"To a bountiful harvest!" a High-Lunar noble shouted, raising a crystal goblet high above his head.

"May the Moon Goddess bless the hunt!" another answered.

The Ashborne Pack great hall erupted in cheers, the sound of clinking glass echoing off the vaulted ceilings.

I stood in the arched doorway. The cold autumn wind blew past my shoulders, rustling the fabric of my simple dress.

"Ah, the Alpha's mate arrives," a woman sneered from the nearest table. "Late as always."

"Probably scrubbing the kitchen floors," another noble added. "Old habits die hard for the moon-blind."

I ignored them. My gaze locked on my husband, Caelan, standing at the head of the room.

Next to him was Serena Ashford. My best friend. The woman who had spent countless hours sitting at my kitchen island, drinking tea and listening to me cry about my marriage.

Tonight, she wore a stunning silver gown. Her arm looped tightly through Caelan's.

And wrapped around her left ankle was a crimson cord bracelet.

I stared at the intricate knots. I had woven that cord myself. I spent weeks perfecting the pattern, bleeding from the rough threads, preparing it as a fifteenth-anniversary gift for him.

Serena noticed my stare. She stepped forward, lifting her hem so the red silk caught the chandelier light.

"Do you like it, Elara?" Serena asked, a sickeningly sweet smile on her face. "Caelan gave it to me this morning. He said it was just lying around the house."

My throat tightened. I walked up to the dais.

"I made that for him," I said. "Today is our anniversary."

Caelan swirled the amber liquid in his glass. He refused to meet my eyes.

"You always cling to these pathetic gestures, Elara," Caelan said, his voice flat and annoyed. "Anything to remind everyone you hold the title of Alpha's mate. It's exhausting."

"Gestures?" I stepped closer, closing the distance between us. "I waited at home with a dinner you never showed up for. I took a rogue wolf's claws to my ribs to save your life three years ago. I tailor your winter coats because you hate the heavy fabrics from the market. Are those just gestures to you?"

"They are survival tactics," Caelan replied coldly. "You do them to secure your place here."

"You told me he was just bad at expressing his feelings," I said, turning my focus to Serena. "You sat in my kitchen and told me to be patient with him."

Serena smirked. "I told you what you needed to hear, Elara. Did you really think an Alpha like Caelan would settle for a mutt forever?"

She laughed, a sharp, ringing sound that echoed over the music.

"Oh, stop looking so betrayed. You sound like a desperate maid," Serena mocked.

She picked up a heavy silver pitcher from the banquet table.

"Since you're so good at domestic chores, pour the wine," Serena commanded. She shoved the pitcher hard into my chest. "Low-blood women are best suited for serving anyway."

I shoved the pitcher back at her. Wine sloshed over the rim, staining the white tablecloth.

"I serve no one, Serena," I told her. "Especially not a traitor."

Serena's eyes narrowed. "Watch your mouth."

She lunged forward, her foot shooting out to hook my ankle.

I stumbled backward. The open terrace doors offered no support. My shoes slipped on the slick stone.

I fell hard into the rain-soaked courtyard. Mud splashed across my face, coating my hair and soaking into my dress.

The hall erupted in laughter. High-Lunar nobles pointed and jeered from the warmth of the room.

Serena stepped out into the mud. She pressed her heavy leather boot directly onto my fingers.

Pain shot up my arm. I gritted my teeth, refusing to scream.

"Lick it clean," Serena ordered. She ground her sole into my knuckles, tearing the skin. "You dirtied my shoe, Faded-born."

I looked up past her, finding Caelan. He stood in the doorway, watching with hollow eyes. He did absolutely nothing.

"Caelan," I said, my voice steady despite the crushing weight on my hand. "Tell her to stop."

"You brought this on yourself," he replied, taking a sip of his drink. "Learn your place."

I yanked my hand free. My skin tore against the gravel beneath the mud. I scrambled to my knees, scanning the laughing crowd.

"Kael!" I called out.

My fourteen-year-old son stood near the edge of the terrace. He was my blood. My last reason for staying in this frozen, loveless marriage.

I reached out my bleeding hand to him. "Kael, help me up."

He walked over slowly. But when my muddy fingers brushed his tailored sleeve, he violently yanked his arm away.

"Don't touch me," Kael spat, wiping his sleeve as if I were a disease.

My hand hovered in the freezing air. "What's wrong with you? I'm your mother."

"You're a Faded-born," he shouted, his face flushed with anger. "The High-Lunar boys at the training grounds mock me every single day because of you. They call me a mutt!"

"I taught you how to track," I reminded him, staring at the boy I had raised. "I hired the best warriors in the territory to train you. I alter your clothes every season because you grow too fast."

