Chapter 4

~ Aria~

I woke with a jolt, chest heaving, breath tearing through my lungs. My pulse thundered in my ears as the dream clung to me like damp shadows me, running. Feet pounding against unseen ground. The air thick, every breath a fight. I didn’t know who, or what, was behind me. I only knew I couldn’t stop.

But it wasn’t just a dream. It felt like my life, painted in motion running without rest, without safety. And though I pretended not to, I already knew who I was running from. And why.

For a long moment, I stared at the ceiling, waiting for my heartbeat to slow. Then I sat up. The silk sheets twisted around my legs like soft, silken chains smooth, too smooth.

The room they’d given me was small but elegant. White walls, a crystal mirror, a silk curtain swaying at the window. Beautiful. Almost too beautiful for someone they didn’t even know. I hadn’t told them my name, yet they offered me comfort. My plan was simple: show gratitude, then disappear.

Even the bed smelled clean lavender and something else that I couldn’t name.

I swung my legs over the side, ready to leave this territory before I became a burden. But my stomach betrayed me with a loud growl. I hadn’t had a proper meal in… I couldn’t even remember. The last gathering I attended meant to announce my supposed future as a Luna had instead been my downfall. Funny, in a cruel sort of way.

Hunger won, it always did.

I rose, following the scent of food through the house. The house wasn’t large, and the scent of food drew me like a trail. I followed it, the quiet halls swallowing my footsteps until I found her—Lena.

She stood in the kitchen, apron tied around her waist, hair gathered in a messy bun that somehow looked intentional. She was effortlessly beautiful even in the unpolished moments of morning, she still looked flawless. Meanwhile, I didn’t need a mirror to know I probably resembled a scruffy Christmas elf.

She turned, catching sight of me, and smiled.

“Good morning.”

I mumbled something back, trying not to look like I’d been caught staring.

“I hope you’re hungry” she said moving gracefully between the stove and counter .

“I didn’t know what you liked, so I made a little of everything—pancakes, toast, eggs, oats, juice. Or would you rather have coffee? Tea?”

I just kept staring. The kindness felt foreign. When was the last time anyone treated me like this?

She misread my silence, her eyes widening. “Oh my gosh… you don’t like any of this? I’m sorry, I should’ve ordered takeout. I just thought, since it’s your first time here, I’d make it special.”

Finally, my voice found its way out. “No, please I’m grateful. I’m just… surprised you went through all this trouble for me. You barely know me. I doubt you even know my name.”

Her shoulders relaxed, a small smile tugging at her lips. “Thank goodness. I don’t have to know you to be nice to you.” She set the last plate on the table.

“Thank you,” I murmured. I didn’t even know what I was thanking her for the food, the kindness, or the rare feeling of being treated like a person instead of a problem.

“Is there anything I can help you with?” I asked.

She shook her head. “No, please. Sit down you’re my guest.”

Then a deep, masculine voice cut into the moment, smooth and edged with amusement.

“I told you, darling, you were stressing yourself for nothing,” he said, brushing a kiss against Lena’s forehead before turning his gaze on me.

Up close, his presence was… heavy. Confident. Dangerous.

“We’ve not been formally introduced,” he said, extending a hand. “I’m Finn, Beta of the Midnight Crescent Pack.”

Midnight Crescent.

The name struck like ice in my veins. A whisper of old stories, blood soaked and brutal, tangled in my mind. Ruthless. Unforgiving. The kind of pack that showed no mercy to its enemies.

My face must have betrayed the thought because Finn chuckled, low and knowing. “You should see yourself right now. I doubt you knew which pack you crossed. If you had, you would’ve stayed far, far away. Your face says it all.”

Heat rushed to my cheeks, but my voice finally clawed its way out. “Aria Vale.”

That was all. No title. No pack name to anchor it.

His eyes narrowed, studying me like I was a puzzle he’d half solved. He looked ready to pry deeper until Lena stepped in.

“Finn,” she warned lightly, “you can ask all your questions after I’ve fed her.”

Relief washed through me. I didn’t know if I was more grateful for the food or for the way she shielded me.

