LOGINThe moonstone glowed with a soft, silver-white light.I stared at the ring for a long time.Adrian was kneeling in front of me. His eyes held a sincerity I had never seen from him before.This person who had refused to leave my side at my darkest.Three years. Every day and night he had walked with me — the small warmths, the small moments — they rose through me now like a tide.In the Stormwood territory, healing from my wounds, it was Adrian who came every day with the best moonlight herb preparations.When I said I wanted to build my own territory, he didn't try to talk me into being his Luna instead. He just stayed at my side, battle after battle, quiet and steady.The silence stretched."Yes." I said it quietly. My voice was soft, but it didn't waver.Adrian went still. Like he hadn't heard right.Then in the next breath, his face broke into pure joy. He rose and pulled me into his arms."I'll take care of you." His voice was trembling faintly against my ear. "I swear it. On my li
In the healing center, I moved from bed to bed — battered, every wound aching — but I kept going.A little boy, no older than three or four, had his arms locked tight around my neck and wouldn't let go. He was crying in stuttering hiccups. His mother had been badly injured in the mine rescue and was still being treated in the room next door."It's okay." I rubbed his back gently. "The bad wolves are all gone."The wound on my left shoulder was still seeping through the bandage.But I carefully set him back in his bed and pulled the blanket over him.I turned, and my legs swayed under me.Kieran stepped in almost before he'd decided to — reaching instinctively to steady me.I stepped aside."Alpha Kieran." My voice was measured and polite. "I've already thanked you for what you did."Kieran stood frozen, his arm still held out at the angle meant to catch me. "Your wound needs to be redressed.""I'm fine." I said it lightly. "Adrian has already arranged a medical team."From outside came
Kieran stood as if turned to stone, his mind completely blank.Seraphina. Status unknown.The words looped through his head like a curse."Get every combat team ready." His voice was frighteningly quiet, his eyes already burning red. "We move now."His Beta blinked. "Alpha, that's Moonfire Pack's territory—""I said now!"Twenty minutes later, three SUVs tore out of Frost Pack territory. Kieran drove the first one himself, foot flat on the accelerator.His Beta was gripping the door handle with both hands. "Alpha, the border mining district is at least twenty hours away—""Shut up."His hands were locked white on the wheel.Images of me flashed through his mind without stopping.Me in the moonlight, hair spilling in the wind.Me looking at him, cold and distant. "Your whole life, Kieran? I don't want it."Those were the last words I'd said to him.And now I might—Kieran shook his head hard. No. Impossible.I was too strong. Too proud. There was no way I'd fallen.But the fear ran thro
Adrian's voice filled the conference room, carrying the effortless weight of an Alpha King's heir. "Kieran, you know better than anyone that the Stormwood Foundation has been the primary resource supplier for packs across the Northern Highlands."He opened the folder in his hands without hurry. "Over the last five years, we've provided over two hundred million dollars in support to seventeen packs. I believe those numbers aren't unfamiliar to anyone in this room."The conference room fell completely silent. Several Alphas lowered their eyes.Adrian leaned back, a lazy smile on his mouth. "Seraphina's strength doesn't require any Alpha's charity. And she certainly shouldn't be accepting conditions from someone with private motives."On screen, Kieran's face had gone dark.The three pack Alphas were shaken — Stormwood Pack's reach across the northern territory was in a different class from Frost Pack's entirely.I rose slowly from my seat. No growling. No shifting. Just the clean, steady
No one had dared approach the Frost Pack Alpha's office in three days.Kieran sat on the floor, his back against the couch.Empty moonshine bottles lay scattered around him. He still held a half-finished one, eyes vacant, staring at nothing."I don't need your love anymore."Those words had become a kind of curse. They played on a loop in his head, over and over.The look in my eyes — unfamiliar, flat. Like looking at a stranger who meant nothing.That gaze was a silver blade. It cut him in pieces, again and again.Three days. He had called me an uncountable number of times. Sent endless messages. Every one of them swallowed into silence.He had even gone to my front door and stood in the snow all night. But I didn't open it.Kieran pressed his forehead to his knees. His whole body was trembling.This helplessness, this loss of control — it was driving him out of his mind.He was Kieran Frost. Alpha of Frost Pack. The strongest wolf in the entire southern territory.There had never bee
Kieran fought to stand. His legs had gone completely numb, and he hit the snow hard."Seraphina—" His voice was raw.I turned. My gaze passed over him — kneeling in the snow where he'd been all night.No surprise. No softening. Just calm indifference.Kieran lurched to his feet and walked toward the boundary line. The guards stepped forward immediately. "Stop right there, Alpha Frost."He stopped at the edge. He reached into his coat and pulled out the blood oath stone.The sacred object caught the morning light, its surface still marked with the burn scar from Melody's hand."Seraphina — look — all the evidence is here. The wolfsbane incident all those years ago, the rogue attack, what happened outside the bar — Melody arranged all of it. I was wrong. I was wrong about everything—""So?"I cut him off. My voice was ice.I walked toward the boundary line until I was close enough to see the red threads in his eyes. "What exactly do you want me to say? That I forgive you?" I looked at hi







