Chapter#01

MAYA

“Is she sweating or melting?”

The sound pierced through me, snapping the surface silence of the assembly hall. A few scattered laughs followed.

The assembly hall reeked of my heat. I hoped no one else could smell it. I was stiff on stage, blinking into the blinding white lights that transformed the room into a spotlighted nightmare. They were hot, too hot as if one were standing with no shade under a midday sun.

Heat scuttled beneath my skin like ants on fire. My fingers gripped the folded notecards tightly, but they still shook. They were fluttering in my hand like they were wings. Not a word could I read.

I didn’t like to give this speech. I hadn’t even volunteered. But “Pack Integration Day” was apparently far too imperative for anyone to miss… especially the daughter without a wolf of the Alpha.

That had been the true reason I’d come up here, hadn’t it? Not that I had anything to say. But it was because I was the cautionary tale. And the reminder of what you see when the moon turns her face from you.

“No, she’s dripping,” another voice contributed, louder this time. It was less derisive and more amused. As if they were indicating a freak in a zoo.

I couldn’t move. I couldn’t speak. My throat was too tight. My tongue felt heavy and dry.

Then someone said it… what I did not want to hear.

“Oh hell, is she going to be in heat again?”

My stomach dropped.

This was met with snickers, and the snickers gradually turned into open guffaws. I could feel it from all around me. Eyes stabbing at me… not just peering but judging.

I made myself look down.

My jeans were uglier than I’d imagined. I had blackened patches down the insides of my thighs. Now it was obvious... drenched. I didn’t have to check. I knew. I could feel it.

Worse, I could smell it.

My scent hung in the air like smoke after a burn. It was that unmistakable indicator of heat that no one in the room could deny. Not a single wolf, at least.

It was everywhere… me, my shame, the thing I couldn’t control.

I couldn’t breathe.

My heart was pounding so loudly in my ears, and yet, somehow, I could still, in my head, hear their laughter, still see the twisted smirks and not-so-well-hidden looks of pity and disgust.

I wished the floor would simply fall apart beneath me. I wanted to be unnoticeable, to slip into the crevices and never be alive again.

But I was there and had no choice but to take it.

I should’ve stayed home. I should’ve lied. Said I had a fever. Food poisoning. Anything. Hell, I should’ve broken my leg if that’s what it would have taken to get out of this.

"I knew the second I walked on that stage," I said. “I knew it was going to implode."

A shrill whistle pierced the low monotone of whispers, rousing me from my reverie.

“Damn, if she looks like that here, imagine her in bed.”

The words crackled across the room with a vulgar kind of electricity. Phones were already lighting up, and laughter spread across the room. Not the nervous kind. Not the “ha-ha, let’s make-believe this isn’t a disaster” kind.

“Don’t be a dick,” Brielle’s voice suddenly thrust in between with sickly sweet honey that sliced through the clamor with faux concern.

From her seat in the front row, she got up slowly, dusting imaginary lint off her designer skirt as though she were about to take a stroll down a runway.

“Maybe she just wanted to spread her… gifts around,” she added. “Real generous of you, Maya.”

It was almost a slap to feel my name on her lips.

My face burned with humiliation. I squeezed my notecards, and they crumpled in my hands. I didn’t feel them tear until I looked down. They were torn down the middle… like me.

Brielle stepped into her aisle and swung her hips. She strolled up to the stage steps as if she owned the world. Like, this was her show.

“But no, really,” she said, rising and climbing, her heels clack-clacking on the stairs. “Is it even legal for her to be here when she goes off like she is now?”

She glanced at the teachers and flashed a saccharine smile.

They didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Why would they? No one ever did. Their silence was a verdict.

“Too close to the stage.” She joined me on stage, far too close. I instinctively backed away.

“Aw,” she cooed, “you can do it… Don’t be afraid.” She cocked her head. “You have to tell us what it’s like being a walking hormone bomb.”

The audience erupted into laughter again.

“Sounds like fun,” she added, “coming every time a guy breathes near you.”

The room roared. I couldn’t even look at them.

I turned to leave. I needed out. Now.

But Brielle wasn’t finished. She dug into her glittery bag and fished out a bottle. One quick, expert flip of her wrist popped the cap, and in one easy, fluid motion… she poured it down the front of my shirt.

