On my eighteenth birthday, I packed a bag to run away with the boy I loved.

By midnight, I was wearing my sister's wedding dress.

...

"You're marrying Jacob tonight."

My father said it like he was reading the weather. He didn't even look up from the papers on his desk.

"Alpha John is dead," he went on. "His heart stopped at dinner. Jacob takes the title at dawn, and an Alpha needs a Luna beside him when he does."

"Winnie is his fiancée," I said. "Not me."

"Winnie refuses."

From the couch, my older sister filed her nails. She didn't bother hiding her smile.

"I'm not marrying a cripple who'll be dead before twenty-five," Winnie said. "Sorry, Fi. Somebody has to take one for the family."

"So you pick the daughter with no wolf." My voice cracked on the last word. "The one nobody will miss."

Dad finally raised his eyes. They were flat and tired.

"You're eighteen tonight, Fiona. Your wolf never came. No Alpha will ever claim you. This is the best offer you'll get."

"It's not an offer if I can't say no."

"You can't," he said. "Go get dressed."

I walked out of his office with my hands shaking. I didn't go get dressed.

I went to my room, pulled the duffel bag out from under my bed, and checked it one more time. Two sweaters. The money I'd saved. The silver bracelet Leo gave me last spring.

*We'll leave on your birthday,* he'd promised. *Just you and me. No pack. No rules.*

Leo was the Beta's son, strong and golden, and everyone said he'd lead his own pack someday. He was the only one who never called me broken.

I climbed out my window and ran.

...

His door wasn't locked.

I pushed it open with a grin already on my face. "Leo, we have to go now, they're trying to—"

The words died.

Leo was on the bed, his shirt gone. A girl was straddling him, her dress hanging off one shoulder, her lipstick smeared across his jaw.

She turned her head.

Winnie.

For a second, nobody moved. Then my sister laughed. A bright, happy laugh, like I'd just told her a joke.

"Oh, look," she said. "The bride found us."

I stared at Leo. "Tell me this isn't what it looks like."

He sat up slowly and reached for his shirt. He didn't rush. He didn't blush.

"It's exactly what it looks like, Fiona."

"We were leaving tonight. You said—"

"I know what I said." He pulled the shirt over his head. "I meant it, back then. I do love you."

"Then *why?*"

His eyes went cold. I'd never seen them like that. Not once.

"Because I'm going to be an Alpha one day," he said. "I can love you. But a future Alpha's Luna can't be a wolfless waste. Be realistic."

Something inside my chest cracked straight down the middle.

Winnie slid off the bed and tugged the collar of his shirt aside. Right there, at the base of his neck, was a fresh bite. Two neat curves, still pink.

A Mate Mark.

"Pretty, isn't it?" Winnie tilted her head. "We've been seeing each other since winter. You really never noticed? Every time he said he was training late, Fi. Every single time."

My bag slipped off my shoulder and hit the floor.

I didn't cry. I thought I would. Instead, a strange, hollow laugh came out of me, and both of them flinched.

"Happy birthday to me," I said.

Then I picked up my bag and walked out.

...

The dress was too long. It had been made for Winnie.

The maids pinned the hem while my stepmother tightened the lace at my back until I could barely breathe. Nobody asked if I was okay. Nobody said anything at all.

By eleven, I was in a black car heading up the hill to the Alpha House.

...

The great hall was packed. Every family in Blue Lake Pack had come, and every face turned when I stepped inside.

The whispers started right away.

"That's the younger one. The one with no wolf."

"A sick Alpha and a broken bride. Moon Goddess, this pack is finished."

"Give it a year. He'll be in the ground, and she'll be nobody's widow."

I kept my chin up and my eyes on the altar. That was when I saw him.

Jacob.

I'd only ever heard stories. The Alpha's son who never ran with the pack. Who coughed through every ceremony. Who, people said, wouldn't live long enough to matter.

