Chapter 6: The Name She Refused

The witch’s sister laughs, blood dripping from the cracked altar stone. The whole Summit watches my belly like it’s a death sentence. 

Draven’s hand locks around my wrist, his claws digging in to hold me upright because my knees want to give out. 

“Double curse,” the witch’s sister says. “One takes the babe, one takes the mother. Your uncle knows.”

The crowd gasps, two hundred Alphas heard every word. Every one of them smells my fear now.

I taste copper, I bit my tongue when she said pregnant. I didn’t know, we only bonded three days ago.

Caiden steps forward from the circle, his face white. “Lies,” he spits. “She’s not bred, the Goddess would not give a bastard to that bloodline.”

Draven moves, one second he’s beside me, the next his hand is around Caiden’s throat with no growl or warning. 

The crowd flinches back, stone cracks under Draven’s boot. “She is not yours to question,” Draven says, his voice ice. “She is not yours to name.”

The witch’s sister claps, slow and mocking. “Oh, but she is mine to take. The debt stands, Lyra Holloway promised the firstborn of this union. Did your niece not tell you, Butcher?”

My head snaps up. Lyra, my sister, promised my baby before I was even mated. Rage hits first, then it burns cold, then it goes quiet.

I step out of Draven’s grip, my legs holding barely. “You want my child,” I say, my voice steady. “Come take it.”

The witch’s sister smiles, her teeth black. “Bold, but you’re already dead, little wolf. The double curse means you die when the babe draws first breath, or you kill the babe before that. Choose.”

The Summit erupts, Alphas shouting and bets being called like this is entertainment. Draven roars, the sound breaks the altar in half, stone shards fly and one cuts my cheek.

“Enough,” he says, turning to me with eyes that are black now, no gold left. “Wren.”

That’s my name. He uses it, not little wolf. “Do you trust me,” he asks, not an order but a question.

The witch’s sister hisses. “Trust won’t save her. Only a name can break a death curse, a true name given freely, not stolen.”

A true name. The High Priestess said the same thing when she carved the leash into my shoulder. I look at Draven, really look at him.

He’s the Butcher, the uncle they told me would break me, the one who said I was his mate when Caiden tried to take me back. He’s also the one who broke my witch leash with his teeth, who bled for me, who asked my name before he claimed me.

“What name,” I whisper.

Draven steps closer, the crowd goes silent as even the wind stops. “Mine,” he says. “Take my name, Wren Holloway. Become Wren Duskbane, my Luna, my wife in truth, not force. Then the curse has no claim because you are not Holloway.”

The witch’s sister screeches, the sound makes Alphas cover their ears. “Trickery. The debt transfers, the child is still Duskbane. The firstborn of Duskbane is mine.”

“No,” a new voice says. 

We all turn. The High Priestess stands at the edge of the circle, her white robes stained with mud from walking alone from the marsh. 

“The debt was specific,” the High Priestess says. “Lyra Holloway promised the firstborn of her sister’s body, born to a Duskbane. She did not promise Wren’s life, only the child.”

My stomach drops. So I die anyway. Draven goes still, too still, and that’s when he’s most dangerous.

“Then I refuse the child,” I say, the words tearing out of me. “If my baby dies, I die with it. I won’t birth it just to feed you.”

The witch’s sister grins. “Then the Duskbane line ends. No heirs, the 20 year curse I broke returns worse. Every Duskbane pup born will be stillborn, your husband’s line dies screaming.”

Caiden laughs, it’s ugly. “Good. Let them rot. You chose him, Wren. Now you both lose.”

I feel Draven’s hand on my back, warm and steady, and he doesn’t speak. He lets me choose.

I close my eyes, thinking of the leash, the branding, the cell, Lyra’s smile when Caiden picked her, the way the court called me worthless. I think of Draven saying little wolf like it was a vow, his teeth breaking the witch’s mark, the name he asked for.

I open my eyes. “I accept,” I say. “I take your name.”

The air changes, power snaps. The brand on my shoulder burns, then goes cold as the leash scar fades to white.

Draven’s eyes flare gold. He cups my face, his thumb wiping the blood from my cheek. “Wren Duskbane,” he says. “My Luna.”

