Elara POV:

For two whole days, I actively blocked my end of the Mind-Link with Kael.

I began to pry my mind from his, inch by agonizing inch, like drawing a rusted nail from living flesh. The grating sensation of the severance festered at the ends of my nerves.

To my utter disappointment, he did not even notice.

He was too absorbed in soaking up the admiration of his new, fragile Omega.

The heavy rain returned on Tuesday as I finished my border patrol shift.

As a high-ranking Warrior, I was responsible for keeping the rogue wolves away from our territory.

I stood outside the muddy training grounds, waiting for the pack transport vehicle, my clothes soaked through.

A few feet away, Selene stood under a large oak tree, holding a delicate umbrella.

She was talking on her phone, her voice dripping with artificial sweetness.

"Alpha Kael, the wind is so scary here," Selene whined into the receiver. "Can you bring your big SUV and park it close to me? I am freezing."

Ten minutes later, the roar of a heavy engine cut through the rain.

Kael's black off-road vehicle skidded to a halt, splashing mud onto my boots.

He stepped out, his eyes instantly locking onto Selene, drawn entirely by her distress signals and the sweet scent of a helpless Omega.

It was only when he opened the passenger door for her that he finally noticed me standing in the shadows.

A flash of genuine surprise crossed his handsome face.

"Elara? What are you doing out here in the storm?" Kael asked, his brows furrowing.

Selene slid into the passenger seat, deliberately releasing a wave of innocent, distressed scent.

"Oh my, Elara looks so cold," Selene said, her eyes wide with fake pity. "Alpha, we should give her a ride. I do not mind squeezing in."

I looked at the passenger seat that was supposed to belong to the Luna.

I let my eyelids fall, my gaze fixed on the thick clods of mud clinging to the vehicle's tires. I did not permit a single muscle in my face to twitch.

"No need," I said, my voice as cold as the rain. "I prefer the transport truck."

I turned my back on them and walked away, ignoring Kael's confused shout.

An hour later, I was back in my repaired cabin, stepping out of a hot shower to wash away the mud and the chill.

I was drying my hair when the heavy oak door of my cabin suddenly groaned.

The defense ward flared a brief, protesting crimson before its light was crushed.

Kael stood in the doorway, having used his supreme Alpha privilege and bloodline to force his way into my private sanctuary.

"You are being ridiculous, Elara," Kael sighed, closing the door behind him.

He walked toward me, reaching out to cup my cheek.

The moment his skin brushed mine, a jolt of lightning rushed through my veins.

It was the Electric Touch, a powerful physical reaction granted by the Moon Goddess to Fated Mates.

Usually, it brought immense comfort, but today, it only made my stomach turn.

I took a sharp step back, dodging his hand.

"I was just picking her up on my way back from the council building," Kael explained, sounding annoyed by my rejection.

"You drove ten miles in the opposite direction," I stated calmly, staring into his eyes.

"It's about appearances, Elara," Kael argued, puffing out his chest. "I cannot have you living in the estate before the Marking. What would the elders say?"

"They would say nothing, because you are the Alpha," I replied, my voice steady. "Perhaps it is time we reconsider this Mate bond."

Kael froze, his eyes widening in pure shock.

Instantly, his Alpha aura exploded into the room, making the air thick and hard to breathe.

"Do not speak nonsense!" he growled, his pride wounded. "You are making a mountain out of a molehill. Selene is a packless, weak Omega. She has nothing! I took her in out of pity."

"Pity?" I laughed, a dry, harsh sound. "Is that why she called you an 'old friend' at the pack gathering last week?"

Kael's jaw tightened, his silence confirming my suspicion.

"And is that why you gave her my special healing herbs?" I pushed further, my chest burning with a cold fire. "The herbs my mother sent me from the Bloodborne Pack?"

"She has a weak constitution, Elara!" Kael defended himself, his voice rising. "You are a Warrior. You heal fast. You are so rough and independent, you don't need constant care. Why do you have so little tolerance for Omegas?"

He was calling me rough.

He was punishing me for being strong enough to fight for his pack.

Before I could respond, the cabin door slowly creaked open.

Selene peeked her head inside, a sweet, triumphant smile playing on her lips.

"Oops, am I interrupting something?" she asked softly.

She stepped into the room, deliberately releasing a heavy, provocative scent of blooming roses to challenge my territory.

My Inner Wolf went silent. Not calm—silent. The kind of silence that comes before the killing strike.

Elara POV:

My eyes turned as cold as glacial ice.

