Chapter 3

After I submitted the request to leave the pack, Marcus approved it almost immediately.

I was taken by surprise at first, but after thinking about it, I realized it made sense.

He was busy spending time with Clara. He probably skimmed the paperwork and signed it without even noticing who submitted it.

I didn't go home right away. I kept driving until I was far beyond the city limits.

I had already prepared the agreement to sever the mate bond, but just in case, I had also spent a large sum buying medicine from a witch for that purpose.

On the way back, I took a detour to my favorite bakery and bought a slice of strawberry shortcake.

The sweetness spread across my tongue, and my mood lifted with it.

Even when I got home and saw that the kids had burned a hole through one of my photos, it didn't ruin my good mood at all.

When they saw the cream at the corner of my mouth, both of them puffed up angrily.

"You're a bad mom. You ate a cake in secret and didn't share it with us!"

Rowan grabbed my clothes and threw himself onto the floor, kicking and screaming, "I want cake, too!"

I wiped the cream from my lips with my finger, then deliberately licked it.

"If you want cake, tell your new mom to buy it for you."

They froze for a second, then both started rolling around on the floor.

"You're a bad mom! You're so selfish! We hate you!"

"If you don't buy me a cake today, I'll hate you forever!"

As they shouted, they grabbed small objects from the table and hurled them at me.

At that moment, they looked like little demons who had come to collect a debt from me, nothing like the sweet, well-behaved children I remembered.

The irony was almost laughable.

I had once treated them as my emotional lifeline. For them, I had been willing to endure Marcus's coldness and cruelty, year after year.

I thought my sacrifices would earn their gratitude.

What I didn't expect was that Marcus had already poisoned their minds. They saw me as the enemy and hurled cruel words my way.

I let out a quiet sigh.

Then I turned toward my room to start packing.

The moment I stepped inside, I froze.

Every wall was covered in red paint, words like "You're disgusting", "Get out", and "We hate you" scrawled everywhere, packed so tightly that they filled the entire room.

My clothes and bags had all been slashed to pieces with a small blade.

Rowan and Noelle dragged their claws across my clothes again and again.

"You're a bad mom. We hate you!"

Looking at their twisted expressions, I was surprised by how calm I felt.

It was as if something inside me had already been worn down over the years, polished away until nothing was left but numbness.

I turned to leave.

But just as I reached the stairs, my foot slipped. I hadn't noticed that oil had been poured across the floor.

I tumbled from the second floor all the way down, my head slamming hard into the cabinet at the bottom. My scalp split open, and blood poured out.

My vision blurred. It took a long moment before I could make out what was in front of me.

Noelle stepped into view, a smug smile curling her lips.

"Serves you right. That's what you get for not giving me cake."

The crash downstairs finally caught Marcus's attention.

He took in the mess on the floor, then his gaze landed on me, covered in blood.

"Zoey, what are you doing now?"

My head throbbed so badly that I could barely think. Before I could even get up, Noelle burst into tears and threw herself into Marcus's arms.

"Dad, Mom went crazy again. She wouldn't let us eat cake!"

"Yeah! We got scared and tried to hide. She was chasing us, and then she fell down the stairs by herself."

"Zoey."

Marcus looked as if he was about to explode, but his expression quickly settled into something cold and controlled.

"I think you've been cursed. You're losing your mind. I'll call the elders and have them take you to the altar to cleanse it."

He pulled out his phone, but I snatched it away. Gritting through the pain, I forced myself upright and rasped, "I'm not crazy. And I'm not cursed."

"Then what is wrong with you?"

He finally lost his temper.

"They're your children. Just because you're jealous of Clara, you'd hurt them, too? And you still say you're not insane?

"You want to sever the mate bond, right? Fine. I'll handle the application. You don't deserve to be Luna, and you don't deserve to be their mother!"

For eight years, he had never stopped belittling me and breaking me down, reminding me that I was nothing without him.

After a while, even I believed it.

But now, I understood something.

Before I was Marcus's mate or anyone's mother, I was my own person.

I staggered toward my bag, reaching for the agreement, but my body suddenly gave out.

My vision went dark, and I collapsed.