The witch’s sister screams, her skin starts to peel. “No. The ritual requires blood, consummation. You have not—”

“We have,” Draven says. 

The crowd explodes, gasps and growls, someone faints. Three days ago, after the bite, after he asked my name, we did. In his war room, on the map table, I bled on Duskbane territory lines.

I didn’t know it was a ritual. He did.

The High Priestess nods. “The bond is sealed. The Holloway debt is void, Wren Duskbane owes nothing.”

The witch’s sister staggers. “The child, the child is still mine. Firstborn of Duskbane.”

Draven smiles, it’s not kind. “About that.”

He looks at me, really looks, then he says it. “You’re not carrying one.”

The world stops. I stare at him. “What.”

“The healer checked you this morning,” he says. “Before the Summit, I needed to know if you were with pup before I challenged the witch. You are.”

The witch’s sister laughs. “Then she’s mine.”

“Twins,” Draven says.

Silence. Dead silence.

The High Priestess sucks in a breath. “Twins change the law. The debt was for the firstborn, singular. The first to draw breath, the second is free.”

My hands go to my stomach. Twins, two.

The witch’s sister’s face splits, her skin cracks from her mouth outward. “No. No. Lyra promised me the womb, all of it.”

“Lyra promised the firstborn,” the High Priestess says. “Words matter in blood magic. You should have been specific.”

Draven pulls me against him, his mouth finds my ear. “One we keep,” he whispers. “One we fight for. I will burn this world before I give either to her.”

The witch’s sister lunges, not at me but at Draven. She wants him dead, if he dies the claim breaks and the debt returns.

I move without thinking, my hand grabbing the ritual knife from the broken altar. The same one they used to brand me.

I step in front of Draven, the blade goes up and sinks into the witch’s sister’s chest. Her eyes meet mine, shock, then rage, then fear.

“You,” she chokes, blood pouring from her mouth. “You’re not weak. You’re not omega.”

I twist the knife. “I was. Now I’m Luna.”

She falls, the crowd doesn’t cheer, they’re terrified. Draven’s arms come around me from behind, he doesn’t take the knife, he lets me hold it.

The High Priestess steps over the body, she looks at my stomach then at Draven. “The double curse still stands,” she says. “One child lives, one child dies, or the mother dies with the firstborn. Choose before the next moon.”

The Summit is silent, two hundred Alphas wait. Caiden breaks it, he’s crying, actual tears. “Wren. Please. I didn’t know, I didn’t know Lyra did that. Come back, we can fix this.”

Draven growls low. I put my hand on his chest. “No,” I say to Caiden. “You chose her. You chose wrong.”

I turn in Draven’s arms, I look up at him, my mate, my husband, my Alpha. “We keep them both,” I say. “Find a way, or we die trying.”

He nods once, like it’s a war pact. “Then we need a witch,” he says. “Not her kind. Older, stronger.”

The High Priestess shakes her head. “None left. We killed them all twenty years ago, when the Duskbane curse started.”

“Not all,” a voice says from the crowd.

Everyone turns. A boy steps forward, maybe fourteen, chains on his wrists and eyes like silver fire. 

“My grandmother lives,” he says. “The first witch, the one you Duskbanes locked under the mountain. She can break death curses, for a price.”

Draven goes rigid, I feel it through his chest. “Impossible,” the High Priestess says. “She died.”

“She didn’t,” the boy says. He looks at me. “But she’ll only talk to her, to the Luna who killed her daughter.”

He points at me, at the knife in my hand, at the dead witch at my feet. “The price,” he says, “is your name. Your true name, not Duskbane. The one you were born with. Give it to her, and she saves both pups.”

My blood goes cold. Give up Wren, give up Holloway, give up everything I am. If I do, I lose myself. If I don’t, I lose my children.

Draven’s grip tightens. “No,” he snarls. “We find another way.”

The boy smiles, it’s sad. “There is no other way. The mountain opens at dusk. She waits.”

The sun touches the horizon. Dusk is here.

I look at Draven, at the boy, at the knife, at my hands. I have to choose now.

My name for their lives, or my children for my soul. The Summit holds its breath.

I open my mouth to answer.