Chapter 4

  Allene’s POV

  “How dare you, a lowly omega, reject me?” Leonard shouted, his voice echoing through the hall as his fury lashed out at me. He was enraged by the fact that someone of my status had dared to reject him when he did not want it.

  I said nothing as I turned to leave, but guards had already blocked the door I intended to escape through.

  Leonard must have summoned them through the pack’s mindlink, and since I was wolfless, I hadn’t heard it. I hadn’t even known when they arrived.

  “Don’t let her leave! Arrest her and throw her into the dungeons!” he roared. “And whoever dares to bring her food or water will answer to me—I will behead them! How dare you reject me, Allene?”

  He kept shouting despite how his strength was clearly failing him.

  This was nothing compared to the punishments and tortures he had put me through for five years—every single time he was intimate with another woman. He didn’t want to accept my rejection, and that alone was supposed to hurt him. A bond being severed was painful, yes—but while I was in pain, it was nothing compared to his. He was the one who had just been rejected..

  “You will regret rejecting me, Allene,” he continued viciously. “I am an Alpha. Alpha blood runs in my veins. When my refusal to accept your rejection begins to bite at you, you will crawl back to me. You will kneel at my feet and beg me to take you back.”

  Jessica Sanders didn’t look pleased by his words. For years, they had waited for the day I would finally be fed up and leave. But now that I had finally rejected him, he refused to accept it. It baffled me, just as much as it baffled her.

  A warrior stepped forward and seized my wrists, his grip iron-tight.

  I couldn’t let them take me. Not when I knew that staying here would be worse than it already had been these past few years.

  Leonard was egoistic and being rejected first, by a lowly, wolfless omega like me—was a humiliation he would never forgive. I knew he would make my life a living hell. He had done it before. Years ago, he had banished Kennedy from the pack despite her sickness, just to remind me of my place and of how little power I had in his pack.

  “Let me go!” I screamed, thrashing violently in their arms. But they didn’t budge. It was as though I wasn’t even moving. They were too strong.

  Leonard began walking toward me.

  Whether it would be a slap or a punch, I already knew. Either way, pain was inevitable once he reached me.

  “Where do you think you can run to now, Allene?” he mocked, forcing himself forward despite the agony tearing through him, clinging stubbornly to his choice to reject my rejection.

  I bit down hard on the arm of the guard restraining me.

  He shouted in pain and that was all the opening I needed.

  I ran. As fast as my legs could carry me.

  They chased after me with guards first, then Leonard behind them.

  I reached a window and realized too late that I had been cornered in the hallway.

  There was nowhere left to run.

  How could I escape now?

  The only option was the window, but we were on the fifth floor. I had no wolf.

  At eighteen, when I had been handed over to Leonard in marriage as a reward for my parents’ sacrifice, I had believed my dormant wolf would awaken.

  Not at twenty-one either—the final age dormant wolves were said to awaken.

  I was an empty shell.

  And Leonard knew it.

  That was why satisfaction twisted his lips as he approached me, knowing I couldn’t jump. Knowing escape was impossible.

  Moon Goddess, I whispered desperately.

  I needed to leave.

  I couldn’t stay here. Not in this pack nor for another moment.

  Then pain exploded through my leg.

  An arrow.

  I screamed and suddenly, something inside me snapped.

  A roar tore from my throat as a shimmering light erupted from my body, blinding and violent.

  “What is happening?” Leonard shouted in disbelief. “Why is she shifting? Isn’t she a wolfless shell?”

  Shock drained the color from his face.

  Jessica Sanders gasped, stumbling back, nearly falling as her eyes widened in horror.

  And for the first time in my life, something answered me.

  I stared down at myself, bewildered by the surge of power that had just ripped through me. My skin had snapped, bones elongated, and before I could even comprehend it, I was no longer human. I had shifted into a white wolf.

  I, the daughter of lowly omegas, should never have been capable of this. White wolves were said to be born from the alpha bloodline, descended from the Moon Goddess herself thousands of years ago. How… how could I shift into one?

  “Capture her! If she escapes, I’ll have every one of you and your families beheaded!” I heard Leonard’s voice thundering behind me, threatening his men. I didn’t hesitate.

  I leapt from the window, landing on the stone walls that fenced the pack from the outside. The guards screamed, but I didn’t look back. Leonard wouldn’t carry out his threat. I had to believe that. I couldn’t afford guilt for their lives—not now. I had to survive.

  I ran.

  I ran for my life, for the first time truly choosing me over anyone else. Through the forest I fled, branches slashing at my fur, the scent of my pursuers heavy in the air. Leonard’s voice echoed from behind, a mixture of growls and shouts as he drove his warriors deeper into the woods after me.

  And yet there was something unfamiliar, something overwhelming. My wolf was shifting, yes, but she wasn’t under my control. She had awakened on her own, and now, she wanted freedom—wanted to escape. The confusion made my chest tighten. Why was she a white wolf?

  I leapt over a massive fallen tree, only to trip and fall, fear clawing at me as I imagined Leonard and his pack catching up. My eyes squeezed shut, and I whispered a prayer to my late parents, begging them to protect me from whatever punishment he might inflict.

  Then, as one of Leonard’s warriors shifted into human form to confront me, a voice cut sharply through the tension.

  “Let her go!”

  I froze. So did Leonard. His eyes darted around, furious and incredulous. Who dared command him to release his mate when he still hadn’t accepted her rejection? I was still, by law and bond, under him—yet someone was overriding his authority.

  “How dare you?” Leonard bellowed, his gaze scanning the darkness, illuminated by the rising full moon. “Do you know who I am? Show yourself, or I will have you killed to the last drop of your blood!”

  A figure stepped out from the shadows behind me.

  “You’ll kill me, in my own lands?” the voice demanded. My heart skipped. I turned slowly, realizing with a jolt that I had crossed the boundary separating SilverFang Pack from rogue territory.

  Leonard’s step faltered as the realization hit him. He couldn’t follow, not without igniting war, a war he could not risk. And yet his expression was pure venom, hatred, and disbelief all at once.

  “She belongs to me now,” the voice continued. “Because she has trespassed my lands.”

  I hesitated, curiosity fighting panic. Who could command such authority, enough to halt Leonard Amari himself? The figure was imposing, cloaked in shadow, yet unmistakable.

  “Draven Amari?” I whispered, stunned.

  The man who had just saved me from Leonard’s grasp. Leonard’s uncle—the same Draven banished decades ago.

  Why?

  Since being mated to Leonard, I had been his enemy too, or so I believed. We had crossed paths in schemes, plots, and betrayals. And yet here he was, intervening, saving me from the very man I had once joined hands to challenge.

  The forest was silent but for my ragged breathing and the rustle of leaves. Leonard’s glare burned into me, full of fury and confusion, but even he knew he could not act.

  I trembled, staring at Draven, wondering what this meant for me, for my life, and for the new, impossible power that had awakened within me.