Chapter 4- The secret I carried home

POV: LYRA ASHBOURNE

I stood in front of the mirror for what felt like forever, staring at the mark on my neck as the faint crescent of red surrounding the two small marks beneath my collarbone refused to fade overnight. I lifted my hand toward it, but my fingers stopped just before touching my skin because part of me was afraid that the moment I touched it, I would have no choice but to accept that it was real.

I had been marked by Alpha Kael Draven, my mate, and the thought alone made my stomach twist.

I stepped away from the mirror until the edge of the dressing table pressed against my back, closed my eyes, and tried to steady my breathing, but my mind kept dragging me back to the previous night, to Kael’s eyes, his voice, and the strange reaction between our wolves.

Except I didn’t have a wolf, or at least, I had never believed I did.

Nothing about this made sense, and the harder I tried to understand it, the more frightened I became.

I was supposed to be Selene, which was why I had been allowed into the palace in the first place. Kael had chosen my sister, not me, and I had only taken her place because my family expected me to, yet somehow, I had become the person connected to him.

If Kael discovered the truth, everything would collapse because my family would be exposed, Selene would lose the future they had spent years preparing for, and the Ashbourne name would become a disgrace throughout the territory. Worse, I had no idea what Kael would do when he discovered that the woman he had chosen had never been Selene at all.

My stomach tightened at the thought, and I knew I couldn’t stay there.

I hurried to the wardrobe and changed, my hands trembling so badly that I struggled with the buttons and had to stop several times just to steady them. Once I was dressed, I pulled my hair over one shoulder and adjusted the collar of my dress until the mark was completely hidden, determined that no one would see it, at least not yet.

A soft knock sounded at the door, making me freeze.

“Lady Selene, your carriage is waiting.”

I swallowed before answering, “Yes. Thank you. I’ll be there shortly.”

The footsteps faded down the corridor, leaving me alone with the silence that followed.

For a moment, I simply stood there and listened before letting my gaze drift around the room, wondering how this place had changed so quickly in my mind. When I had first entered the palace, I had been terrified of the Alpha who ruled the Northern Territories, and all I had wanted was to survive the night and leave, yet somehow, leaving him behind was what unsettled me most.

I pushed the thought away because whatever had happened between us could not happen again, and I needed to remember exactly who I was.

Lyra Ashbourne, the wolfless daughter, the unwanted twin, and the girl who had spent her entire life standing in Selene’s shadow.

I wasn’t his mate or his chosen woman, and I had no place beside the Alpha, so I repeated those thoughts to myself until they almost sounded convincing before finally opening the door.

As I walked through the palace corridors, my heart refused to settle, and every set of footsteps behind me made me expect Kael to appear, although he never did. Part of me was relieved, but the other part was disappointed, and that frightened me more than anything else.

When I reached the entrance, the carriage was already waiting, but before getting inside, I stopped and looked back at the palace.

For one dangerous moment, I wondered what would happen if I simply told him everything. What if I told him I was Lyra, admitted that the woman he had chosen was actually my sister, and confessed that something had changed between us, something neither of us seemed to understand?

My hand moved instinctively toward the mark beneath my collar, but I forced myself to stop.

I couldn’t.

I climbed into the carriage and pulled the door shut as we began moving, watching the palace slowly disappear behind me. Leaning against the seat, I stared through the window at the familiar landscape and tried to convince myself that the previous night had been nothing more than a strange mistake caused by circumstances neither of us understood.

It had been one night and nothing more, and I repeated the thought whenever my mind wandered back to Kael until the words almost became believable.

Almost.