Chapter 2

Nine years ago.

The once peaceful Moonlight Pack was struck by a catastrophic water contamination.

Everyone who drank from the supply fell into relentless fevers and uncontrollable sickness. Crops irrigated with the tainted river water were inedible.

Famine and thirst closed in on Moonlight Pack like a fist.

My parents and my sister left the last piece of bread for me, and died together in their sleep.

But without clean water, I wasn't far behind them.

I could already feel the eyes of starving people watching me from the shadows. I didn't dare think about what they might do.

That was when Owen appeared.

He lifted me onto his back and carried me home, step by step. His voice was gentle but steady:

"Don't be scared. My father is the Alpha. He'll find clean water. He'll make sure everyone survives."

"Our house is big. You can live there forever. We're your family now."

"There's an apple tree in the courtyard. The apples are sweet and fragrant. And Aunt Sandra makes the most amazing apple pies. When autumn comes, we can pick them together..."

The contamination was devastating. The single river that ran through Moonlight Pack territory was poisoned. All people could do was collect rainwater.

Owen's family was running low, too.

I expected Luna and Alpha Elbert to turn me away at the door. They didn't. They divided their own water and food to share with me.

And so I came to live in Owen's home.

But the shadow of the drought never lifted. It hung over Moonlight Pack, relentless.

Desperate, maddened people began rioting. Some even broke into Owen's house while the Alpha and Luna were away, and stole what little water and food remained.

That night, Owen secretly brought out the last of the water he'd hidden away, and tricked me into drinking it.

It wasn't until the following evening, when he collapsed from dehydration, that I realized what he'd done.

He had saved the last mouthful for me.

Without hesitation, I slashed open my own arm. Dark, thick blood welled out, and I fed it to Owen.

If we were both going to die, then I should go first.

In that darkest hour, Alpha Elbert and Luna returned—

They had found a new water source. At last, the people of Moonlight Pack had clean water to drink.

Once the crisis was over, Alpha Elbert and Luna severely punished the looters, and officially adopted me.

They gave me a comfortable life, warm affection and companionship, and the finest education.

Every year, on the anniversary of my parents' and sister's deaths, they accompanied me to the cemetery to visit their graves.

They treated me as their own child, yet never once demanded that I treat them as my birth parents.

When the crowd saw all of this, they nearly tore through the barricades.

Someone hurled a jagged stone at me.

It struck an open wound. Blood ran freely, and a fresh wave of pain shot through me.

But I was almost numb to pain by now.

Compared to a year of prison torture, compared to the agony of the potion eating through my brain, this was nothing.

Owen grabbed a fistful of my hair and wrenched my head up, forcing me to meet his eyes.

His gaze cut into me like a blade.

"Salia, we treated you so well."

Yes. They treated me so well.

A bitter smile flickered across my face. I parted my cracked lips, struggling to speak.

Before any sound could come out, a young woman stepped forward and hooked her arm through Owen's.

"Owen, don't lose your resolve. Justice will be served. She'll get what she deserves."

"Salia is going to die today, no matter what. And I'll be right here beside you."

I knew her.

Delilah. A witch from Roaring Valley. She was the one who'd given Owen those three doses of the potion.

She was also Owen's lover now.

I hated Delilah for taking Owen from me.

And yet I was grateful to her. During the year I'd spent locked away, she had stayed by his side, helping him find the strength to carry on.

When I still refused to speak, the guard forced the second dose down my throat.

The potion clawed through my memories, and the pain drenched me in cold sweat.

Through the haze, I saw Owen grip Delilah's hand tightly, as though drawing strength from her.

On his wrist, I could just make out a crescent-moon mark.

It was the sign of fated mates, chosen by the Moon Goddess. A mark unique to the two of us.

But the patch of skin where my own mark had been was gone. During the interrogations in prison, they'd pressed a white-hot brand into it until the flesh melted into a grotesque, scarlet ruin. Only that ugly scar remained.

At the same time, the second fragment of memory unfolded before the crowd.

Three years ago.

By then I was already the Alpha and Luna's adopted daughter. In the eyes of the world, I was Owen's future mate.

Alpha Elbert and Luna treated me like their own flesh and blood, and surrounded by their care, I had slowly emerged from the darkness of my past. The nightmares of that hellish time rarely found me anymore.

When Luna noticed that Owen and I had feelings for each other, she took my hands and said earnestly:

"No matter what happens between you and Owen, you will always be my precious daughter. If he ever makes you cry, I will deal with him myself."

Alpha Elbert, usually a man of few words, broke character entirely and lectured Owen at length about a man's responsibilities in a family, the importance of staying faithful to one's mate, and how to communicate through conflict.

"Oh, and one more thing. Before you two are officially mated, make sure you take the proper precautions. Otherwise."

"Dad, stop." Owen's face went bright red. He grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the room.

Luna covered her mouth, laughing.

Just when our family was wrapped in that kind of happiness, disaster struck.

Alpha Elbert fell gravely ill. His symptoms were identical to those of the people who'd drunk the contaminated water years before. Nearly every healer in the pack came to examine him. None of them could do anything.

To make matters worse, word got out. The entire pack learned not only that the Alpha had collapsed, but that his symptoms matched the old contamination sickness.

Panic swept through Moonlight Pack overnight.

Owen was already of age by then, and the full weight of pack leadership crashed down on his shoulders before his father had had the chance to teach him anything.

The neighboring packs smelled blood. When they learned that Moonlight Pack's Alpha was bedridden and his son was green and inexperienced, they began circling. The Silver Star Pack was openly preparing for war.

Moonlight Pack sat at the foot of the Nolan Mountains, a range teeming with mineral veins and precious resources.

Owen grew quieter by the day, spending his evenings speaking softly to his unconscious father.

Everyone was waiting for the moment Alpha Elbert finally stopped breathing, so they could descend on Moonlight Pack like wolves on a lamb.

And so, on a very dark and very quiet night, I slipped into the Alpha's study.

I took the survey map, the one that charted every mineral vein in the Nolan Mountains.