Chapter 1

Chapter 1

Seraphina's POV

The celebration at Silver Crest Royal Academy pulsed around me like a living adrenaline mixed with laughter, music, and the electric energy of wolves drunk on triumph. 

Tonight, the B4 had dominated the inter-pack racing competition, and every student in the great hall seemed to glow with reflected glory.

Everyone except me.

I weaved through the crowd with my serving tray, invisible as always. I'm always a walking ghost carrying drinks to people who looked through me like I was made of air pumped right inside my flesh. 

"Excuse me," I whispered to a group of the cheerleading girls blocking my path but they didn't move or tried to notice me so I squeezed past them, my shoulder bag catching on one girl's perfectly curled hair which made her turn abruptly and wince.

"Ugh, watch it." she snapped, then did a double-take when she saw who'd bumped her. "Oh…. It's just the scholarship fatso, can you try not to break my bones next time, I'm so fragile please."

Her friends giggled, and heat crawled up my neck at the name that haunted me more than anything else.

That's what they all called me, the poor scholarship fat girl like I was some charity case who'd won a lottery ticket to their world. They never mind that I'd earned my place here with grades none of them could match. In their eyes, I was just lucky to breathe the same air.

"Seraphina!" Gracie Morrison's voice cut through the noise like a blade, the head cheerleader stood near the VIP section, her perfect blonde hair catching the light as she beckoned me over with one manicured finger. "Finally….we've been waiting forever…get us more drinks."

I hurried toward her, the tray wobbling in my sweaty hands while I prayed it wouldn't slip. Around the VIP tables sat the cream of Silver Crest elite students council members, team captains, and the daughters of various pack Alphas. All watching me with the same expression they'd wear while observing a trained monkey.

"I was beginning to wonder if you'd ever learn to do anything right," Gracie continued, picking up a drink from the tray and talking loud enough for everyone to hear. "Though I suppose we shouldn't expect much."

“I heard she applied for the position of the cheerleader, can you imagine that?” One of them retorted, reminding me of my silly trial.

“She did?” Gracie gasped, turning towards me with a huge grin. “You're so shameless, aren't you? You really think you can cheer for the B4, looking like…like an elephant?”

Scattered laughter rippled through the group. I set down glasses with shaking hands, trying to make myself smaller, invisible, anything to escape their attention.

"Speaking of expectations," Madison Chen, the student council president, leaned forward with a cruel smile. "Did you hear about the Full Moon Competition next month? They're looking for participants to represent our school."

"Oh god," another girl gasped dramatically. "Can you imagine if she tried to enter? The embarrassment!"

"What would she even compete in?" Gracie mused, tapping her chin in mock thought. "Farting her ass up in the air for being so big? Common, the school will expel her before she participated.” 

She added that and each word was a small death to me and my wolf but I focused on arranging napkins, hoping they'd get bored and move on to other targets, get done with tonight and get ready for another trauma tomorrow.

"Seraphina."

My blood turned to ice at the familiar voice. I looked up to find my brother Blake standing behind me, his jaw was tight with barely contained anger which made me swallow nervously. Even at eighteen, he carried himself with the authority of a future pack leader but practised how brutal he was going to be with me, he was tall, lean and blessed with green eyes, he's everything our father wanted in an heir, everything I wasn't.

"What are you doing?" His voice was low, dangerous.

"I was assigned to serve the—"

"I don't care what you were assigned to do." He gripped my elbow, his fingers digging in hard enough to bruise. "Instead of making yourself visible and disgracing our family, couldn't you have just locked yourself in the restroom until this was over?"

The words hit like physical blows. My own brother in front of everyone, I do that all the time for him, lock myself in the basement at home and in school, the restroom.

"Blake, I was handpicked to serve alongside the other students," I whispered, desperate to salvage some dignity. "I'm just doing my job like everyone else, what do you expect me to do—" My voice cracked helplessly.

"Job?" Another voice interrupted and that belonged to Cora Thorne, my former best friend. We'd once shared secrets and dreams. Now she looked at me like I was something she'd scraped off her shoe. "This isn't a job, Sera. This is a charity we're doing to you, for your size. Many would be so grateful for being in a place like this, in the midst of the bikers and Elite students.”

Blake's grip on my arm loosened as he turned to acknowledge Cora with a smile that never reached his eyes when he looked at me.

"You're right, as always," he said. "Though maybe she needs this. Might help her lose some weight for once." His gaze raked over me with obvious disgust. "I keep telling Father to stop coddling her, but he insists on these little 'character building' exercises."

I swallowed the scream building in my throat, it's affecting my wolf. Pushing all this aside, not being able to fight back isn't good for her but what’s the need when I can just leave peacefully.

All I wanted was to finish school, get my degree, and find some quiet corner of the world where I could exist without being constantly reminded of how little I mattered. No one would accept me in pack society anyway….everyone could see I was broken, different and wrong. .

Only my parents still believed I had value, and even that felt like obligation rather than love.

My phone buzzed with an incoming order through the academy's service app. My stomach dropped when I saw the sender: B4 VIP Section.

Knox know as "Razor" , Ryder as "Beast" Jaxon as the "Phoenix, and... Axel known as the"Viper". The four most powerful students at Sally Royal, the princes of our own world here and the one name that made my heart race despite years of training it not to.

Six bottles of champagne. Table 7. Immediate delivery.

"I have to..." I gestured weakly toward my phone.

Blake released my arm with a disgusted sound. "Just try not to embarrass us more than you already have."

I loaded the champagne onto my tray with trembling hands, each bottle worth more than my monthly allowance. The B4's table sat in the center of the VIP section like a throne, surrounded by admirers and hangers-on. As I approached, conversations became quiet, not because I was interesting, but because I was so painfully out of place that my presence disrupted the natural order.

Knox barely glanced up from his phone as I began setting bottles on the table. Ryder continued his conversation without pause. Jaxon…my own cousin—looked through me like I was invisible.

But Axel...

Those sea-green eyes found mine for exactly three seconds. Three seconds where I felt seen, recognized and noticed. Then his gaze moved on, dismissing me as completely as if I'd never existed.

"About time we get that drink," Knox muttered, still not looking at me. "We've been waiting like forever"

"Sorry," I whispered automatically. "The crowd was—"

"Nobody asked for excuses." Jaxon interrupted coldly and I nodded, setting down the final bottle with extra care. I was almost done and about to disappear the hell out of this place but that's when Gracie's voice rang out behind me. "Seraphina! You forgot the glasses!"

I turned, looking confused. I'd brought glasses. I'd set them down at—

My foot caught on something. For a split second, I felt myself falling, the full tray of champagne bottles tilting in my arms. Time slowed as I realized what was happening, as I saw Gracie's foot pulling back from where she'd deliberately placed it in my path.

The crash seemed to echo forever. Six bottles of champagne exploded against the marble floor, glass and alcohol splashing across the VIP section, Across Knox DeVille himself.

.