He was tall, but too thin. His skin was pale, almost gray under the candlelight. He leaned on a black cane, his knuckles white around the handle.

But his eyes were sharp. Dark and steady. They found me across the room and didn't move.

I reached the altar. A heavyset man in the front row snorted loudly.

"Hey, Jacob," he called. "Think you'll survive the wedding night? Or should we call the healer now?"

Laughter rolled through the crowd.

Jacob turned his head. He didn't raise his voice.

"Gerald Morrow," he said. "Your family owes the Alpha House three years of back tribute. Laugh again, and I'll collect it tonight. In full."

The hall went dead silent.

Gerald's face turned purple. He sat down.

Someone behind me whispered, "Well, *she* can't even shift. What's he protecting her for?"

Jacob's gaze swept toward the voice. The whisperer shut up so fast I heard her teeth click.

Then he leaned toward me, just a little. His breath smelled like mint and something bitter, like medicine.

"Don't look at them," he murmured. "Look at me."

I did. Up close, his eyes were even darker.

"I won't touch you," he said quietly. "I know you didn't choose this. Neither did I. Once I truly hold power here, I'll break the engagement. You'll get your freedom back."

I blinked at him. Of all the things I expected tonight, kindness wasn't one of them.

"Why would you do that for me?"

The corner of his mouth moved. It wasn't quite a smile.

"Because someone should."

Before I could answer, the old priest lifted his staff and struck the stone floor. The sound echoed through the hall.

"By the light of the Moon Goddess," he announced, "we bind these two before the sacred flame."

Behind the altar, a bowl of white fire burned tall and still. It had burned that way for a hundred years, people said. Pure white. Never changing.

"Bride," the priest said. "Step forward. Stand beside your Alpha."

I took one step toward Jacob.

The flame flickered.

I took another.

The fire shuddered, hissed, and then roared upward, higher than the priest's head. The white bled away. In its place, the flame burned a cold, glowing silver-blue, bright as moonlight on ice.

Someone screamed.

The priest stumbled back, his staff clattering to the floor. His face had gone completely white.

"That's impossible," he whispered. "The flame hasn't turned that color in three hundred years."

Beside me, Jacob's grip on his cane tightened. For the first time all night, he looked shaken.

And he was staring at me.

The morning after my wedding, the whole pack came to watch me fail.

...

"Luna Fiona!" Winnie's voice carried across the training field. "Come join us! Surely the Alpha's wife knows how to spar?"

Thirty wolves turned to look at me. Some were in fur. Most were in sweat-soaked shirts, grinning.

I had only come down to the field because the maid said Jacob wanted me to see the pack. I hadn't expected my sister to be here first.

"I'm just watching," I said.

"Watching." Winnie strolled toward me, her ponytail swinging. Leo's shirt hung loose on her, the collar pulled wide so everyone could see his mark. "That's all you've ever done, isn't it, Fi? Watch other people have wolves."

A few people snickered.

"Is there a point to this?"

"The point," she said, loud enough for the back row, "is that a pack needs strength. The woman who stands beside a future Alpha should have a wolf worth fearing. Not a hollow little girl in a borrowed dress."

"You mean *your* borrowed dress. The one you were too scared to wear."

Her smile froze for half a second. Then she laughed and snapped her fingers.

Across the field, a boy with red hair was standing near the fence. Young. Sixteen, maybe. His hands were trembling, and his eyes had gone yellow at the edges.

"Toby just got his wolf last week," Winnie said sweetly. "He's still learning control. Toby, why don't you say hello to your Luna?"

"Winnie, don't—" someone called.

Too late.

Toby's spine bent with a crack like snapping branches. Fur ripped through his skin. A second later, a gangly brown wolf hit the dirt on all fours, snarling, his lips pulled back over wet teeth.

And he was running straight at me.

My legs locked. I had no wolf to call. No speed. No claws. Just my own two feet, and they wouldn't move.

