Chapter 4: Mark of the Alpha

Aria didn’t sleep that night.

Not because she couldn’t, but because sleep would mean surrendering to the memories waiting behind her eyes.

She lay in the dark, her sheets kicked aside, the ceiling above her painted with moonlight. The world outside was quiet, but inside her everything screamed. Her skin still tingled from the change. Her muscles ached like they’d been broken and rebuilt. And in the silence, she started to wonder...

What if I was never normal to begin with?

Her thoughts drifted back to when she was little.

She had always been... different.

When other kids played tag, she ran faster than everyone. Teachers said she had “sharp hearing,” because she always turned around just before someone called her name. Animals liked her too much. Dogs would follow her on the street. Cats purred when they saw her. And when she cried at night, she could feel the moonlight through the window, soothing her like a whisper.

Once, when she was nine, she got lost in the woods behind her neighborhood. It was late, and no one could find her for hours. But she didn’t feel scared.

She had followed a silver shape in the trees, thinking it was a dream.

By the time her parents found her, she was sitting calmly in a clearing, staring at the stars.

Her mom said it was luck.

But now, Aria wasn’t so sure.

she fell asleep with her mind filled too many thoughts to comprehend.

At school the next day, everything felt dull. Like she was pretending to be someone else. The other students moved around her like ghosts talking, laughing, stressing about exams. And Aria just sat there, quiet, breathing through her mouth because the room smelled like a hundred perfumes and pencil shavings and microwaved food.

Tasha leaned across the table at lunch. “Seriously, where are you? You’ve been gone all week.”

“I’m here,” Aria mumbled.

“No, you’re not,” Tasha said, annoyed now. “I’ve known you for years. You’ve been weird lately, but this... this is something else. It’s like you’re turning into a different person.”

Maybe I am, Aria thought.

She wanted to tell her. She needed to tell someone.

But how do you explain to your best friend that you're not just changing you’re remembering?

She stood up, grabbed her tray, and left without a word.

Later that day, the forest welcomed her again.

Kael was waiting, leaning against the same tree as before, watching her with those silver eyes.

“You came back,” he said.

“I didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

He studied her for a moment. “You remembered something, didn’t you?”

Aria nodded slowly. “Pieces. Feelings. I don’t know. I remember being... small. But also strong. Like I wasn’t afraid of anything. I used to think that was just being a kid. But now... it feels like something more.”

“It is,” Kael said gently. “Your soul never forgot who you were. It’s just your mind that’s catching up.”

“I used to think I was broken,” Aria whispered. “Like I didn’t fit into anything. My family, my school, even my own skin sometimes. But now I’m starting to think... maybe I wasn’t broken. Maybe I was just waiting.”

Kael nodded. “You were. And now the moon is calling you

He stepped closer. “Show me your mark.”

She held out her wrist. The crescent-shaped birthmark had darkened since she’d last looked at it. It pulsed faintly like a heartbeat, glowing under the light.

Kael brushed his fingertips over it, and everything changed.

Her knees buckled, but he caught her.

A memory slammed into her,

her running across snow covered ground. Her paws churning the earth. Another wolf beside her Kael. They fought side by side. Laughed. Bled. Loved.

And then

A betrayal.

A flash of red eyes.

Pain.

Her own death.

She gasped and staggered back, eyes wide.

“You saw it,” Kael said quietly.

“I saw me,” she whispered. “But... not this me.”

He nodded. “The wolf you were. The Alpha.”

Tears stung her eyes. “Why me? Why bring me back?”

“Because you were meant to lead again,” he said. “But you won’t be alone this time.”

That night, the moon was full.

She felt it before she saw it pulling at her blood like a tide.

She went into the woods alone.

No fear.

No hesitation.

And when the first wave of heat hit her

bones snapping, claws forming, muscles shifting she didn’t fight it.

She welcomed it.

When the pain passed, she stood tall on four legs, fur like silver fire, breath fogging in the moonlight.

This time, the change didn’t steal her.

It revealed her.

Kael stepped into the clearing beside her, his own form dark and powerful.

They locked eyes.

And ran.

Two wolves reborn.

Two hearts remembering.

Two shadows rising beneath the blood moon.