"I didn't ask for any of that!" Kael pointed sharply at Serena. "Serena actually understands what I need to be a true Alpha. She doesn't embarrass me."

I pushed myself up to my feet, mud sliding off my skirt. The cold wind bit into my soaked skin.

"If you walk away with them right now, Kael, you are making a choice," I warned him. "Think carefully."

Kael crossed his arms. "Of course Dad and Serena. Why would I choose a weak, mixed-blood mother who makes everyone look down on me?"

My chest hollowed out. A deep, agonizing void replaced the love I had carried for fourteen years.

I reached into my pocket and pulled out a second crimson cord.

"I made this one for you," I said softly, holding the woven silk out to him.

Kael snatched the red string from my palm.

He turned to Serena, holding it up like a hunting trophy. She gave him an approving nod.

He threw the cord directly into the deep puddle at my feet.

He raised his boot and stomped on the woven silk, burying it deep into the muck.

"There," Kael said, glaring at me. "Are we done here?"

Caelan finally stepped onto the terrace. He didn't spare a single glance for the ruined bracelet in the mud.

"Pack your things by morning," Caelan declared, his commanding voice carrying over the silent crowd. "A woman with impure blood was never worthy of this position."

He turned his back on me. He guided Serena and Kael back into the warmth of the hall, shutting me out.

The heavy wooden doors slammed shut, cutting off the light and the music.

I stood alone in the freezing rain.

I didn't shed a single tear.

Bending down, I dug my raw, bleeding fingers into the mud. I pulled out the ruined crimson cord Kael had crushed.

As I brushed the thick dirt from the silk, the dark storm clouds above suddenly split apart.

A blinding beam of full moonlight pierced the darkness, washing directly over the courtyard.

It struck my shoulders, instantly warming the chill in my bones.

I glanced down at the ground. My shadow stretching across the muddy stones wasn't black.

It glowed with a faint, pulsing silver light.

Deep within my chest, a heavy, ancient bell—silent for three hundred years—began to slowly toll.

*Dong.*

The vibration rattled my ribs, sending a surge of forgotten power through my veins.

I wasn't just a mixed-blood.

My true lineage was waking up.

"Maybe if you pray hard enough, the Goddess will give you a better Ancestral Link in your next life!" a boy shouted.

A jagged rock struck my shoulder. I didn't flinch.

Frost coated my simple dress. I had knelt in the cedar forest at the edge of Ashborne territory all night. My lips felt completely numb. My knees were locked blocks of ice against the frozen earth.

"Look at her," another High-Lunar youth sneered, tossing a pinecone at my head. "The Alpha's mate, freezing in the dirt like a stray."

Words I had never learned spilled from my cracked lips. A heavy, rhythmic chant in the old tongue vibrated in my throat.

The boys laughed louder and walked back toward the main estate.

I shifted my weight. A sharp, blinding ache flared in my left leg, radiating from the massive, jagged scar that ran from my knee down to my ankle.

*Weak wolf.* Kael’s insult from last night echoed in my ears.

I traced the raised, ruined tissue through the tear in my skirt. Six months ago, my son had wanted to prove he wasn't weak. Serena had cornered him in the armory before his first winter hunt.

"Show them you aren't tied to her moon-blind apron strings," Serena had told him, her voice dripping with fake encouragement. "Take the northern ridge."

He had run straight into the restricted zone. Straight to a feral wolf rotting with moon poison.

I remembered the beast lunging. I remembered throwing my body over Kael's. The fangs tearing through my muscle. The snow turning crimson.

"Mom!" Kael had screamed, sobbing over my bleeding body as I lost consciousness.

But the next day, Serena stood in Caelan’s office, spinning her web.

"She lured him there, Caelan," Serena had lied smoothly. "She orchestrated the attack so she could play the hero. A desperate bid for the pack's sympathy."

And my husband had looked at my bandaged, mangled leg with absolute disgust.

"Don't use my son to secure your place," Caelan had warned me.

Kael had stood right beside them. He knew the truth. He knew I had nearly lost my leg to save his life. Yet he chose silence to hide his own broken rules.

A low whine broke my focus.

I looked up. A massive gray war wolf crept through the cedars. Then another. And another.

They didn't bare their teeth. As the morning moon hung pale in the sky, the lead wolf dropped its belly to the frozen earth. The others immediately followed.

"Get up!" a perimeter guard yelled, running into the clearing. He projected his Alpha command, the sheer force of it making my ears ring. "Up, you mutts!"

The wolves whimpered. They pressed their snouts into the dirt, pointing directly at me. They refused to move.

"What did you do to them?" the guard snapped, grabbing my arm and hauling me to my feet.

"Nothing," I answered, my voice raspy.