"Fiona!"

Something black blurred in front of me.

Jacob.

He didn't shift. He *couldn't*, the stories said. He just swung his cane in one hard arc and cracked it across the young wolf's shoulder.

Toby yelped and tumbled sideways into the dust.

Jacob stood there, breathing hard. Then he started coughing. Deep, wet coughs that bent him nearly in half. His free hand gripped my arm, and I realized he wasn't holding me back.

He was holding himself up.

"Are you hurt?" he rasped.

"No. Are *you*?"

He ignored that. He straightened, one slow inch at a time, and turned to face my sister.

The field had gone silent.

"Winnie Grant," he said.

"It was an accident." She lifted her chin. "He's new. He lost control. Nobody could've—"

"You snapped your fingers." Jacob's voice was quiet. "Thirty witnesses saw it. Would you like me to ask them?"

Nobody spoke up for her. Not one person.

"You provoked an unstable wolf to attack the Luna of this pack," he went on. "In any other house, that's treason."

Winnie's face drained. "You wouldn't dare. My father—"

"Your father is not the Alpha. I am." He tapped his cane against the ground once. "You're banned from the Alpha House grounds for three months. And you'll serve kitchen duty at the healer's hall until Toby's shoulder heals. Every meal. Every dish."

"*Kitchen duty?*"

"Would you prefer the cells?"

Her mouth opened. Closed. She turned and stormed off the field, and for the first time in my life, I watched my sister run from something.

Jacob coughed again, quieter this time, and wiped his mouth with a handkerchief. I caught a flash of red on the white cloth before he folded it away.

"Go inside," he told me. "Rest."

"You're the one bleeding."

He glanced at me, surprised. Then he walked away without answering.

...

Leo caught me behind the stables an hour later.

He leaned against the wall like he owned it, arms crossed, that easy smile I used to love sitting on his face.

"Quite a show," he said. "The cripple playing hero."

"Don't call him that."

"Why not? Everyone else does." He pushed off the wall and came closer. "Look at you, Fi. Yesterday you were a waste. Today you're a sick man's wife. Is that a step up or down? I honestly can't tell."

I didn't move back. I used to shrink when he got close. I used to *want* him to get close.

"Is that what you came to say?"

"I came to warn you." He tilted his head. "He's dying. Everybody knows it. A year, maybe two. And when he goes, the council will strip that Luna title off you so fast you'll get whiplash. Then where will you be?"

"Not with you. That's for sure."

His jaw ticked.

"I'm trying to help you," he said.

"No. You're trying to make me cry. Like I did every time you trained late." I tilted my head, the way Winnie had last night. "I'm done crying for you, Leo."

"Fiona—"

"He stood in front of a wolf for me today. A man who can barely stand. You know what that means?" I stepped past him. "At least he knows what respect is."

Behind me, something slammed into the stable wall. Hard. I heard wood splinter.

I didn't turn around.

...

The message came after dark. A folded note slipped under my door, in my father's handwriting.

*Come home. Alone. Now.*

...

He was waiting in his office, same chair, same papers. The only light was the lamp on his desk.

"Sit," he said.

"I'll stand."

He looked at me for a long moment. Then he shrugged.

"The Alpha House has a war room. Jacob keeps the border patrol maps there. Troop counts. Rotation schedules." He folded his hands. "And he carries the Alpha seal on a chain around his neck. I want both."

My stomach dropped.

"You want me to *steal* from him."

"You're his wife. You're in his house. In his bed, soon enough." His lip curled slightly. "Nobody will look twice."

"And what happens when you have them?"

"When Jacob dies, and he will, the pack needs a strong Alpha ready to step in. Leo has the blood. He has the support. All he needs is the proof that Jacob's leadership is failing." He tapped the desk. "You'll give him that."

"Leo." I almost laughed. "The man who's mated to your *other* daughter."

"Winnie understands family duty. You'd do well to learn."

