Chapter 4

For as long as I could remember, my parents were rarely home.

They were the Beta couple of the Moonshadow Pack, and they had spent their lives guarding the borders for the old Alpha. Whenever the pack mentioned them, people called them loyal and powerful. They also said I was lucky to have parents like them and a brother like Soren.

But I barely saw them. The one who truly raised me was Soren.

When I was six, I was bullied by young wolves in the pack and hid behind the Moonlight Tree crying. When Soren found me, his shoes were covered in snow and mud.

He crouched down to wipe my face, his voice still awkward with youth.

“Don't cry. Your brother will protect you.”

The next day, he went to the training field and beat up the young wolves who had bullied me. The elders punished him by making him serve as a sparring partner for the border warriors for a full month.

When I secretly went to see him, an adult wolf had just thrown him to the ground. There was blood at the corner of his mouth, yet he smiled at me on purpose.

“This is nothing.”

“When I get stronger, no one will dare bully you again.”

Soren had always been the gentler one.

Kaiden was the old Alpha's only son, raised to be calm and restrained, and even his concern often came with a force that left no room to refuse. But every time I got into trouble, he would still hide me behind him first, then go to the elders and take the blame for me.

When I was fourteen, the Moon Goddess confirmed that he and I were fated mates. Under the full moon, he placed the moonstone ring on my finger and promised that on my eighteenth birthday, he would give me the grandest Marking Ceremony.

Back then, I thought they would always love me.

Until the year my parents died in battle.

There was a border uprising, and silver-poison weapons appeared in the north for the first time. My parents died in the Snow Valley protecting the old Alpha.

During that battle, Kaiden's childhood injury to his wolf soul flared up again, and Soren was nearly destroyed by silver poison. The one who saved them was a witch who had once been exiled by the Moonshadow Pack.

She used forbidden magic to give part of her Moon Goddess blessing to Kaiden and drew the silver poison out of Soren.

The price was her life.

Before she died, she held Soren's hand and begged him to find her missing daughter.

A year later, Soren found Lia. The day he brought her back to the pack, there was a solemn look in his eyes I had not seen in years.

He said, “Freya, her mother saved Kaiden and me.”

“From now on, she is your sister too.”

At first, I truly tried to be good to Lia.

She was afraid of the dark, so I gave her my moon lamp. She said she was not used to pack banquets, so I sat with her in the corner. The first time her old illness flared up, I went to the Moon Temple in the middle of the night to fetch a Healer.

But later, she began destroying things that mattered to me.

First it was the moon-silver comb my mother had left me. Then it was my father's border badge.

Every time, she would apologize with red eyes and say she was clumsy. Soren would tell me she had suffered enough outside the pack, that I should be more understanding.

Kaiden would rub his brow and tell me her mother had saved us.

Later, Lia wanted my key, my gown, my room, and Kaiden's company through every night her illness acted up.

At last, I broke. But she was the daughter of the woman who had saved my brother and my mate. All I could do was hide in the stairwell at night and cry where no one could hear me.

That was the night I heard Lia on the phone at the end of the corridor.

“They'll never guess that the real Lia died in that attack in the south.”

“All I did was take the moon-marked charm she was wearing, yet those two idiots instantly believed I was their savior's daughter.”

The person on the other end said something. Lia gave a soft little scoff.

“The Alpha and the Beta are almost laughably stupid. One is turning his back on his mate, and the other on his own sister, all for me.”

I froze as my blood slowly ran cold. When I stepped back, I accidentally knocked over the plant stand by the wall.

Lia opened the door. The smile in her eyes hadn't even faded. Then she flashed me a malicious little smile before turning and flinging herself down the stairs.

By the time Kaiden and Soren rushed over, she was curled at the bottom of the steps, crying so hard her whole body shook.

“I only wanted to explain things to Freya.”

“But I think she really hates me.”

That was the first time she framed me.

After that, every time I tried to tell them the truth, they called it jealousy.

Later, Soren and Kaiden took her side more and more often. Kaiden kept postponing the Marking Ceremony that should have happened on my eighteenth birthday.

Each time, I told myself that one day they would come to their senses.

Until today, Lia shattered the moon-silver bell my mother had left me. It was the keepsake my mother had worn on her wrist when she was alive. My name was still carved inside the bell.

When I arrived, the pieces were scattered across the floor.

Lia was already clutching her chest and sobbing, accusing me of coating her utensils with silver poison and causing her wolf to go berserk.

Soren and Kaiden believed her.

Soren said that no keepsake, no matter how precious, mattered more than Lia's life. Kaiden carried Lia to the hospital. When he passed me, there was only disappointment in his eyes.

Standing alone among the broken silver pieces, I finally lost the last of my hope.

I had to leave.