CHAPTER ONE – The Night the Reaper Woke

(Lyra’s POV)

The first thing I learned about being soulless was that silence cuts deeper than cruelty.

Every Blood Moon Festival, the Silverborne wolves filled the skies with howls, their voices rising in wild devotion to the Moon. The sound rolled over the mountains like thunder, sharp, alive and sacred. 

All except mine, I was forbidden to join them because a hollow girl like me had no right to echo the Moon’s song.

So while the others feasted and danced beneath the crimson glow, I scrubbed blood from the temple steps, kneeling in freezing water that numbed my hands and turned my skin raw. My reflection stared back from the crimson puddle—pale hair plastered to my face, bruised knuckles, and those strange silver eyes that never changed with the moon.

The pack called me Hollow Pup, some days they forgot my name altogether.

Laughter poured from the Great Hall, spilling warmth and music through the open windows. The scent of roasted venison and spiced silver wine drifted through the cold air, so rich it made my empty stomach ache. For one fragile heartbeat, I let myself imagine being in there, dancing, laughing and howling, until a bucket slammed into my shoulder.

“Faster, Hollow,” one of the guards barked. “You move slower than a human.”

The others chuckled, enjoying the sport. I bowed my head, biting down the words that burned on my tongue.

The guard kicked my bucket over, filthy water splashing across my tunic and soaking through to my bones. “Careful,” he sneered. “Don’t want your curse rubbing off on us.” Their laughter echoed as they walked away.

For a long moment, I just knelt there, dripping and silent. My hands trembled, not from the cold, but from holding everything inside. Crying never helped. Not here. Not when you were the pack’s reminder of what they feared most.

When the courtyard finally emptied, a whisper broke the silence.

“Lyra.”

I turned, startled. A small figure darted from behind one of the pillars. Eira, my sister. All wild curls, wide gray eyes, and too much hope for a place like Silverborne. She carried a bundle wrapped in linen.

“Did they hurt you again?” she asked, her little voice trembling.

I forced a smile. “Nothing that won’t fade.”

Eira unwrapped the linen, revealing a crust of bread and a few berries. “You haven’t eaten since dawn. Here.”

My throat tightened. “You’ll get caught.”

“Let them catch me,” she said fiercely. “You’re my sister, not a curse.”

Her faith hurt more than their cruelty ever could.

Eira still believed Silverborne could be kind, that Alpha Ceryn might show mercy and that the Moon’s light blessed everyone equally. She believed I was just… different. Not broken, not soulless but Aurevia wasn’t kind to dreamers.

Here, Alphas ruled by divine decree. The Moon Goddess chose who rose and who rotted. To defy the order was treason. To be born without a wolf was blasphemy.

That was my sin, my missing wolf, my empty soul and everyone in Silverborne reminded me of it every day.

Eira’s eyes flicked toward the Great Hall where the music thundered louder. “The festival’s almost over. Come home when you can, all right?”

I nodded, smiling faintly. “I’ll try.”

But I didn’t make it home, the guards came before dawn.

They dragged me by the arm through the temple corridors, my bare feet scraping over the cold stone. The Hall of Judgment smelled of incense and iron. Alpha Ceryn sat upon his marble throne, his silver eyes sharp as a blade.

“You defied my orders,” he said, voice calm in the way that promised danger. “You left the temple steps unfinished.”

“I—I didn’t,” I stammered. “The guards—”

“Silence.”

The word cracked through the chamber like a whip.

Ceryn descended the dais, the faint jingle of his ceremonial chains echoing in the stillness. He circled me once, slow and deliberate. “Perhaps a night among the dead will remind you of your place.”

My knees weakened. “Please, Alpha, I only did as I was told.”

He smiled—a cold, cruel thing. “Your kind always says that. Always pretending innocence, when the truth is, your very existence insults the Moon.”

There it was, the truth behind the punishment. Not failure, not disobedience, just me being born wrong.

Ceryn’s voice rose so all could hear. “The Moon’s blood does not run in her veins. She’s a hollow thing pretending to be a wolf. Let her prove her worth to the Goddess she shames.”

The crowd murmured, hungry for spectacle.

“Take her to the old lunar crypt,” Ceryn commanded. “If she returns untainted, she will have earned her life.”

The sentinels seized my arms. I caught a glimpse of Eira pushing through the crowd, tears streaking her face.

“Lyra!” she screamed.

Then the doors slammed shut, cutting her voice from mine.

The journey to the outskirts of Silverborne was a blur of snow and fear. When the guards threw me into the crypt, the heavy door clanged behind me, sealing the darkness in.

The air was thick with dust and decay, my lantern flickered weakly, its light swallowed by shadows that shifted like they breathed. The walls were carved with wolves, frozen mid-howl, their stone eyes glowing faintly in the dark.

I swallowed hard and knelt, scrubbing the cracked floor until my arms ached. My hands bled from the rough stone, but I didn’t dare stop.

Hours passed then my rag caught on something sharp near the altar.

I frowned, reached down and gasped when I saw it. A silver shard, glinting faintly in the lantern light.

Before I could think, it sliced my palm open, my blood dropped, spilling over the altar stone.

The air instantly shifted as silence deepened until I could hear my heartbeat pounding in my ears.

Then came the hum low, ancient, alive. Silver veins crawled across the altar, pulsing like veins beneath skin.

“No,” I whispered, stumbling back. “No, no—”

The ground shuddered and cracks split across the floor as blinding light burst through the fissures, chains rattled from beneath the altar. Then an arm, clawed and trembling, shot from the stone.

I screamed.

The altar erupted, making the stones shatter and from its heart rose a man—if a man could look like a god carved from fury. His hair was white as ash, his body marked with burning runes that glowed like molten silver.

And his eyes, those eyes were the moon’s own fire.

He looked at me like he’d been waiting for me. Like he already knew my name.

“Who breaks my slumber?”

My voice caught in my throat. I tried to move. I couldn’t.

He stepped closer, barefoot on shattered stone, the air crackling around him like a storm made flesh.

When his hand brushed mine, pain seared through me,it was no ordinary pain, hot, blinding and endless.

A crescent mark flared on my palm, mirrored on his chest. My pulse stumbled, syncing with his. I couldn’t breathe, couldn't think, could only feel the burn.

His breath hitched, eyes darkening from silver to black fire. “You shouldn’t have called me back,” he said, voice low, filled with something that sounded like sorrow—and rage.

Light exploded around us and the tomb trembled as if the world itself recoiled and as darkness swallowed me, I heard it, his heartbeat, steady and ancient, thudding in perfect time with mine.

That was the night the Reaper woke.