"And if I say no?"

He didn't blink.

"Then I'll stand before the council and tell them the truth. That your mother was unfaithful. That you're not of my blood at all." His voice didn't change. Not even a little. "A wolfless girl with no family name. Jacob will have to cast you out. The pack will make sure of it."

The room tilted.

"Is it true?" I whispered.

"Does it matter?"

I stared at him. At the man who'd taught me to ride a bike. Who'd signed my school forms. Who'd never once, I realized now, hugged me.

"No," I said. "I guess it doesn't."

"You have three days."

...

The walk back up the hill felt longer than it had last night.

The Alpha House was dark. Every window. I slipped through the side door and felt my way down the hall toward our room, my heart pounding so loud I thought the walls might hear it.

A lamp clicked on.

I froze.

Jacob sat in the armchair by the cold fireplace, his cane resting across his knees. He was still dressed. He looked like he'd been sitting there for hours.

"You're late," he said.

"I went for a walk."

"To your father's house."

My mouth went dry.

He leaned forward and slid a thick leather folder across the low table. It stopped right at the edge, in front of me. Stamped across the top in red ink was a single word.

*CLASSIFIED.*

Border maps. Troop rotations. I could see the corners of them sticking out.

Jacob looked up at me, his dark eyes calm. Too calm.

"That's what your father wants," he said softly. "Isn't it?"

Ice poured down my spine.

He knew.

He knew *everything*.

I waited for him to call the guards.

Jacob didn't move. He just watched me stand there with my father's threat still ringing in my ears.

"Sit down, Fiona."

"Are you going to lock me up?"

"Sit down," he said again. Softer this time.

My knees gave out before my pride did. I dropped onto the edge of the couch across from him, and the folder sat between us like a loaded gun.

"How long have you known?"

"Since you left the grounds." He tapped the arm of his chair. "Your father's house has three windows facing the road. One of my men watches all of them."

"You've been spying on my family."

"Your family has been spying on mine for six years." He said it without anger. "I just got better at it."

I stared at the red stamp. *CLASSIFIED.* My fingers itched, and I hated myself for it.

"He said if I don't bring him this, he'll tell the council I'm not his daughter."

Jacob was quiet for a moment.

"Are you?"

"I don't know." A laugh slipped out of me, thin and ugly. "Isn't that funny? I don't even know whose I am."

He picked up the folder.

For one sick second, I thought he was going to hand it to me. A test. A trap.

Instead, he leaned over, pulled the grate open, and dropped it on the dead ashes. He struck a match. The flame caught the corner and crawled up, curling the maps black.

"Those were real," I whispered.

"They were. Now they're not." He sat back, the firelight carving deep shadows under his cheekbones. "I have copies. Your father doesn't."

"Why are you showing me this?"

"Because I want you to hear a question. And I want you to answer it with nothing in your hands."

The paper popped and hissed.

"Do you want to be their pawn," Jacob asked, "or do you want to be yourself?"

Nobody had ever asked me what I wanted. Not once in eighteen years.

My throat burned.

"I don't know how to be myself," I said. "I've never had the chance."

"Then start tomorrow." He rose on his cane, slow and stiff. At the door, he paused. "Goodnight, Fiona."

I sat there until the fire went out. Something in my chest refused to go out with it.

...

The next afternoon, I walked to the edge of the forest to breathe.

I didn't hear Leo until he grabbed my wrist.

"There you are."

"Get your hand off me."

He spun me around and pressed me against a pine trunk. Bark bit into my shoulder blades.

"You've been avoiding me."

"I've been *married*, Leo. It's a full-time job."

"Stop." His eyes searched my face, hungry and sure. "I saw how you looked at me yesterday. You're still angry. That means you still care."

"It means I'm still angry."

He kissed me.

Hard. His mouth crushed mine, his fingers digging into my jaw so I couldn't turn away. I shoved at his chest. He didn't budge. He tasted like mint gum and arrogance.

