C5

"Healer Thomas, check her pulse before we throw her corpse to the rogue dogs!"

Elizabeth’s shrill command cuts through the freezing air of the underground medical chamber as my soaking, waterlogged body is dumped hard onto the blood-stained slab.

I lie paralyzed, unable to move a single muscle, but my hearing is sharp and hyper-focused. Silver water leaks from my nostrils, burning my sinus passages. Healer Thomas rushes to my side, pressing his trembling hands over my drenched lower stomach. A faint golden glow radiates from his palms as his diagnostic magic sinks into my core.

Suddenly, Healer Thomas gasps, stumbling back two paces, his eyes wide with absolute horror and awe.

"By the Goddess," Healer Thomas breathes out, his voice shaking violently. "She has two heartbeats. The pup... the pup survived the silver! It transformed! It is tenfold stronger than a normal royal lineage!"

Before the old man can take another breath or call out to the guards, a sharp metallic flash slices through the dim light of the chamber.

Elizabeth steps up behind Healer Thomas and thrusts a silver dagger straight through his throat.

The healer choked on his own blood, his eyes bulging as he slumped forward over my bare, freezing feet, painting my skin in dark crimson. Elizabeth pulls the bloody blade free, wiping it on her dress without a single hint of remorse.

She grabs a sheet of thick parchment from the table, dipping a feather quill into the fresh blood pooling on the floor, and rapidly signs her name across the bottom.

"Healer Thomas was killed by the rogue threat, Ada," Elizabeth says, tossing the bloody parchment onto my drenched chest. "This execution order for your death is signed by the council. You die today."

Two heavy Alpha guards grab my wet hair, dragging my limp, unmoving body out of the medical room and up the winding stone stairs to the grand execution courtyard.

The full moon hangs high above the courtyard, throwing harsh silver light over the hundred wolves assembled in a silent, suffocating ring. The execution block sits at the center, carved from solid black granite, stained dark from centuries of pack blood.

Micheal stands on the upper terrace overlooking the block, his arm wrapped tightly around Cecelia’s waist.

Cecelia stands on her toes, pressing her wet, burning lips against his mouth in a long, desperate kiss, asserting her dominance in front of the entire pack. But Micheal is not looking at her. His black eyes are fixed entirely on me, staring relentlessly at the base of my throat.

Where the silver water stripped my flesh, the ghost of the true Luna mark still flickers in soft, rhythmic pulses of silver fire beneath my skin.

He knows. The truth is screaming at him, but his pride keeps his jaw locked like iron.

The guards slam my chest down onto the rough black granite of the execution block. A heavy iron chain is clamped over my back, pinning my neck flat against the cold stone. The executioner steps up beside me, lifting a massive, broad silver blade over his shoulder, the metal gleaming under the moonlight.

Elizabeth steps to the edge of the terrace, raising her voice so every wolf in the courtyard can hear.

"Ada of the Bloodmoon Pack!" Elizabeth shouts into the cold air. "Do you have any final prayers for the Moon Goddess before the blade severs your head from your body?"

I do not pray. I do not beg. I do not shed a single tear for the mate who destroyed me.

I force my chin up against the cold granite, fixing my eyes straight on Micheal where he stands above the crowd.

"You sold your true mate for a witch’s puppet, Micheal," I say, my voice carrying a terrifying, echoey power that rattles the stone walls. "Alpha Malakor of the Shadow Pack is laughing at you right now. He owns Cecelia. He owns Elizabeth. And when you finally realize what you’ve done, you’ll beg me to kill you."

Micheal’s face drains of all color. His hand drops from Cecelia’s waist as if he has been burned, his pupils dilating in pure, unadulterated terror at the mention of his greatest enemy's name.

"Executioner, drop the blade now!" Cecelia screams in a frantic, terrifying shriek, her human illusion glitching for a split second.

The executioner brings the heavy silver blade down with full, lethal force.

The air rushes past my ears, cold and sharp. In that final fraction of a second, as the freezing metal touches the bare skin of my neck, my thoughts do not dwell on my unborn child or the blood pool in the dungeon.

My last thought is of Micheal’s face five years from today—standing in the ruined ashes of his pack house, completely broken, utterly defeated, and hopelessly alone.

The silver blade falls.

Total, suffocating darkness consumes my world.

There is no pain. There is no cold air. Just a silent, black void where time ceases to exist.

Then—a heartbeat echoes.

Thump-thump.

It is slow, heavy, and resonant. But it is not my heart beating inside my ribs. It is the pup’s heartbeat, vibrating across time and space, pulling my fading soul through the dark veil of death.

Thump-thump.

A sudden, sharp gasp of warm air bursts violently into my lungs.

My eyes snap wide open.

I am not lying on a bloody granite execution block. I am not drenched in freezing rain or silver water. The smell of burning silver and fresh blood is completely gone, replaced by the scent of lavender sheets and warm sunlight streaming through a glass window.

I sit up rapidly, clutching my hands over my chest.

My skin is soft, whole, and completely unblemished. There are no chain marks on my wrists, no silver burn scars on my neck, and no blood between my legs. My hands are smaller, youthful, and uncalloused.

I scramble out of the soft bed, my bare feet hitting a clean wooden floor, and rush straight to the full-length mirror standing in the corner of the bedroom.

I stare at the reflection in the glass, my breathing coming in short, panicked hitches.

The face staring back at me is mine—smooth skin, bright eyes, devoid of the five years of exhaustion, starvation, and misery that Micheal put me through. Sitting on the nightstand right beside the mirror is a small, wooden desk calendar with the date circled in dark red ink:

May 14th — The First Ceremony of the Eighteen-Year-Old Mating First Sight.

I am back in my eighteen-year-old body, on the exact morning I am supposed to meet Micheal for the very first time.