CHAPTER 2

Amara

The door creaked open, but I didn’t see who was there.

I couldn't look. My brain just quit. It didn't want to be in this room anymore, so it went somewhere else. It went back to the very first time I died.

The sun was hot on my neck that morning in the village. I was sitting on a wooden stool while my mother combed the knots out of my hair. It hurt, but it was a good kind of hurt because she was right there.

"Ow, Mama," I said.

"Stop wiggling, Amara," she said. She kissed the top of my head. "If you don't keep still, I'll never get these braids finished."

My father came out of the hut. He was carrying a heavy bucket of water, but he stopped to pull on one of my messy locks. "I think a bird lived in there last night. I saw it fly out when she woke up."

"It did not!" I laughed.

"It did," he said, his eyes crinkling. "A big, fat blue one. It told me you snored."

"I don't snore," I told him.

"You do," my mother whispered, smiling. "But it’s a very pretty snore."

We were Omegas. We were the bottom of the pile. We didn't have gold or big houses or fancy swords. We had a hut that leaked when it rained and enough bread to get through the week. But it was warm. It was so warm. I didn't know back then how hard it is to find people who just love you because you're you. I know it now.

The village bells started banging. They didn't sound happy. They sounded like a warning.

"What's that?" I asked.

My father’s smile went away. He put the bucket down. "Stay behind me, Amara. Corvus is here."

"Who is Corvus?" I asked.

"The man who takes things," my mother whispered.

We all went to the center of the village. There were hundreds of us, all standing in the dirt. The air felt heavy, like it was going to rain rocks. Then he walked in. Corvus. He looked older than me, but not old. He looked like he was made of iron. He walked through the lines of people like he was looking at cows he might want to buy.

He stopped right in front of me.

I felt a zap. It wasn't like static from a blanket. It was like a lightning bolt hit me in the chest and stayed there. It was a pull. It was a string tied to my heart and the other end was in his hand.

"Look at me," Corvus said. His voice was deep. It made the ground under my feet feel shaky.

I looked up. His eyes were dark. For one second, just one tiny second, his face changed. He felt it too. He felt the mate bond. The Moon Goddess had picked him for me. My soul reached out to him, crying "There you are! I found you!"

I smiled a little bit. "Hello," I whispered.

Corvus didn't smile back. His face turned into a mask of stone. He looked at me like I was a bug he wanted to squash. He looked at my parents, then back at me. He saw my thin arms. He saw my low rank. He saw that I was nothing.

"No," Corvus said.

The word was like a slap.

"What?" I asked. My heart was thumping so hard it hurt.

"You are an Omega," Corvus said. He said it loud so everyone could hear. "You are weak. You are a mistake."

"The bond..." I started to say.

"I, Corvus, Alpha of the Black Ridge, reject you," he said. He didn't even sound angry. He sounded bored. "I do not want a mate who smells of dirt and poverty. You are nothing to me. You are less than nothing."

The string tied to my heart snapped. It didn't just break; it whipped back and cut me open inside. I fell to my knees. I couldn't breathe. It felt like my lungs were filled with broken glass.

"Amara!" my mother cried. She tried to run to me, but one of Corvus's soldiers pushed her back.

"Leave her," Corvus said. He didn't even look back as he walked away. "She is unclaimed. She is a ghost."

The weeks after that were the worst part. Being rejected by a mate isn't like breaking up with a boyfriend. It’s like your body forgets how to stay alive. I stayed in my bed in the hut. The sun came up and the sun went down, but I was always cold.

"Eat some soup, baby," my mother said. She was sitting by my bed. She looked so tired. She had been crying.

"I can't, Mama," I said. My voice was just a whisper. "It tastes like sand."

My father came in. He looked at me, and I saw a tear fall down his face. He didn't say any jokes anymore. "He’s a monster, Amara. He doesn't deserve you. You have to fight it."

"I don't know how," I said.

My skin was turning gray. I could feel my wolf inside me curling up into a ball and going to sleep. She didn't want to live in a world where her mate hated her. I didn't either.

One morning, the room was very bright. The light was coming through the cracks in the roof, and it looked like gold dust. I felt very light. I didn't feel the pain in my chest anymore.

"Mama?" I said.

She grabbed my hand. Her hand was warm, but mine was cold. "I'm here. I'm right here."

"I think I'm going to go to sleep now," I said.

"No, stay with me," she whispered. "Stay with me, Amara."

"I'll see you in a minute," I said. I really believed that.

I closed my eyes. Everything went black. Then there was a bright light, and then I was screaming, and a different woman was holding me, and I realized I was a person again. And the worst part was, I remembered everything. I remembered the braids. I remembered the jokes. I remembered the way Corvus looked when he told me I was nothing.

The Moon Goddess gave me my memories back. People think memories are a gift. They aren't. They are a cage.

Suddenly, the cold air of the present hit my skin. The memory of the straw hut and my mother’s braids vanished. I wasn't in the past anymore.

I was in this room. The door was open.

I realized I had been holding my breath since the moment the handle turned. My lungs ached. I finally let the air out, and it sounded like a sob.

I looked up.

There was a shadow in the doorway. A tall, wide shadow that blocked out all the light from the hallway.