voice sugar-sweet. “No.”

“Good,” he whispered, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “Nothing is more important than you.”

My breath caught in my throat.

Nothing is more important than you…

Not me. Not the mate bound to him by fate and blood. Not the woman marked beneath a full moon in secret and left unclaimed in the daylight.

But Lexie wasn’t done.

She turned her eyes on me, wide with mock guilt. “You don’t mind, right, Avelyn?”

My gaze dropped.

The sculpture had been one of a kind.

A custom piece from a craftsman in the eastern mountains, commissioned after our first run outside the Nightbane borders. A rare moment of peace carved into stone.

Our faces had been etched together into the base. A memory. A symbol.

Now, just shards.

Years ago, I would’ve lashed out. Let my wolf rise. Demanded respect.

Now?

“It’s fine,” I murmured.

Just two words. But they tasted like ash in my mouth.

A flicker passed through Lexie’s eyes—victory, perhaps—but it vanished quickly beneath another smile. “Aww. You’re really so kind.”

Then, without missing a beat, she twisted the knife.

“With a sister like that,” she said to my husband, “I’m sure she won’t mind my next request either.”

Alpha Darius didn’t even glance at me. He didn’t have to.

“She just got back to North Carolina,” he said. “Her parents, the Moonveils are out of state. She doesn’t feel safe staying alone.”

I stood still. A stone. A statue.

“Let her stay here,” he said.

My stomach turned. My wolf stirred uneasily beneath my skin.

Then, as if that wasn't enough, he added without pause, “And your room faces the sun. She’s always been sensitive to the cold. Let her have it.”

It wasn’t a request, nor a suggestion—it was a command. And in that moment, I finally understood: Darius had never truly been my Alpha. Never truly my husband. Never truly loved me, because he had always belonged to her.

But not for much longer.

Because soon, he’d learn what it meant to lose a wolf who had already died once.

To watch the one he buried rise again—with fangs sharper, spirit stronger, and fire in her bones.

One month...

That’s all he had left.

Even after three years of being mated, Alpha Darius Nightbane and I didn’t always sleep in the same bed.

He claimed it was because he didn’t like anyone lying beside him at night.

But I knew better.

It wasn’t “anyone” he couldn’t tolerate. It was me.

I was the Luna by title only—unmarked, unclaimed, and unwelcome beneath his sheets. His wolf never reached for mine. His scent never wrapped around me like a true bond should. I was the shadow of a promise he never intended to keep.

And yet, he was always gentle with Lexie.

He probably had a whole speech rehearsed to justify giving her my room. Something polite. Something pitiful. But when I agreed without a fight, it clearly threw him off.

“All right,” I said lightly. “There’s a lot of my stuff in there anyway. I’ll just move it all out.”

Besides, it didn’t matter whether I left that room now or later.

We both knew—sooner or later, I’d be gone.

When I mentioned I’d be taking all my things, I saw something flicker behind his eyes. An instinct. A protest rising to the surface.

But before he could say a word, Lexie—the golden wolf, the precious one—cut in with that sugary tone of hers. “Thanks, sis… Luna Avelyn.”

I didn’t answer. Just bent down, and let my arms tremble as I lifted one of the heavier boxes and turned toward the stairs.

The thing was too full. My foot slipped across a hidden shard of glass on the floor. And then—I fell.

My knee slammed onto the floor hard, and a stabbing pain tore through my skin. Sharp edges sliced through me as if the floor itself wanted me gone.

My body went rigid. Pain sang down my leg, sweat gathered at my temple, and my wolf whimpered softly beneath my skin.

But I didn’t make a sound.

Darius didn’t see. He was too busy being led away by Lexie, who clung to him like he was hers.

And maybe he was.

So I stayed there on the floor, broken pieces of glass beneath me and tears falling silently onto the tiles.

I used to believe those tears would matter. That someone would notice.

But I knew better now.

