Chapter 4: Chosen one

Elena

I was floating in a dark, weightless void.

It wasn't sleep, nor was it the gentle peace of death. It was a suspended twilight deep within my own mind—a space Vernia had pulled me into to keep my conscious mind from shattering under the sheer, agonizing trauma done to my body. I couldn't move my fingers. I couldn't lift my eyelids. My physical vessel lay broken and unresponsive on the damp forest floor, but my mind was hyper-aware, drinking in every sound, every breath, every vibration in the air.

And then, the scents hit me.

Strong. Overwhelming. Layered with absolute, suffocating dominance.

Vernia stirred within our mindscape, her ghost-like paws pacing restlessly across the dark ether. She bristled, letting out a low, uneasy whine that vibrated through my soul. My wolf knew those scents before my conscious thoughts could assemble the memories. I had breathed in those exact scents years ago—when I was just a quiet shadow standing at the back of the Pack Academy courtyard.

They smelled of crushed pine, ozone, dark leather, and blood.

No... it can't be, I thought frantically, grasping at the fragmented memories of my past. Goddess above, please no...

The realization crashed through my paralyzed frame like a physical blow, leaving me mentally breathless.

The Bloodmoon Dynasty. The Quadruplet Alphas.

They were legends of terror across the northern territories—four brothers born under a rare crimson eclipse, sharing a single bloodline and an iron grip over the largest, most ruthless war-pack in the region. They were men who showed no quarter, spoke no mercy, and wiped entire rogue clans from the earth without blinking.

"No, wait! Hold the light higher!" a harsh, commanding voice barked above me. "Isn't she...?"

The sentence hung suspended in the freezing night air, shattered by a collective, violent gasp from the men surrounding my limp body.

"Mate!" a second voice rasped—darker, heavier, echoing with a raw, stunned reverence that made the air itself vibrate. "She... she is our mate."

What?

The word echoed through my internal void, sending a jolt of pure horror through my mind. Their mate? Four of them? How is that even possible?

My heart hammered against my ribs, though my physical chest remained entirely still. The mate bond was supposed to be a sacred, singular thread between two souls! The bond within me was already a tangled, bleeding mess—unclaimed and unrejected by Kieran, pulsing weakly like a severed nerve. How could four dark Alphas claim a bond over me?

A heavy, leather-clad hand reached down, fingers cupping my jaw with brutal, possessive force.

I felt him before he even spoke—Valerian, the second brother. His dark, intoxicating heat hovered inches from my cold skin, his breath fanning across my face.

"Isn't this the Beta's little stray from the Crest pack?" Valerian's voice dropped into a dangerous, dark growl as he tilted my chin upward. "The one who ran away from the academy five years ago after her own stepsister dragged her through the dirt?"

"It’s definitely her," another brother—Lucian—chortled dryly, squatting beside my head. His thumb pressed harshly into my cheekbone, prying my lip slightly to inspect my teeth as if examining livestock. "She hasn't changed a bit. Still as fragile and pathetic as the day she left."

"She’s a spy!" a third voice thundered. Darian, the hot-headed war commander of the brothers, slammed his fist into the trunk of the nearby pine tree, splitting the wood with a deafening crack. Sharp, obsidian claws extended from his knuckles. "The Crest pack knows we’re expanding our borders! They sent her to play the helpless victim so we’d bring her inside our perimeter. I'll tear her throat out right now!"

"Hold your blade, Darian," the eldest brother, Cassian, cut in smoothly. His voice carried an ancient, chilling authority that instantly silenced his brothers.

I felt his shadow fall over my body. Cassian didn't touch me, but his presence was so heavy it felt like a lead weight pressing down on my broken chest.

"Killing her here is too simple... too merciful," Cassian murmured, his words laced with an icy, calculating cruelty. "If the Beta sent his daughter to play the spy, then we shall give her the welcome she deserves."

He turned to the armored enforcers standing behind them. "Bind her hands. Wrap her in the iron chains and drag her to the keep. She is our new personal maid."

"A maid?" Lucian chuckled, a dark, amused smirk curving his lips. "Oh, brilliant, Cassian. A Crest Beta's bloodline sweeping our stone floors and scraping grease from our boots. We’ll break whatever spirit she has left within a week."

A hollow, silent laugh reverberated through my internal darkness.

Left to die in the mud... or dragged into a den of wolves who hate my very blood.

For a terrible, fleeting moment, I wished the four rogue men had killed me under the oak tree. Death would have been a gentle blessing compared to the slow, methodical torture waiting for me at the hands of the Quadruplet Alphas. Kieran had shattered my heart and broken my bones; now, these four dark brothers intended to tear away whatever scraps of soul I had left.

Hands—rough, unyielding, and cold as iron—wrapped around my limp ankles and shoulders.

They didn't carry me with care. They hauled my lifeless, paralyzed body across the rough forest floor. Sharp stones, jagged roots, and thorny brambles bit deep into the bare skin of my back and thighs as I was dragged through the dark woods, leaving a faint trail of crimson in the frozen dirt.

I wanted to scream. I wanted to fight. I begged my legs to move, willed my arms to lash out, but my body remained a useless, paralyzed cage.

I lay there in the dark space of my mind, listening to the heavy footsteps of the four Alphas marching ahead of me, silent and unmoving as they dragged me deeper into the mountains—toward my new prison.