Then we sat to eat, the three of us gathered around the small table.

Or rather, they sat to eat with me present.

Lena and Finn slipped into their own rhythm teasing each other like I wasn’t even there. The banter was light, their smiles easy. For a moment, I just watched, wondering how the man who carried danger in his very stance could look this… soft for someone.

It was strange comforting, even but also a reminder that I didn’t belong here.

Lena, ever the kind one, tried pulling me into the conversation with small questions. How I liked my food. If I needed anything else. I gave her polite answers, but part of me stayed guarded, the way you do when you know kindness can be fleeting.

After breakfast, I knew there was no escaping Finn and his questions. So I told him everything.

_____

I can still see the day it all changed how our laughter faded overnight. One moment, we were a family. The next, my mother was gone. They all said she was sick, but I knew better. She’d never been sick a day in her life. I saw the marks when I went to say goodbye dark, ugly bruises blooming across her skin like secrets no one wanted to talk about.

I didn’t ask. I should have, but I didn’t.

My father tried to fill the space she left, but nothing fit. The air in the house grew heavier, colder. I started pulling in, retreating into a shell I didn’t even know existed… and I’ve been there ever since.

We never really spoke much about her again, but she was a missing piece to both of us. Then one day, I came back from school and saw a woman in our house, with a girl about my age. My father called me over and said he was going to marry her she was going to be my new mother.

I was livid.

It hadn’t been that long since Mom died… three years still wasn’t enough to mourn her. I thought they were fated mates. I was angry because my mother always spoke so highly of mates, using herself and my father as proof that such bonds were real and unshakable. Why didn’t he believe in her?

I left the room, too angry to speak.

Later, he came knocking, but I didn’t respond. I thought he’d left, then I heard the scrape of wood. He’d set a chair in front of my door, ready to camp outside until I opened it. Hours passed before I finally unbolted the lock.

He was still there, slumped in an uncomfortable position. The moment he saw me, he sat up and opened his arms. And I didn’t realize how many tears I’d been holding back until I felt his warm embrace.

He told me he knew how I felt.

Did he?

He said nothing was going to change, that I needed a motherly figure. I cried, telling him the two of us were enough for each other, but he kept saying it wasn’t.

Then he told me my mother wouldn’t want us to mourn her that long and be unhappy. That Grace and her daughter, June, were going to be family. That we were going to love them, and that no one would ever replace me in his heart.

I wanted to fight it, but I also knew aside from being my mother, she was his fated mate. He’d experienced a pain I could never fully understand. He felt the bond snap. He must have been lonely all along.

So I agreed.

And Grace and her daughter moved into our home.

At first, it was good. Better than good. They were nice. I didn’t regret my choice, and my father looked happy again. There was a spark in his eyes I hadn’t seen in years. If my father was happy, then so was I.

But then Grace started showing her true colors.

With my father around, she was sweet, loving, the kind of woman who wouldn’t hurt a fly. In his absence, she was the devil himself. It didn’t take long before June joined her mother’s act, and suddenly I was a stranger in my own home.

I endured it for my father’s happiness. Once, I tried to speak up, but it caused a fight between them, and after that, she became worse than before. My father started growing tired of what he thought were my “daily complaints.”

“Aria, you’ve got to learn how to share.”

“Aria, June is your sister now.”

“You should grow up, Aria.”

And just like that, I was no longer his little princess. I was just Aria.

But that wasn’t even the worst of it.

I was a late bloomer. Almost everyone had gotten their wolf by sixteen, or at least eighteen, but I was almost twenty without one. That made me the pack’s favorite punchline. At school, I was the laughingstock. Friends drifted away, not wanting to be mocked by association.

And then June didn’t just take my father’s love she took the only guy I’d ever liked.

Everyone knew I liked Darius. The Alpha’s son. He was always kind to me. If I had to describe Darius Wolfe, a litany of words came to mind beautiful, the kind of man who broke the scale of handsome, kind, brilliant. He was one of the reasons I didn’t break down completely in the pack.

