They said I carried the future of the Hallowfang Pack, a royal-blooded hybrid, the child destined to unite the Northern Clans. But on the night of the full moon, when I was meant to give birth, I was taken.

The wind howled like mourning spirits as I was dragged from the convoy, silver chains binding my wrists, wolfsbane burning through my veins, my wolf forced into silence. I couldn’t fight, couldn’t shift.

At first, I thought the wolves who took me were from a rival pack. Maybe the Shadowfangs or eastern rogues striking at my mate through me, the Luna of Hallowfang.

But what came next shattered every illusion playing in my head.

Clawed hands. A black hood. Stone beneath me. My limbs are bound. Pain, unlike anything I'd known, as they cut my child from my womb. I screamed, begged the Moon, but it was useless. They smothered him with a silver-lined pillow and placed his lifeless body in my arms like some cruel gift.

I nearly shifted then, mad with grief, but my body betrayed me.

Moments later, the doors burst open. Kale, the powerful Alpha of the Hallowfang Pack, and his warriors charged in, claws and fangs bared. Silver bullets flew. Blood drenched the altar as the masked wolves fell.

He ran to me, cloaked in red, whispering frantic reassurances as if they could mend the raw, jagged ruin of my soul.

He told me I would be alright, that we would have another pup.

I did not lose my mind, not for my own sake but for his. For Kale, the Alpha I had followed into war, into bed, into dreams. But by the time they loaded me into the pack’s hospital and raced toward our private medical wing, I was barely conscious, my life bleeding out in waves.

I don’t know how long I remained under, perhaps hours, maybe days… But when I finally stirred awake, I was greeted not by comfort, not by warmth or solace, but by voices, whispers that shattered everything I thought was real.

“… but what you did was insane, Alpha Kale,” I heard Talon, his Beta and childhood friend, say. “Kidnapping your own mate, killing her newborn pup… that’s next-level cruelty.”

My heart stopped mid-beat. For a brief moment, I forgot how to breathe. My throat dried. The painkillers dulled my limbs but not my mind. I prayed it was the remnants of anesthesia, a hallucination. But then Beta Talon continued.

“You promised me fake bullets,” he muttered. “When you barged in, claws out, I thought you’d changed your mind.”

I lay perfectly still. The blood drained from my face, my hands falling limply by my side, the truth hitting harder than any silver blade.

“I would never harm you, Talon,” Alpha Kale replied, far too casually. “I just needed Alina to believe I rescued her. That I killed the rogues. The entire scene had to look real. And besides, I gave my word to Talia. I wouldn’t let anyone threaten our son’s place as my heir. I couldn’t allow Alina’s pup to live.”

It took everything in me not to scream. My chest burned. My breathing faltered. He wasn’t just the architect of my pain. He was the executioner.

He had betrayed me.

All for Talia Greymore, the she-wolf who left him at the altar two years ago. The same female who abandoned him when she discovered she was carrying his child.

But they weren’t finished. They kept talking, and every word was another claw tearing into my heart.

Beta Talon’s voice lowered. “You took Alina’s pup’s umbilical cord… to save Talia’s boy. You could have spared the child. You didn’t have to tell the healer to render Alina barren, too.”

My hand moved slowly to my aching stomach. That explained the searing pain. The dull, hollow agony. He hadn’t just killed my pup. He’d taken my ability to ever bear another.

Seconds later, when Alpha Kale’s reply came, it was colder than the tundra winds. “Talia’s son was dying. I needed the umbilical cord to strengthen him. If I hadn’t used it, Magnus would’ve died. And I don’t need Alina birthing more pups when I already have Talia. She was all I needed.”

The ringing in my ears intensified. My chest rose and fell, but the air didn’t come. I wanted to shift, to leap from the bed and rip out his throat. But I couldn’t.

I remained still, my eyes shut, my body numb.

The voice that once called me “love” now sounded like the voice of a stranger. A monster.

“I don’t know, Kale. You are my Alpha, but you are my friend too,” Talon said, exhaling. “You killed Alina’s son with your own hands and made her watch it happen. What do you think she’ll do if she finds out?”

My fingers twitched against the sheet. A feeble, unconscious flicker. My body didn’t know what to fight for anymore, but some part of me still believed I could. I had to.

Then I heard Kale snarl. “Don’t start with me, Talon. You knew the plan. Alina needed to believe it. Needed to witness the massacre. Talia was pregnant and panicked; she ran. She’s my true Luna. If Alina ever finds out, she can’t do shit. She’s an orphan. She has no one but me.”

