Chapter 1: Why Am I Alive?

**Eirian's Pov**

"Look at her, she can barely stay on her feet. How can someone be so fat and ugly?”

I could tell Daven, the pack's troublemaker, was the one speaking without lifting my head. Eighteen years old and already broad-shouldered, with his father's cruelty running in his veins. 

He'd been tormenting me since we were children. It started with insults, then sticks, and now stones, that left bruises no one cared to see.

I planted my palms flat on the ground and pushed myself up, careful not to drop my basket. Another huge stone struck my shoulder before I made it to my feet. The pain shot down my arm, and my basket slipped from my grasp, spilling the dried herbs I had spent all morning collecting. Lavender and moon root scattered across the pack’s square cobblestones.

I bit the bottom of my lips hard enough to taste blood, trying my best to fight back tears.

“The cursed omega is out again," Daven announced loudly, drawing more eyes to me. "Collecting weeds. How useful.”

"She's not even going to cry," a girl from the circle that had soon formed sneered.

Mira. She was always around whenever Daven decided to make someone's life miserable.

"What's wrong with you?" she asked, wrinkling her nose. “Does the cursed omega not feel pain?"

I felt every bit of it. I just couldn't admit it.

The pack square was full today. Men and women were browsing stalls loaded with dried herbs, cured meat, and leather goods. They all saw what was happening but ignored me. Some simply watched with bored curiosity, but never intervened. Others acted as if I wasn't there.

I usually avoided coming here on market days, when it was crowded, but Mother's wrath was sharper than any of the stones or rocks thrown at me. She would have had my head if I didn't get the ingredients she needed.

I crouched and gathered the scattered herbs with trembling hands as warm blood trickled down my temple and across my cheek. I had stopped expecting rescue years ago.

"Did you really come to the pack square looking like that?" Daven snickered, scanning me from head to toe as he stepped closer with his friends to block my path. His gaze raked over my curvy body with open disgust. "You take up half the road just by walking through it.”

The group burst into laughter.

I kept my gaze fixed ahead. If I stayed quiet long enough, it would eventually end like always. I focused on a crack in the stone wall behind him, breathing through my nose while counting silently.

Another stone struck, and this one hit my knee. I fell hard, catching myself with one hand. The cut on my temple continued to bleed, streaking down my face.

Anger burned inside me. 

Do not make a sound, Eirian. Do not speak. 

The rules were simple. I followed them for years, and they kept everyone alive.

The pack believed I was mute, and I let them. It was easier and safer. The truth was far worse, which was that the last time I spoke in anger, children died.

I was little. Seven, maybe eight. The details had faded over the years, but I remembered their taunts. I screamed back at them, and something inside me had answered. It rose from a place I had not known existed until it moved inside me like a tide going out. 

By sunset, all six of those children had died. The healers blamed the fever. Although no one connected it to me directly, they suspected I had a hand in it.

After that day, people kept their distance and called me cursed. Soon, I came to terms with the fact that my voice was not like other people's voices. Whatever I said came to pass.

So I ceased speaking completely.

I pressed my lips together until they hurt. I hadn't uttered a single word in eleven years, and I wasn't about to break that silence now, not for Daven, and definitely not for any of them. 

I was getting up from the ground when a familiar voice cut through the noise.

"Honestly, Eirian."

Serelith headed over to me from behind the crowd as they cleared the way for her like she was someone important. She wore a pretty red gown, her wavy hair flowing over her shoulders, and her face carried that expression she reserved only for me, disgust laced with arrogance. The sort that comes from believing you're better than everyone else.

She halted a few feet away, shaking her head at me. "You're making a scene," she mocked. "It's embarrassing."

I met her gaze in silence, my eyes steady despite the tears I refused to shed.

"Don't give me that look, you chose to come here on a market day. What did you expect to happen?" She plastered on a smug smile and flicked her gaze sideways at Daven, who was grinning like a loyal dog, delighted to have her on his side. 

"Some of us have worked hard to earn respect in this pack. Then you show up, and people start wondering how we're related."

"Wait, she's really your sister?" Mira asked dramatically. 

"Half-sister," Serelith corrected. The word landed like a slap. "And barely even that."

More laughter followed.

My jaw ached from how hard I'd been holding it shut. My knee stung. The blood on my cheek had begun to dry. I could feel dozens of eyes on me, judging every part of me.

Serelith drew closer. "You should be thankful," she said. Her voice softened, but not enough to keep others from hearing. "You know that, right? Mother and Father could have gotten rid of you the moment they discovered what you were. Most packs would've abandoned you in the woods for wild wolves to feed on.”

She paused. 

"However, they let you stay. They fed you, sheltered you, and this is how you repay them? By humiliating us in public?"

Someone actually clapped, as if it were a performance.

I lowered my eyes to my hands and thought about the Moon Goddess. I always did when life became unbearable. It was easier than thinking about myself.

I wondered why the Moon Goddess had allowed me to survive. Why was I really alive?

While Serelith droned on about family reputation and appearances, I gathered what remained of the herbs, letting her words fade to the background. I had learned long ago how to stop listening.

Holding my basket against my side, I walked away with my head down and my fists hidden inside my sleeves. I had almost reached the lane leading home when the pack's bell startled me. It thundered, rolling across the rooftops and down every corner that I felt the vibration in my chest. 

Then the gamma's voice rose above it, pouring out the pack in a tone that left no room for noise.

"The Moon Goddess calls for the Lunar Mating Ceremony. All unmated wolves of age are required to present themselves at the ceremonial ground tonight at moonrise. Fated mates will be revealed under the full moon. Attendance is mandatory. The Goddess has spoken.”

I stood at the edge of the lane, clutching my basket. My face throbbed from where the rocks had hit me, and a strange tension gripped my chest. 

My first thought was simple: This is not for me.

I was nineteen and unmated, but it certainly wasn't meant for someone like me.

"Everything changes tonight!”

I spun around, my breathing hitching. 

Who said that?

But no one was there. The voice seemed to have come from... inside me. 

I had not heard that voice in eleven years.

Shaking my head, I tried to clear the foolish thought. I had to be hallucinating; it was surely a result of the stone that had struck my head.

Because who in their right mind would ever want a cursed, mute omega for a mate?