Things between us had felt… different. Yes, he was kind to everyone, but with me, it felt like there was more. I’d even prayed to the Moon Goddess to make us mates. Then I’d laugh at myself—if the Moon Goddess couldn’t save my mother, why would she care about this?

Everything changed when June came into the picture again.

June. June. June.

She thrived on attention. And slowly, I could feel Darius’s attention slipping away from me.

One afternoon after school, I was glad to be home alone. June was off to wherever she went, and Grace hadn’t returned from her usual spending trips with my father’s money. I curled up on the couch, binge watching Friends, laughing at the ridiculous jokes, letting myself forget for a moment.

Then it happened the sound of bones snapping and stretching, muscles tearing and reforming.

At first, I thought it was coming from outside. A branch breaking, maybe. But then the sound ripped through me deep, raw, and sickening.

It wasn’t outside.

It was inside me.

My spine arched so sharply it felt like it might snap in two. Pain lanced through every bone, every joint, as if invisible hands were tearing me apart piece by piece. My fingers curled into claws, nails lengthening before my eyes.

I tried to scream, but it came out as a strangled, guttural sound that didn’t belong to me. My jaw ached, my teeth pushing forward, reshaping into something sharper. My skin burned hot, then cold, then hot again as dark fur pushed through.

I fell to the floor, gasping, my vision fracturing half in the warm light of the living room, half in a strange new clarity where every detail was too sharp, too bright. I could hear my own heartbeat thundering in my ears, smell the dust in the carpet, the faint hint of my father’s cologne clinging to the couch.

And then… silence.

The pain faded, replaced by an electric pulse thrumming through every inch of me. I looked down and the hands I’d known all my life were gone. In their place were paws, powerful and trembling.

Somewhere deep inside, something stirred. A voice not quite mine, but part of me all the same whispered:

“Finally.”

My breath came fast, shallow, like I’d just run for miles. My heart hammered against my ribs, every beat vibrating through this… new body.

For years, I’d imagined what it would be like my first shift, the moment the Moon Goddess would finally claim me as one of her own. I thought it would be magical. Beautiful. Maybe even painless.

I was wrong.

It was brutal, raw, a storm tearing me apart and putting me back together in a way that didn’t feel entirely like me. But underneath the terror, something else bloomed warm, fierce, alive.

I padded forward on unsteady legs, claws clicking softly against the floorboards. My reflection in the mirror across the room stopped me cold.

A wolf stared back sleek, with fur the color of midnight and eyes so bright they almost glowed. My eyes.

A shiver rolled through me. This was real. I wasn’t broken. I wasn’t the pack’s joke anymore.

Finally, the voice inside whispered again, stronger this time. We’re whole.

But before I could fully grasp the moment, a sharp knock rattled the front door, and my blood went cold.

My senses were waking up in ways I’d never felt before.

I heard June’s voice from the other side of the door, casual and careless, saying something about how Dinah wasn’t going to make it herself. Then her footsteps faded away.

I stayed there for a moment, my heart pounding, excitement buzzing in my veins. I’d shifted. I was a wolf now. Who was I supposed to tell? Should I even tell anyone? Part of me wanted to scream it to the whole pack; another part wanted to guard it like a secret.

I shifted back and stepped out, determined to avoid any drama or stories Grace and June could twist against me.

Grace came home not long after. She gave me a long look and said I looked… different. After a string of complaints about one thing or another, she left me alone.

Then June came into the kitchen, heading straight for the fridge. That’s when my senses sharpened again more vivid, more undeniable than before.

I smelled my mate on her.

Fury lit up inside me. I rushed forward, grabbed her, and demanded, “Who were you with? Where were you?”

She wrinkled her nose and shoved me back. “Get off me. I don’t think I owe you any explanation.”

My nails dug into my palms. I didn’t want to blame her not completely. I hadn’t told anyone I’d gotten my wolf, so how would she even know what that scent meant to me? No… the blame fell on my mate.

If it was someone in the pack, almost everyone had found their mate by now. Maybe they’d known I was theirs but didn’t want to wait for me. Maybe they’d decided it was easier to reject me before I even had the chance to claim them.

The thought burned.

