Chapter 1

At the Awakening Ceremony, I awakened Caine as my mate, but Caine awakened Sera as his.

No one had seen anything like it. The entire pack erupted.

Sera looked at me with smug satisfaction. "Evelyn, this is a first for me, seeing a she-wolf fake a mate bond. Are you really daring enough to defy the Moon Goddess?"

I frowned, glanced up toward the Moon Goddess, and focused. My wolf pointed straight at Caine. "Evelyn! It's him!"

Why couldn't he sense me?

Caine studied me for a moment, then said flatly, "Evelyn, you're already a commander. There's no need to fight over Luna as well. Sera is naturally delicate. Compared to you, she needs the pack's support more."

But the next instant, Sera suddenly burst into tears.

"Caine, Evelyn has feelings for you! Her wolf will always be drawn to you. How am I supposed to feel safe..."

Elder Thorne was the first to speak up. "We should just send Evelyn back to her old pack!"

I clenched my fists so hard my nails bit into my palms.

I was the daughter of Black Stone Pack's Alpha.

But my uncle colluded with a rival pack and murdered my father, wiping out my entire family.

It was then that the Moon Goddess revealed my true destiny: I was not meant to become the Alpha of Black Stone, but the Luna of Frost Fang.

The Moon Goddess told me that my fate awaited me there.

So I worked tirelessly to earn the acceptance of the Frost Fang pack.

But now, it seemed I had only become a nuisance to their new Luna.

But these people I had looked after all along were now stabbing me in the back, every single one.

"Are you sure you want me to leave?"

Elder Thorne said, "You're not a wolf born of this pack, Evelyn. A Luna needs the trust of her people! Your leaving is the best choice."

Beta Dallas stepped forward as well. "Sera is gentle by nature, the purest she-wolf in all of Frost Fang. You, on the other hand, carry foreign blood that runs too hot, too dangerous. We don't need someone who could turn on us at any moment!"

"That's right." Rose, who had once been close to me, now looked at me with open disgust. "Besides, Evelyn, it's not like your family never had a Luna. Your mom was Luna before your dad died, right? You've seen that being Luna isn't all it's cracked up to be. Why fight Sera over it?"

I let out a cold laugh and turned to Elder Thorne. "Thorne, if I remember correctly, three years ago your only son Reid was sentenced to death for breaking pack law. I used my reputation and my service record to save his life."

Elder Thorne's gaze darted away, unable to meet mine, but his flicker of guilt vanished in an instant. "What nonsense! You only did that to curry favor and meddle in Frost Fang's internal affairs! I heard you even channeled your wolf's energy into him."

"I did that to heal him! He had been brutalized!"

"You just wanted to turn him into your puppet!"

What a masterful twisting of the truth.

My fists clenched tighter. I turned to Dallas. "You say I'd turn on you? Then who pulled you out of the fighting pit back then? And who spent three sleepless days and nights building you up from a wreck who couldn't even shift, all the way to the Beta you are today?!"

Perhaps it was guilt, because Dallas suddenly raised his voice and roared at me, "I got where I am today on the strength of my own wolf and my own merit. What does any of that have to do with you, Evelyn?"

Fine. Fine. So none of it had anything to do with me!

"And what about you, Rose? When your mother was dying in labor, I went deep into the Miasma Woods to find the herbs that saved her life and yours. Are you going to deny that too?"

Rose said nothing. She glanced instinctively toward Sera.

An awkward silence settled over the crowd.

That was when Caine stepped forward once more. He walked up to me and said, "Why does it have to come to this? Evelyn, everyone's only asking you to leave Frost Fang for now. As long as you accept Sera, I can still let you come back..."

"No need." I refused without a moment's hesitation.

If they refused to accept me, why should I waste my energy protecting these heartless people?

Under the gaze of the entire pack, I walked slowly up to the Moon Altar.

"Evelyn, what are you doing?" Caine started forward to stop me.

But I had already bitten my finger and pressed my bloodied hand against the altar. "With the Moon Goddess as my witness, I, Evelyn, ask that you revoke my mate bond!"

Caine's eyes tightened, and the way he looked at me turned impossibly deep.