“Keep your voice down,” Talon hissed. “You’ll wake her.”

“She’s drugged to the brim. Doc says she won’t wake until moonrise,” Kale said with a scoff.

They didn’t notice my eyes crack open.

I watched them walk out. Kale muttered something about checking on Talia and his son. The door closed behind them.

I sat up, sudden and forceful, causing my skull to throb and my stitches to scream in protest. The tears came then, bitter, hot, and unrelenting. I pressed my trembling hands against my flat stomach, and all I could see was my son’s lifeless form… the memory seared into my soul.

What had I done to deserve this?

I had loved Kale Hallowfang, my mate, my Alpha. Saved him from the cliff the day he almost ended it all. Loved him when no one else did. And this was his reward, forcing me to carry his child to full term just to slaughter him in front of me. To make me barren. To destroy me so he could return to the mate who once abandoned him.

But he was right about one thing.

I was an orphan.

What he forgot was…that I was never helpless.

With shaking fingers, I reached for my phone. I dialed a number I had not dared call in over two years. It rang once. Then came a voice, smooth as velvet and laced with danger, answered.

“Darling. To what do I owe the honor?”

“I’ll accept your proposal,” I whispered, gripping the device so tightly my knuckles turned white, “but only if you help me.”

The voice laughed softly. “Have you finally come to your senses? Say the word, and it’s done.”

I closed my eyes, forcing my breath steady.

“Help me destroy Alpha Kale Hallowfang and his pack,” I said. “Then I’ll marry you.”

There was a pause. A dark chuckle followed. “Darling, that’s my favorite pastime. When should I pick you up?”

“Seven days,” I replied. “I need to bury what’s left of me first.”

And then I hung up.

Seven days…

Just seven days, then I will disappear from this cursed territory.

Seven days before I become vengeance beneath the blood moon.

And when I return, the Alpha who betrayed me would beg for mercy the Goddess would not grant.

I will make sure of it.

Alpha Kale didn’t return that night, and the tears refused to stop falling from my eyes. I twisted and writhed on the enormous hospital bed, the pain of losing my child and the savage healing from the forced surgery warring inside me like claws beneath the skin.

There were moments I genuinely wished the Moon Goddess would take me. Death seemed easier than living with the image of my pup's lifeless body, ripped from me before he’d even had a name. But I knew better. If I died, my son’s death would go unanswered. His soul would never know justice.

No. I would stay alive for vengeance.

By dawn, my sobs had quieted, not because the pain was gone, but because something inside me had turned to ice. My heart no longer throbbed with grief. It had numbed itself to survive. I lay there, unmoving, staring blankly at the stone ceiling as the clan physician entered the room to check my vitals.

“How are you feeling, Luna Alina?” the old Pack doctor asked gently, clipboard in hand.

“I want to go home,” I said flatly.

He blinked in surprise, clearly expecting a different answer. “I- o-of course. I’ll prepare your release.”

I didn’t wait for Alpha Kale or anyone from the pack to arrive. Instead, I called a human lawyer I found through an outdated search directory. The werewolf courts were all tied to the Alpha, and I needed someone neutral.

“I’d like to file for divorce,” I told him without preamble.

“I’ll send over the documentation right away. Once signed, the process will take three days,” came the response.

The moment I ended the call, the doctor returned with the clan’s black-uniformed driver waiting by the door.

“Alpha Kale asked for you to be escorted home. He’s preparing your favorites,” the doctor informed me with a kind smile.

I wanted to bare my fangs and ask why he’d removed my womb without my consent, whether it was by threat or bribe, but I knew he was likely as trapped in Alpha Kale’s grip as I had been.

I gave a polite nod instead. “Thank you.”

The ride back to the packhouse, the sprawling Hallowfang manor tucked deep in the woods, was agonizingly quiet. The driver said nothing. I said even less. But nothing could’ve prepared me for what greeted me inside.

Talia Greymore.

She was curled gracefully on the living room chaise, draped in a luxurious crimson gown that clung to her curves and revealed her small, unmistakable baby bump. And beside her, fussing like a doting wolf-mother, was Alpha Kale’s own mother.

I felt something snap in my chest the moment I saw them.

Talia’s gaze caught mine instantly, and her voice rang out with delicate sweetness. “Thank you for the kind offer, Elder Luna Sasha, but I really can’t stay here. I don’t want to make Alpha Kale’s wife uncomfortable.”

“Uncomfortable?” Kale’s mother barked in disgust. “That orphaned bitch has no say in this family! I’ve never understood why my son didn’t cast her out the moment he ascended. What good is a Luna who can’t even carry a pup?”