In the Moonveils’ pack house, Alpha Darius never let Lexie carry anything heavier than a teacup. “Our Lexie’s a little princess,” he’d say, full of warmth. “She should be treated like one.”

When I was still the maid’s daughter, I scrubbed floors until my hands bled. I lifted more than I could carry. I learned to keep moving, no matter the weight.

Now, I am the daughter of a powerful wolf. Now, I was Alpha Darius’s wife. I was Nightshade Pack’s Luna.

And still, nothing had changed.

It took me the rest of the day to finish packing. Box by box. Memory by memory.

By sundown, I had everything loaded onto a truck.

“You didn’t have to throw so much out,” Alpha Darius muttered as he passed by. There was a small frown between his brows. “Lexie’s only staying for a little while. When she leaves, you’ll move back in. What’s the point?”

To him, I was acting strange. Too calm. Too quiet.

“They’re old,” I said simply. My voice didn’t shake. “It was time to let them go.”

He studied me like he was trying to read something between the lines.

“You’re not the wasteful type.”

No. I wasn’t. Never had been. I never grew up with luxury, only with leftovers and hand-me-downs. Every object I owned had a story. A cost.

I just smiled faintly. “They’ve been with me a long time. Sometimes… you need room for something new. Out with the old, right?”

Just like people, I thought.

He couldn’t argue with that. If he pushed again, he’d only make himself look petty.

“There’s an auction tonight,” he said instead, shifting the conversation. “The organizers invited me. You’ll come. With your sister Lexie.”

I was about to say no.

But he cut me off. “You may be my Luna but outside, you’re still my secretary. I can’t show up to an event like that without one.”

I looked at him for a long time.

So many words gathered in my throat like a rising tide, I wanted to cry out—And bringing your mistress is appropriate? What am I now? The staff?—but I said none of them.

Instead, I nodded.

One final task.

One last show before I disappeared.

Night fell fast.

The auction hall was bright—white lights cast over velvet curtains, polished glass, and high-ranking wolves in tailored suits and elegant gowns. The air smelled of money, power, ambition… and secrets.

Alpha Darius walked ahead, he walked tall, letting Lexie clutch his arm like she belonged there.

Sable, the host, came out to greet him. “Alpha Darius Nightbane,” she beamed. “Your seat is ready. Right this way.”

She gestured for two seats.

“I heard you got married?” Sable smiled. “The second seat is for your wife.”

And just like that—the moment I always knew would come—arrived.

A beat of silence. Long enough to feel like a lifetime.

Alpha Darius of Nightbane’s Pack marriage had always been a secret. Hidden away, like I was something shameful.

Two women. One seat.

The choice wasn’t surprising.

He didn’t hesitate.

“I’m not married,” he said coolly. “Not sure where that rumor started.”

My heart didn’t break—it had already done that, long ago.

But something tightened in my chest. A cold burn beneath the ribs. The ache of final clarity.

Sable blinked. “And these two?”

Darius reached for Lexie’s hand. “This is Lexie Moonveil, daughter of Alpha Jonas of the Moonveil Pack.”

Sable nodded politely.

Then—like it pained him—Darius flicked a glance at me. “That one next to you is my secretary.”

Only this time, I didn’t flinch.

I had prepared myself for this moment.

But no amount of preparation could dull the sting of public rejection. Not when you are already bleeding from a thousand cuts beneath the skin.

I stayed upright. Proud. Dignified.

A Luna only in name. A mate only on paper.

They took their seats while I stood behind them—like a servant. Like I was nothing.

Maybe it was just the air, too cold and sharp. Maybe it was the weight of betrayal pressing against my bones. But pain stabbed at my lower abdomen, sharp and sudden.

I pressed a trembling hand to my belly, each step away from him heavier than the last. I turned and walked toward the restroom—not with grace, not with strength, but with the quiet desperation of a wolf retreating from a battle, she already knew she had lost.

At least… for now.