When he finally pulled back, he was smiling.

"See? You didn't bite me."

"You didn't give me room to."

He laughed like I'd flirted. Then he cupped my face, and his voice dropped low and gentle. The voice he used to use under the bleachers.

"Listen to me. Jacob's dying. When he's gone, I'll be Alpha. Your father's already promised the votes."

"Congratulations."

"Winnie will be my Luna. Publicly. She has to be, she's got the wolf and the name." His thumb brushed my cheek. "But you, Fi? You'll be mine. Privately. I'll get you a house near the river. Nobody will touch you. Nobody will laugh at you ever again."

I just looked at him.

"You have no wolf," he said, like he was being generous. "Nobody's going to marry you for real. But I can keep you."

The slap cracked through the trees.

My palm stung. His head snapped sideways. A red print bloomed across his cheek, and for a moment, the forest was dead silent.

Leo touched his face.

Then his eyes went gold.

"You shouldn't have done that."

The air got heavy. Thick, like wet sand pouring into my lungs. It was the Alpha blood in him, the pressure every wolf in the pack bowed to without thinking.

I had no wolf to fight it.

My knees buckled. My palms hit the dirt. Pine needles stabbed my skin.

"Kneel," Leo said. "That's where you belong. You always did."

"Go to hell."

"Kneel, Fiona."

The weight doubled. My spine bent. My forehead dipped toward the ground, inch by inch, and I felt tears sting my eyes. Not from pain.

From *rage*.

Eighteen years. Eighteen years of *broken*, *hollow*, *waste*. Of watching. Of kneeling.

*No.*

Something cracked open inside me.

Not a bone. Deeper. Like ice breaking on a frozen lake, a long groan and then a roar of cold water rushing up.

Light spilled out of my skin. Silver-white, bright enough to throw Leo's shadow across the trees.

And in the dark behind my eyes, something enormous lifted its head.

A wolf. White as snow. Bigger than any wolf I'd ever seen, bigger than the Alpha statues in the great hall. Her eyes opened slowly, and they were the same silver-blue as the wedding flame.

*Fiona.*

Her voice filled my skull. Warm. Ancient. Almost amused.

*I've waited for you a very long time.*

"Who—"

*Stand up.*

I stood.

The pressure didn't just break. It *reversed*. A wave of force burst out of me and slammed into Leo's chest. He flew backward like a kicked doll, crashing through a bush and hitting the ground six feet away. He rolled twice and stopped on his back, gasping.

My hands were burning.

I looked down. Silver fur rippled up my forearms. My nails had lengthened into curved white claws. My jaw ached, my teeth pressing sharp against my lips.

I wasn't scared.

I was *laughing*.

"Fiona."

I turned.

Jacob stood at the tree line, one hand braced on a trunk, his cane forgotten in the leaves behind him. He'd run. I could tell from the way his chest heaved.

Leo scrambled up on his elbows. "Jacob, she attacked me—"

"Shut up." Jacob didn't even glance at him.

He was staring past my shoulder.

I twisted to follow his eyes. The light behind me had shaped itself into something hanging in the air. A crescent moon, framed by rings of silver lines, turning slowly like a clock face made of stars.

"What is that?"

Jacob didn't answer.

He took one step toward me, then another. The calm mask he'd worn at the altar, in the war room, by the fireplace, was gone. His lips parted. His fingers trembled.

"That's a moon sigil," he said hoarsely. "Only the first Alpha bloodlines carried it. The founding families. They've been extinct for three hundred years."

"That's not possible. I don't *have* a wolf. I never—"

"You do now." His dark eyes locked on mine, wide and searching. "Fiona, your wolf... she can't be just an ordinary wolf."

Inside my head, the white wolf chuckled softly.

*Ordinary,* she repeated. *Tell him what they did to us, Fiona. Tell him who buried me.*