Deep within my soul, my Inner Wolf let out a vicious, territorial growl, pacing furiously against the confines of my mind.

I stared at Kael, watching the way his body instinctively shifted to shield Selene.

"Did you bring her to my territory?" I asked, my voice dangerously low.

Kael avoided my gaze, looking suddenly guilty.

"She was scared of the thunder in the estate," he muttered, trying to reach out to pacify me. "Elara, be reasonable."

I threw my head back and let out a harsh, humorless laugh.

"Reasonable?" I spat the word out. "Let's talk about reason. Yesterday, I went to the war room. My records were destroyed."

Selene flinched, her eyes darting to the floor.

"And my 'Full Moon Defense Plan,' the one I stayed up for two weeks to draft, is missing from my desk," I continued, stepping closer to the Omega. "Care to explain why your scent is all over my destroyed files, Selene?"

Selene's lower lip began to tremble violently.

Tears welled up in her large, innocent eyes, spilling over her cheeks in a perfect display of misery.

"I did not do it!" she sobbed, clutching Kael's arm. "Elara is always bullying me because I am an Omega! She hates me because you are nice to me, Alpha!"

With a dramatic gasp, Selene dropped to her knees on the wooden floor, bowing her head.

"I am sorry for breathing your air, Warrior Elara," she cried out. "Please do not hurt me!"

The sight of the submissive Omega crying on the floor triggered every protective instinct in Kael's Alpha blood.

His eyes flashed golden yellow, the mark of his beast rising to the surface. His pride could not tolerate a warrior who met his gaze as an equal—not when he had a pet willing to worship the very ground he walked on.

He blindly believed her performance.

"Enough, Elara!" Kael roared, his voice vibrating with power.

He unleashed the Alpha's Command, aiming it directly at my mind.

Apologize to her, now! his voice thundered in my head, a suffocating weight that tried to force my body to bow.

I planted my boots firmly on the ground, biting the inside of my cheek until I tasted copper to keep myself standing. The command clawed at my will, but I had spent four years bleeding for this pack while she had spent one month batting her lashes. I would not break for this.

Looking at my Fated Mate, the man who was supposed to protect my soul, I felt absolutely nothing but a terrifying emptiness.

The cord of tension I had held taut within my chest for so long did not snap. It simply went slack, leaving behind a hollow quiet where feeling once lived.

"I refuse your protection as my Alpha, and I refuse your judgment as my Mate," I said, my voice eerily calm and steady. "Get out of my cabin. Both of you."

Selene shrank behind Kael's massive frame, continuing her fake whimpering.

Kael stared at me, his chest heaving with anger.

He clearly thought I was just using our Mate bond as a threat to throw a tantrum.

"You are acting like a spoiled pup," Kael sneered, grabbing Selene's hand. "When you calm down and remember your place, you can come find me."

He turned around and dragged Selene out, slamming my heavy oak door so hard the hinges cracked.

The moment they were gone, my knees gave out.

I collapsed onto the floor, gasping for air as the residual pressure of the Alpha's Command faded from my lungs.

With trembling fingers, I reached into my mind and violently severed my connection to the Silver Moon Pack's Mind-Link.

The constant hum of pack voices in my head vanished, leaving behind a deafening silence.

My phone rang on the nightstand.

It was my mother, calling from the Bloodborne Pack, my ancestral home far to the north.

"Elara, my brave wolf," my mother's warm voice flowed through the speaker. "I felt a disturbance in your energy. What is wrong?"

My mother was an Elder of the Bloodborne Pack, a keeper of ancient laws and a woman of immense power.

"Mother," I whispered, my voice cracking for the first time. "I am leaving the Silver Moon Pack. As soon as I hand over my defense duties, I am coming home."

There was a brief silence on the other end.

"And Kael?" she asked gently.

"I am going to perform the Rejection ritual," I stated, staring blankly at the wall.

The Rejection was a sacred and brutal act, severing the soul tie given by the Moon Goddess, a pain worse than breaking bones.

"Good," my mother said firmly, her voice filled with fierce pride. "You carry the noble blood of our ancestors. I will not let my daughter suffer humiliation. Come home, my child."

Tears of gratitude burned my eyes.

I hung up the phone, and a strange peace settled over me. It did not mend the fractures in my chest—it filled them with a cold, quiet finality.

I planned to spend my last two days quietly packing my things.

But out of habit, I opened the pack's public community network on my phone.

The main channel was exploding with thousands of comments.

Selene had just dropped a video file into the public feed, and the title made my blood freeze.