The crowd roared, and all I could do was stand as the red liquid seeped into the cotton, sticking to my chest, my bra… everything.

Gasps echoed. Some laughed. Others just stared. Heat pulsated around my body as I remained at the end of her stunt, wet from the ice-cold juice.

“Thought you could use a cool-off,” Brielle added with a saccharine smile. “Don’t worry, Deviant. That one was free.”

And by the time I could look away and burst out of the tent at a run, a hand had snatched the bottle from Brielle’s grip, and silence had spread through the crowd.

I wheeled and felt my breath get knocked out of my lungs.

My father, Alpha Darius Blackthorn, froze in place, a half-empty bottle still leaking through his fingers.

Brielle’s fake smile faltered. “Uh… sir?”

He didn’t look at her. His eyes were on me. And what he was looking at in his eyes was not love. Or concern.

It was disgust.

“This is what you’ve become?” he spat. “Pathetic. You let them humiliate you.”

My lips parted. I wanted to speak. To say something. Anything.

“Dad…”

The plastic crinkled as the silence was yanked away, and he turned toward the crowd.

“She is my daughter,” he said coldly. “Lay a hand on her, and I swear to every last one of you, I’ll see that you answer to me. Or better yet, to your Alpha. I don’t give a fuck what pack you’re from.”

No one spoke or laughed. The students looked down, and the teachers shuffled around uncomfortably.

He looked at me again. “Come.” And started walking. I surged out of the assembly hall and followed him, the heat boiling in waves over my skin.

The silence outside the hall was deafening. He paused again, his eyes still not down toward me. Gradually, he began fumbling around in the inside pocket of his jacket.

And extracted a white envelope, and tossed it at my feet as if it were garbage.

“The Werewolf Pairing Gala is tonight!” he spat.

“Your sister is too young. You’ll represent our family.” A pause. “Don’t fuckin’ embarrass me anymore.”

The envelope rested on the floor there at my feet. I gaped at it, paralyzed. My breath came shallow. I opened my mouth, but it was an effort just to speak.

“I… I can’t go like this.” My voice broke halfway through.

He shifted his head just slightly, enough to let me see the disgust carved into the hard lines of his face.

“You should be thankful anyone still asks you,” he snapped. His voice was so full of venom, it made my spine curl. “The invite was not even from some clingy Lycan with a crush. Be ready in two hours.”

The Lycan Leader. Kael Draven. Why would he…?

No. It didn’t matter. None of this was for me.

“Dad, please,” I whispered. “Don’t do this.”

He turned fully to face me. “You are making enough fun of me,” he hissed. “Clean yourself up.” And then he walked away.

The envelope was still on the chilly floor.

I stared at it. I stooped to lift it, my hands shaking.

The paper was thick. The Lycan Court had a blood-red wax seal. A half-moon with a wolf’s head nestled in its curl.

I gripped it tighter. Every fiber of my being wanted to rip it in two, but I couldn’t. Instead, I just stood there. Frozen.

A part of me still hoped that this wasn’t real. But it was. And that is when the reality hit me once more.

I’d always believed I was a mistake.

I was Maya Blackthorn, the wolfless daughter of Alpha Darius of the Ashbourne, and I was damned… damned by the Moon Goddess.

I was a disgrace to the pack. That had become my name, spat as though it were poison by Lycans who had revered strength.

But worse than being without a wolf… was the monthly heat. A fire that consumed my body from within as I craved something that no one could provide me.

Every month, I reeked of it. Month after month, it spread, and still no wolf responded to its cry. Because I had no wolf. I was just a body that was damned to feel it all.

They knew me as the Wolfless Deviant. A name I had not adopted but had adhered to me more tightly than my own. A name that chased me like a shadow I could not escape.

My parents had stopped pretending three years before. They had me exiled from the family, and I was sent to serve in the servants’ wing.

I believed that I was the secret they could not figure out how to bury. And now… and now my father wanted to display me in front of the strongest wolves in the world.

Alphas. Warriors. Potential mates. Fated bonds.

As though I were some damaged sacrifice he had pulled back from the flames. As if anyone would want me. 

And the worst part? I knew I’d go anyway.