I stood there, trembling, wondering if I’d have to start watching June stalking her if I had to just to find out who she’d been with. And once I knew… they would have to explain to me exactly why they’d cheated before they even gave me a chance.

I didn’t want to jump to conclusions. Given that it was June, there was always the chance she’d forced herself on someone. I wanted to hear the truth from my mate’s own lips before deciding anything.

The next morning, going to school felt… unreal. Now that I had my wolf, I was connected to the pack in ways I’d never been before. I could hear voices through the mind link snippets of conversations, whispers that carried from far across the school grounds. It was overwhelming, and yet… it felt like belonging.

First period: Math.

Second period: English.

By the time I got through my morning classes, I’d already decided June was no longer my friend.

Then came lunch.

The moment I stepped into the cafeteria, it hit me lavender, sweet and soft and beneath it, a stronger, masculine scent that wrapped around me and stole my breath. My heart slammed against my ribs. I knew, without a single doubt, that it was my mate’s scent.

And when I looked up… he was looking back at me.

Darius Wolfe.

I don’t even know when the word slipped past my lips, but I heard myself whisper, Mate.

Every prayer I’d ever made to the Moon Goddess, every hopeless night I’d dreamed of this, she’d finally answered me. For a second, I almost forgot about the scent I’d caught on June. Almost.

But he didn’t move. He just stared, like he wasn’t sure what to do. Being the Alpha’s son, he’d gotten his wolf earlier than the rest of us, so I knew he could sense mine. I knew he knew.

So why didn’t he come to me?

It’s a question I still don’t have the answer to.

Instead, he turned and left.

I stood there, stunned, my pulse racing, my mind trying to piece it together. By the end of last period, I found a folded note in my locker. Someone wanted to meet me. At the bottom were his initials—DW.

My heart soared.

Finally, I thought. Maybe he just didn’t want to announce it in front of the pack. Maybe this was his way of making it special. I told myself all sorts of excuses for why he hadn’t come straight to me.

I rushed to the bathroom and changed into an extra dress I’d packed, smoothing my hair, trying to look perfect for him. This was it the moment I’d been waiting for all my life.

But when I got there, my heart sank.

There were people everywhere. Not an intimate setting. Not just the two of us. My smile faltered.

And then I saw him.

Before I could even take a step closer, his voice rang out across the space, loud and clear:

“I, Darius Wolfe, reject you, Aria Val, as my mate and the Luna of this pack.”

The words sliced through me, leaving nothing but hollow space where my heart used to be.

Everything in me shattered. The voices around me blurred into a dull roar, and the cold crept in not from the wind, but from the hollow that opened inside me. I remember standing there, waiting for someone to say it was a cruel joke. No one did.

Then I ran .

“Aria…”

My name pulled me back to the present. Lena’s eyes were glossy, her hand halfway to mine as if she didn’t know if she had the right to touch me. “I’m so sorry you went through that.”

I gave a small shrug. “Life happens.”

But Finn didn’t move, didn’t blink, he just studied me like he was seeing the girl from that story still standing here.

“Ever wonder,” he said slowly, “why I took you in that night? Why I didn’t leave you outside or cast you out?” His voice softened. “My wolf said something about you… that you were different. I didn’t understand it, but I couldn’t ignore it. I’m sorry you went through all that too.”

“Thank you,” I murmured, meaning it.

“What’s her name?” Lena asked suddenly.

I blinked. “Who?”

“Your wolf,” she said, smiling.

“Oh.” The corner of my mouth twitched. “Violet.”

“I hope I meet her someday,” Lena said.

“Hopefully.”

I laughed lightly, the heaviness thinning just a little. “Well, I won’t bore you with my stories—”

“You wouldn’t,” she said while smiled.

Finn pushed back his chair. “I need to do my rounds on the pack.” With a nod, he was gone.

Lena leaned in. “You might want to stay comfortable my sister’s coming over. She’s about your age.”

“Your age?” I teased.

Lena smirked. “I’m twenty-six. She’s twenty-two, maybe twenty-three.”

I raised a brow. “You don’t look it.”

“Flattery noted,” she said with a wink.