Chapter 2

Not long after Kyle left, Maya Stone arrived.

She was a record keeper sent by the Moon Council to Ravenwood Pack, and one of the few true friends I had. The moment she stepped inside, she pulled me into her arms, furious enough for her eyes to flash wolf-gold.

“Alia, have you heard? Kyle is really going through with the mate contract with Lila. Last life, he would’ve died for you. This life, did a rogue bite the sense out of him?”

I placed the moonstone ring on the table.

Gray liquid still shimmered in the hidden groove. Maya caught the scent and her face changed at once. “A witch’s forgetting potion?”

I nodded and told her everything I had overheard.

Maya slammed her palm on the table. “Bastard. He wants to save Lila, so he wipes you out? Does he even know that potion can’t be undone? If you had really drunk it, every memory and pull tied to your mate would be stripped clean.”

“He doesn’t care,” I said. “He just thinks I’ll always stand where he left me.”

Maya fell silent. After a long time, she said quietly, “The Council order came down too. Frostfang controls the northern border, and Ravenwood has to honor the alliance pact. The Blackthorn line must send one daughter as Frostfang’s future Luna.”

She paused, then forced herself to continue.

“The name on the original list was Lila. But if Kyle signs a mate contract with her before midnight tomorrow, Ravenwood can shield her. That leaves you with two choices. Challenge Lila before the ceremony and take Kyle back, which means she goes to Frostfang, or take her place.”

I lowered my gaze to the potion in the ring.

In my last life, after I accepted Kyle’s mark, Lila had been sent to Frostfang. Everyone said Alpha Rowan Voss was sick, gloomy, and cruel. Lila died there within a year.

That was why Kyle was so desperate to protect her this time.

But her life was not something he could buy with my love.

“I won’t fight for him,” I said.

Maya stared at me. “Alia.”

“He doesn’t need me, and I won’t take him back.” I looked up. “If Ravenwood has to send someone, I’ll go to Frostfang.”

Tears filled Maya’s eyes. “That’s the North. Rowan Voss has a terrible reputation. Everyone says something is wrong with his body and that he can barely hold his wolf form. Are you really going?”

“At least he didn’t drug me.” I smiled. “That already makes him better than Kyle.”

The next evening, I went to the Ravenwood night market alone.

The downtown street outside the packhouse had been closed for the full-moon fair. Food trucks lined both sides of the road, neon signs glowed in storefront windows, and young wolves gathered around the training square where blue moonfire burned in metal drums.

Moonfire was a ceremonial flame made from silver-pine resin and moon oil. It burned bright and beautiful, hot enough to scar if someone got careless, but it wouldn’t kill a wolf the way wolfsbane would.

In our pack, an Alpha danced through the moonfire before choosing his Luna. It was old-fashioned, a little reckless, and ridiculously romantic. In my last life, Kyle had learned the dance for me.

Back then, he had been a proud Alpha who hated bowing to anyone. But to make me smile, he threw himself into the ring of blue flame again and again, until sparks burned a deep scar into his arm.

He had smiled at me through the firelight.

“Alia, this scar will carry your name from now on. My wolf, my blood, my whole damn life, all of it burns for you.”

I had carried those words in my heart for an entire lifetime.

Now the flames rose toward the night sky again.

A familiar figure leaped from the far end of the fire ring. A black wolf stretched beneath the moonlight, landed cleanly, and shifted back into a man. Kyle pulled off his mask, his eyes bright the way they had been in our last life.

For one breath, my legs almost gave out beneath me.

Then Lila’s sweet laugh cut through the crowd. “Kyle!”

She lifted the hem of her silver dress and ran to him, throwing herself into his arms. “Thank you for dancing the moonfire for me. After tonight, all of Ravenwood will know how much you love me.”

The step I had taken stopped in midair and slowly lowered back to the ground.

So the scar he had once left for me could be burned for someone else.

So when he said he only wanted to save her life, he meant he would spend these two days giving her every piece of devotion he had once given me.

Why bother? If he couldn’t let her go, he should have just let me go cleanly.

I turned to leave, but Kyle seemed to sense me. He pushed through the crowd and caught up. “Alia. It really is you.”

His voice was rough with panic. “It’s late. Why are you out here alone? Why didn’t you bring security? What if you ran into rogues?”

I stopped and looked at him calmly. “Where I go doesn’t seem to be any of your business.”

His face stiffened.

Lila came over and took his hand, sweet and smug at the same time. “Alia, Kyle is just caring about someone I care about. You’re my sister, which means you’ll be his family soon too.”

She lifted Kyle’s hand on purpose, showing me the fresh burns across the back of it. “Was the moonfire dance pretty? Kyle practiced it for me for so long that he even hurt his hand.”

I looked at the red marks and suddenly felt something inside me hollow out.

“It was pretty,” I said. “He put real effort into it for you.”

Kyle stared at me, his eyes softening as if he still had something to say. “If you liked it, I can dance it again.”

I laughed. “She is the woman you love. It’s only right that you dance for her. What would it mean if you danced for me?”

I looked him in the eye, every word clear. “Do you have feelings for me too? A man with one foot in two bonds isn’t exactly popular among wolves. I hate that type most of all.”

Kyle went pale. His mouth moved, but no sound came out.

Then a scream ripped from the end of the street.

A rogue burst out from between two parked cars in wolf form, huge and red-eyed, charging straight into the crowd. Security alarms shrieked. People scattered.

Before I could step back, Kyle instinctively pulled me into his arms. “Alia, don’t be scared.”

His familiar scent slammed into me, and for half a second, the past blurred with the present.

Then Lila screamed and fell near the curb. “Kyle, my leg hurts!”

Kyle’s body went rigid. Almost instantly, he released me. He moved so fast that he shoved me backward into a stone column outside the packhouse. My palm scraped across the rough surface, and beads of blood rose slowly from the torn skin.

He was already at Lila’s side, gathering her into his arms, his eyes red with fear. “Lila, I’ll take you to the healer. Don’t be afraid. I’m here.”

I stood where he had left me and watched him carry another woman toward the medical wing.

Only then did the pain in my palm finally climb up my arm.

So I was still his first instinct. But I was not his final choice.

I didn’t want that kind of love.

Not now. Not ever.