Chapter 1

I returned to the side house Drake had given me.

Calling it a side house was generous. It was a small cabin on the edge of Blackwood territory. Three years ago, when Drake brought me back from a human town, he told me this would be our place.

When I pushed the door open, I was surprised to find someone inside.

“Selene. Long time no see.”

Scarlett stood in a thin moon-white robe that showed off the shape of her newly shifted wolf body. She walked out of the master bedroom Drake and I shared, wearing an apologetic smile that carried clear provocation.

“Drake was worried about me recovering alone, so he let me stay here.”

I looked around the cabin I had decorated with wolftail grass and moon vines. All the paired fur cushions, matching cups, and shared hunting tools had been thrown carelessly into the storage room. In their place were Scarlett’s vanity mirror, moonstone jewelry, and healing salves.

“Drake said this room gets the best moonlight. I just had old wounds removed at a healing ward beyond the border, and I need moon energy to recover.”

A shadow crossed my eyes.

She was staying in the Alpha master bedroom Drake and I were supposed to share after the marking ceremony.

The door opened again.

Drake walked in carrying freshly hunted antelope meat and a bunch of moon orchids. When he looked at me, there was clear displeasure in his eyes.

“What are you trying to do now?”

His voice was low and accusing.

“You already drove Scarlett away once. She is under our pack’s protection now, and this is her home.”

I looked at the cabin Drake had once given me on behalf of the Blackwood Pack.

He had said that as long as I stayed in Blackwood territory, I would always have shelter and a place to belong.

Then Scarlett moved in.

For the sake of her late husband, Drake’s older brother who had died for the pack, I had agreed to let her stay temporarily. She said she would leave as soon as the tearing pain from her old wounds eased.

But she only pushed further.

She took my Luna amulet without permission, and one full-moon night, I found her wrapped in Drake’s arms after his drunk wolf lost control.

I finally lost my patience and clawed her once, only for Drake to shove me to the ground.

“Scarlett lost her mate. She only sees me as a brother,” he roared. “You grew up with a complete pack around you. Scarlett is different from you. She has suffered. You are older than her. Can’t you protect her like a younger sister?”

Looking at my palm cut open by the gravel, I felt Drake become a stranger for the first time.

Now she had returned to the territory and taken over my bedroom again, appearing here as if she were the mistress of the house.

“Selene Frostvale, you have eaten Blackwood food and lived under Blackwood protection for years. I raised you, so you should know gratitude.”

Drake’s voice was cold as a winter howl.

“Scarlett is under my protection now. You have no right to make her leave. If you had not driven her to that border healing ward, her old wounds would never have reopened. You can stay in the storage room until she recovers.”

He looked at me with guarded eyes.

“We have not completed the marking anyway. If you keep making trouble, there is no need to hold another marking ceremony.”

I looked at the two of them, and a trace of mockery passed through me.

If I were still the homeless rogue he had brought back three years ago, perhaps my heart would have broken.

But now, only disappointment remained.

If this place no longer welcomed me, then I should return to the pack that truly belonged to me.

After all, three days ago, I had reunited with my birth parents, the Alpha and Luna of the Frostvale Pack.

I turned and entered the storage room.

My belongings had been thrown everywhere.

The moon-vine gift box had been crushed. The replica Luna crown lay in a corner. The pack totem tapestries I had painted by hand were covered in dust.

They had once carried every hope I had as a homeless rogue dreaming of a future.

One by one, I threw the things Scarlett had ruined into the burn pit.

Drake nodded in satisfaction.

“Those things aren’t worth much. We can buy new ones when we hold the ceremony again.”

But it was not just those things that had no worth.

There would be no ceremony again.

Drake and I were never true mates. He had only claimed me before the pack, and without the final marking, leaving him would be much easier than breaking a marked bond.

For that, I should probably be grateful.

A public claim was not a true mate bond. Without the final mark, there was no bond to break, no rejection ritual to perform, and no council filing to wait for. All I had to do was withdraw my name from Blackwood and walk away.