Her words were cruel, acidic, but after what I’d overheard last night, they hit like cold water rather than fire. I didn’t speak. I simply walked past them, toward the stairs. But halfway up, something yanked my hair with violent force.

“Ah!” I cried, whirling around as sharp pain tore through my scalp.

“You ungrateful girl!” Kale’s mother, Elder Luna Sasha, snarled before slapping me so hard I tasted blood.

“What the hell do you want from me?” I hissed, rage bubbling beneath my skin, my eyes flashing with suppressed wolf light.

“No greeting? No respect? No shame?” she spat, her face twisted in disdain. “No wonder you were taken. No wonder you watched your pup die!”

My eyes burned, but I refused to shed another tear. “Ask your son. He knows exactly what happened. He was there.”

Her arm shot up again, but this time Alpha Kale’s voice cut through the tension.

“That’s enough, Mother,” he said sharply, stepping out of the kitchen wearing an apron, clearly trying to play the role of the gentle Alpha.

His eyes met mine. “How are you feeling, Alina?” he asked, as if nothing had happened, leaning in to kiss me.

I pulled away, disgusted. Once upon a time, I would have melted into his embrace. Now, the thought made my skin crawl.

His mother had hated me from the start. I wasn’t born into a powerful bloodline. I had no empire, no lineage worth parading. To her, I was a barren vessel, a disgrace to the Hallowfang name. But what no one would know, what no one would dare whisper, was that her perfect son had made me this way.

“Alina,” Kale said tightly, “apologize to my mother. And to Talia. Why didn’t you greet them when you came in?”

I scoffed. “I didn’t do anything wrong. Why are they even here?”

“She talks to you like that?” his mother shrieked in disbelief.

“I should go,” Talia whispered in her gentle, manipulative voice. “I don’t want to cause trouble.”

Suddenly, a small voice piped up from the kitchen. “Daddy, why is that lady yelling?”

I turned toward the voice and froze.

A small boy, barely two years old, stood at the doorway, clinging to a stuffed wolf toy. His face was unmistakable. A perfect, miniature version of Alpha Kale.

“Who is that child?” I asked, my voice hollow.

Jack didn’t flinch. He looked me dead in the eye and said, “He’s my brother’s son. Talia’s a widow. She and the boy will be staying here while she’s pregnant.”

My breath hitched. “Then why is he calling you Daddy?”

Kale shrugged. “He likes it. It makes him happy. I’m not going to tell him to stop.”

I was still reeling when he returned to the kitchen and emerged with a steaming bowl of seafood.

“I made your favorite,” he said with a warm smile.

I stared at it. After two years with me, he still didn’t know I was deathly allergic to seafood.

The moment the scent hit me, my stomach rebelled. I turned and vomited onto the floor, my body shaking.

Cara gasped dramatically. “Luna Alina! You should’ve just asked me to leave. Why would you throw up over me and my child?”

“You’re across the room,” I said coldly, wiping my mouth. “Your pity act doesn’t reach that far.”

But Alpha Kale snapped.

He grabbed my arm with bruising force and forced me to my knees in front of them both.

“Apologize. Now. Or I swear to the Goddess, I’ll make you eat your vomit.”

I stared at Alpha Kale with hollow, broken eyes, the ache of betrayal clawing at my soul more viciously than any physical wound. For a brief moment, something flickered in his gaze, remorse, perhaps, as he released his grip on me with a sharp breath.

“I’m sorry, Alina, it’s just-” his words, meant to be a balm, were swiftly interrupted by Talia’s faint whimper.

“Daddy… Mommy is sick,” came Marcus, Talia’s son’s small voice, piercing the tension like a fang to the throat.

In the blink of an eye, Kale turned his back on me and rushed to her side, scooping Talia into his arms as though I were nothing more than dust in the air. He pressed his hand to her forehead, whispering low and tender words meant only for her ears.

“I think it’s the stench of vomit, Kale,” Talia moaned weakly, her voice laced with artificial fragility. “I feel so lightheaded… I can’t even eat.”

“Clean that up,” Alpha Kale snarled over his shoulder, his Alpha command laced with dominance as he walked away, the boy toddling after them like a pup following his sire.

My mother-in-law stared at me with disdain, let out a loud hiss, and turned on her heel, the click of her heels echoing like venomous punctuation.

Suppressing the urge to shift from rage, I crouched down and began to clean the mess, my vomit, the broken bowl, the spilled seafood, all evidence of my humiliation. The weight of being Luna meant nothing here. Not when the Alpha had chosen another she-wolf to protect.