"Drag her to the hall," a second guard ordered, jogging over. He wiped sweat from his forehead, looking thoroughly spooked. "Father Aldren is tearing the relic room apart. He found some burned parchment from three hundred years ago."

"What parchment?" the first guard asked.

"Something about a kneeling pack," the second guard muttered, eyeing me nervously. "He keeps pointing at a drawing of a Moonbound Sigil. Swears it matches the silver streaks in her hair."

The first guard shoved me forward. "Serena wants her in the center ring anyway. Pack's whispering too much. Time to shut it down."

They threw me into the center of the grand assembly room.

The entire Ashborne pack surrounded me. Serena stood on the raised platform, wearing a sharp black suit. Caelan sat in the high-backed Alpha chair, his expression carved from stone.

"Elara," Serena announced, her voice echoing off the timber walls. "The pack demands clarity. The rumors about your stunts are disrupting the peace."

I stood up straight, ignoring the throbbing in my leg. "What stunts, Serena?"

"Your manipulation," she shot back. "You stage attacks to look like a savior. You use cheap tricks to make the border wolves act rabid today. You use your son to cling to a title you don't deserve."

"Is that what I do?" I looked past her, fixing my gaze on my husband. "Are you really going to let her do this?"

Caelan rested his chin on his fist. He looked utterly bored. "Confess, Elara. Stop dragging this out."

I turned my attention to Kael. My son stood by the bottom steps, arms crossed, avoiding my eyes.

"Kael," I said softly. "Tell them what happened in the snow. Tell them whose idea it was to go into the restricted zone."

Kael's jaw tightened. He shifted his weight, glancing nervously at the judging eyes of the High-Lunar elders in the front row.

"Just admit it, Mom," Kael groaned, rolling his eyes. "Then everyone can move on."

A strange calm washed over me.

I didn't cry. I didn't scream. I smiled.

A quiet, broken smile that made Kael take a sudden step back.

They didn't care about the truth. They all saw the reality perfectly well. But my guilt was the foundation they needed to build their comfortable, perfect lives. Admitting I was a villain made it so much easier for them to be the heroes.

"Fine," I said. My voice carried clearly across the silent room. "I confess."

Serena smirked. She stepped down from the platform, handing me a small microphone. "Say it properly. So the elders hear you."

I took the metal cylinder. I stared directly into Caelan's empty eyes.

"I was born without noble blood," I declared, my tone devoid of any sorrow. "I was never worthy of Ashborne."

Laughter rippled through the crowd. High-Lunar women whispered behind their hands, pointing at my mud-stained dress. The elders nodded in grim satisfaction.

Caelan waved his hand dismissively. "Take her to the lower cells until she packs her bags."

I lowered the microphone.

Under the roar of their mocking laughter, I let the ancient words slip from my tongue one last time, barely a whisper.

"Moon remembers."

The guards shoved me down the long stone corridor toward the holding cells.

As the heavy iron door slammed shut behind me, a deafening howl shattered the night air outside.

It wasn't just one wolf.

It was hundreds.

Through the tiny barred window near the ceiling, I heard the frantic shouts of the Alpha guards.

"They're doing it again!" a man screamed from the courtyard. "Every single wolf in the territory! They're all dropping to the ground!"

I reached up and touched the silver streaks in my hair. They pulsed beneath my fingertips, humming with a faint, chilling heat.

"Move." The perimeter guard shoved my shoulder. "Alpha wants you packed and gone by sunrise."

I stumbled down the stone corridor. "I will pack my things."

"You'll pack whatever Serena lets you take." He sneered. "She brought three rogues into the council room an hour ago. They sang quite a song about you."

"What song?"

"That you warmed rogue beds long before Caelan ever found you." The guard crossed his arms, leaning against the damp wall. "They told the elders you just needed a strong male to clean up your mess. Even hinted the boy isn't pure Ashborne."

"Caelan allowed them to speak?"

"He paid them." The guard laughed. "Easier to call you a whore than admit he's wrong."

I stared at the heavy iron torch brackets. My husband needed me to be a monster. Acknowledging my innocence meant acknowledging his own cruelty.

"Tell Caelan something for me." I kept my voice perfectly flat.

"I don't run messages for mutts."

"Tell him I remember the night before his Alpha challenge." I held his gaze. "I stayed awake until dawn grinding his sword."

"Shut up."

"Tell him I remember tearing my own winter cloak to bandage his arm when a silver blade caught him." I took a step toward the guard. "Tell him to check the inside lining of his hunting coats. I sewed a tiny moon into every single one."

"He doesn't care about your sewing."

"He cares about his pride. Ask him why his left shoulder never healed right. Ask him who sucked the silver poison out of his veins while Serena was hiding in the cellar."

The guard grabbed my collar, throwing me into my bedroom. "Pack your trash."

The door slammed shut.