THE LUNA WHO LEFT HER ALPHA CHAPTER 5

The mate bond screamed and scratched and cried. He could feel his wolf tearing at him, insane, desperate.

He raised his hand to knock,

and paused.

For the first time in all the years the Moon Goddess had made them mated, he wasn't sure that she would answer.

But in the dense woods far away from the pack house, Percie Blade bared his teeth into a cold smile which gave no mercy whatsoever.

The fight was about to begin.

This time, however, Corinne Spark was fighting for another reason apart from being chosen.

In the dark corridor of the pack house, she leaned her back against the locked door, breathing like she had just surfaced from the water. The mate bond in her heart beat in rage, pain, and desire, but she would not heed its cry. She would not soothe it. She would not back off to make Leon whole.

Her hands shook. Not from fear. But from the electricity coursing through her veins due to what she had done.

She heard him hesitate.

She knew he was there, sensed the heat emanating from him, the raw power of his wolf and the confusion radiating from him through their golden bond.

"Corinne," he called softly, but without the usual gruffness of his voice. "Let me in."

She closed her eyes.

"Please."

The final word escaped her lips as a broken whisper.

There was someone tearing up in her heart, making her hurt. She was that little girl who would throw herself into his arms and open the door for him; she was that little girl who would take back that last day and forget about the blood and betrayal and those ten steps between them.

But that little girl was dead in the mud while he was looking at another girl.

Silence reigned in Corinne.

Then, not long after, his breathing came through the crack in the door.

After that came the noise of his fingers scratching against the wood.

"I don't understand," he breathed softly. "What have I done? Please, just talk to me."

She opened her eyes and looked at the wall on the other side.

“You’ve already done it,” she whispered. “You just haven’t come to terms with it yet.”

Silence.

And then, in a tone more gentle than he ever used on her: “I will not let you go.”

Corinne smiled.

“You’ve already let me go.”

And thus, she left the room without even waiting for his answer, rushing upstairs, bounding two steps at a time. Her bond screamed after her in distress. However, she could not hear it. She could not hear it until she reached her room and locked it behind her, leaning against the door, crying.

Her tears were not soft.

They were the burning tears, the tearing, trembling sobs that tore their way out of her very soul. She cried for the little girl that believed that the Goddess of the Moon will defend her. She cried for the Luna that was murdered in front of the sight of her mate, only ten feet away from her. She cried for the girl she used to be and for the one waiting patiently to be chosen by the man that belongs to someone else.

When she finished crying, she wiped away her tears with her arm and stood up.

Three months.

Only three months.

She walked over to her bedroom window and opened it wide. The cool night air was full of the pines. Out there in the night somewhere beyond the pack house there were stormy grey eyes watching her.

She did not have to see him to know.

Percie Blade was not far.

A soft knocking sound came from her door, not the same as Leon’s. Soft. Controlled.

Corinne’s heart pounded.

She moved quickly and opened it with no thought.

Percie was standing there in the hallway, still in his black training suit, his scar glinting faintly in the low light. But he didn’t move inside; he just stared at her, at the wet streaks on her cheeks, at the steady hands that weren’t trembling anymore, at the look of determination in her eyes.

“You locked him out,” he said. Not a question.

“I did.”

His eyes darted to her shoulder and to the window behind her. “He won’t give up.”

“I know.”

“Tomorrow will be tougher for him. Alphas don’t like rejection.”

Corinne squared her shoulders. “Then he’ll find out the hard way.”

There was something savage about the look on Percie’s face. He pulled something from his pocket and showed her a tiny crumpled bit of paper.

“What is this?”

“It is a schedule,” he answered. “Training at dawn. Eastern fields. Daily. No exceptions.”

She nodded. Their hands touched only for a moment but the connection caused an electric shock in her body that had nothing to do with the mate bond.

Percie’s voice lowered even further. “In order to survive the challenges that are ahead… you have to be stronger than the girl who died mere steps away from him.”

Corinne felt her throat tighten.

“I will be.”

He held that gaze for one more moment before turning around and walking down the corridor without uttering a single word.

Corinne slammed the door on him and leaned against it, staring down at the piece of paper in her hands.

Three months.

Three months to turn into a woman accepted by the Goddess of the Moon.

Three months to turn into a woman who does not menstruate when a man belonging to another has already claimed her.

Outside, under the glow of the silver moon who had watched her die, Alpha Adrian Leon stood alone and could feel their mate bond weakening.

For the first time ever, he wondered if perhaps, maybe, the Goddess was wrong.

Much further away from here, in the shadows of the eastern training grounds, Percie Blade lifted his eyes to the moon and showed none of the awe of the natural phenomenon.

“Three months,” he whispered into the void.

And then he smiled the same cruel smile and disappeared in the shadows.

The clock had begun ticking.