When I finished, I ascended the stone staircase to the room that had once been our sanctuary, the same one I had shared with Kale for two years, never knowing I had mated with a monster wearing a man’s face.

Kale, Alpha of the Hallowfang Pack. He had come into my life on a night filled with storm and sorrow, the same night Talia abandoned him at the altar. I’d found him at the bridge, ready to leap, his wolf barely restrained beneath his trembling skin. I had saved him. I had offered him warmth and body and heart, believing I was his salvation.

He was my boss then. For two years, I worked by his side, mistaking his kindness for something more. When I felt like I had no one, Kale was there; he paid for everything, held me as I wept, promising I’d never be alone.

Then came the storm. The night we gave in. What I once thought was fate. We made love, and by morning, he wept, calling it a mistake, blaming himself for my grief. He begged to fix it. So we married in secret, bound by wolf law, hidden from the world.

His pack never approved. His mother had loathed me from the beginning, spitting curses about my orphaned lineage and lack of title. She called me a breeder, nothing more. And now, even that purpose has been taken from me.

I didn’t know when Talia returned or when Kale’s heart began to drift, but I knew without doubt that she was back, and I was already forgotten.

He had become her creature. Her puppet. And I? I was this pack's Luna stripped of her moon.

I retrieved the resignation letter I had written weeks before my due date, a quiet dream of leaving the corporate world behind to raise my pup in peace. That dream had died with my child. Now all I needed was Kale’s signature on that letter and the divorce papers, which were soon to arrive.

I packed the documents with steady hands and moved to strip the walls of every framed photograph, every smile that now rang false. One by one, I tossed them into a box, along with all the lavish gifts he had given over the years, jewels, furs, enchanted trinkets, hollow tokens of a love that had never been real.

A knock came at the door.

Kale entered, his eyes sweeping over the near-empty room, then resting on the box at my feet.

“Why is the room bare? And why are you packing the gifts I gave you?” he asked, frowning.

“I don’t like them anymore,” I replied coolly. “I’m giving them away.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Is this because I raised my voice earlier? I apologized. I’ll buy you more. But you need to try to get along with Talia, she’s my brother’s widow.”

I gave a dry laugh, no longer surprised by the depths of his deceit. “You never told me you had a brother.”

Kale hesitated, then let out a fake chuckle. “He was the black sheep of the family. Now that he’s gone, I’m responsible for them. But Talia… she means nothing to me now. I have you.”

I stared at him long and hard. I wanted to believe those words, needed them to be true, but I knew the scent of a lie when it brushed against my wolf senses.

“Fine,” I said at last. “But I don’t want her living here.”

“She is going to live here,” Kale said sharply. “She has nowhere else to go. I’ll send her up so you two can talk.”

He leaned in to kiss me, but I turned my face, letting his lips land on my cheek. He didn’t notice, or didn’t care, and left without another word.

Moments later, the door opened again. Talia entered, looking around with open smugness.

“Perfect. Clear the space. I’ll be moving in soon,” she announced with a smirk.

I nodded. “You can have the whole house. I won’t be here much longer.”

Talia’s grin widened. “Oh, darling, so you do know. Kale told me something earlier. He said your pup died for a good cause. That Marcus is doing better now. You should be proud, your child gave mine a future.”

The words sliced through my chest like silver. I sank onto the bed, staring at her without blinking. “If my pain gives you joy, then take it. Feast on it.”

Talia’s amusement faltered. She scowled. “You’re not angry? What’s wrong with you? Your mate betrayed you, killed your child, left you barren, because I asked him to!”

I looked at her coldly. “Congratulations. He’s yours. Enjoy the leash you’ve got around his neck.”

Talia began pacing the room in frustration, her composure slipping. Then, in a flash, she grabbed my arm, her claws digging in slightly.

“You ungrateful bitch. I’ll show you what happens when you spoil my fun.”

“Let me go,” I growled, trying to yank free.

She refused to release me and instead dragged me toward the top of the staircase. Just as I twisted my wrist loose, she screamed, loud and theatrical.

“Luna Alina, no! Please!”

And then she tumbled down the stairs.

The thudding of her body echoed through the manor, followed by a chorus of hurried footsteps. Kale and his mother appeared at the bottom, finding Talia crumpled and bleeding.

Kale’s eyes burned with fury, glowing red beneath the surface.

“What the fuck have you done?” He demanded. His voice was trembling with rage as he stared up at me, no longer as a husband, but as an Alpha ready to unleash hell.