Chapter 2

“I will plead our case to Alpha Bennet. The Silverwood Pack will also do its best to find a way out of this alliance agreement.”

Ethan looked at the parchment in my hand and suddenly let out a soft chuckle. “Willow, were you trying to beg your father to force me to mate with you? He must have made you suffer in the ice chamber because he’s so stressed right now.

“Go inside. Once I make sure Chloe is safe, I’ll mate with you as agreed. You no longer have to worry about this matter.”

After saying this, Ethan turned to look at me tenderly and gently patted the back of my hand.

He behaved just as he had when he was a young pup.

Perhaps he may have liked me as we grew up together in the pack.

However, after living through everything in the previous timeline, I knew that he truly belonged to Chloe.

We would inevitably torment each other and run into a bitter end.

“You don’t have to worry about me.” I pulled my hand away from his touch.

Ethan frowned and snatched the alliance parchment from me to take a quick look.

“What are you talking about, Willow? Haven’t I worried about you plenty since we were pups?”

That was true. Our mothers had arranged a betrothal between our families when we were young. Thus, we grew up side by side in the pack.

After my mother died, I relied on him and his wolf more and more.

But it was long past time that I woke up from my daydreams.

I pushed his hand away and took the alliance treaty back. “We’re all grown-up wolves now, Ethan. This time, we’ll all get what we want.”

“What are you talking about? The betrothal between our families is set in stone. Who else would you marry?”

I looked at him silently.

In this timeline, I would be the one to leave the pack. Thus, Ethan would not die under the claws of the Rogues.

Even though I knew that everything in the previous timeline had ended in pain and heartbreak, the love and trust I had felt for Ethan was not so easily erased.

In the end, my body gave out from the severe frostbite of the ice chamber, and I fainted onto the snow-covered ground.

Before I fully lost consciousness, I saw Ethan’s golden eyes flash with panic as he pulled me worriedly into his warm embrace.

When I woke up, I smelled the sharp, metallic scent of herbs and antiseptics in the pack infirmary.

Ethan was resting in a wooden chair beside my bed, his calloused hand resting on the edge of my blanket.

As I looked at him in that quiet moment, I would have believed that his wolf really loved me, too—if not for his final words in the previous timeline.

As if his wolf sensed that I had awakened, Ethan quickly opened his eyes. He frowned and scolded gently, “What’s the matter with you? I was just telling you to rest, and you fainted from the cold. Don’t you know your wolf has always been weak?”

“Ethan.”

“Yeah?”

“Do you remember the Silver Lake we always went to as pups?”

“Of course. The first time you tried to chase small fish near the shore, you slipped and nearly fell into the deep water crying. You only stopped bawling after I shifted into my pup form and pulled you out.”

I looked at him and forced a faint smile. “Take me there one last time, please?”

Ethan looked a little displeased. “Why are you talking like that? We can go to the lake as many times as you want after our mating ceremony in the future.”

‘There’s no more future for us,’ I told myself in silence. But I did not say that out loud.

Surely it would be a huge surprise to him when Chloe becomes his Luna instead.

“Let's go this evening. My wolf feels fine now.”

“Alright, just this once. After that, I still need to deal with that alliance agreement between your family and the Bloodmoon Pack.”

Ethan did not stay long. He returned to the pack house to handle some boundary matters after arranging to meet me at the edge of Silver Lake.

I returned to my private cabin to pack up my belongings.

After my mother died, Father brought Chloe and her mother into the Pack House, so I moved out to live on the pack's border.

Before Chloe showed up, Ethan would make me a hand-crafted moonstone charm every year for my birth-moon.

These charms came in various forms. One was carved in the likeness of a wolf pup I used to play with, and others were woven with delicate lunar crystals from the pack. There was even one depicting my mother and me in our human forms.

This tradition only lasted until my eighteenth birth-moon, when Chloe was brought into the pack.

From then on, all the hand-crafted charms went to Chloe. The gifts I received were just cold, formal trinkets bought by his Delta.

I kept only the moonstone charm of my mother and myself in my cloak pocket. The rest I left behind in the cabin.

When everything was done, I stood at the edge of Silver Lake and waited for Ethan.

But even after the moonlight faded and the night grew pitch black, Ethan still did not show up. There were no mind-link messages or signals from him on my phone.

A heavy downpour broke out over the lake, but I had no cloak to shield myself and no pack warriors to escort me home.

The icy rain soaked my clothes and drenched my hair. As the freezing water poured down, it brought back vivid, painful memories of the brutal Rogue attack in the previous timeline.

My heart clenched with unbearable agony.

I took one last look at the dark shores of Silver Lake behind me—the place where Ethan and I had shared so many happy memories as pups.

‘Goodbye, Ethan. I hope our paths never cross again. I hope you and your wolf find happiness in this life,’ I thought.

Before I could turn to leave, someone shoved a wolfsbane-soaked rag over my face. Everything went black.