The Pressure of Blood

They call me the Beta’s daughter. But out here, with my palms blistered and my muscles aching, I’m just Selene—named after the moon but born under no one’s shadow. Out here, I'm not the girl in the pretty dresses. I'm the wolf in the woods. Wild, untamed, and unchosen.

The moon hangs low tonight like a pale coin tucked in a pocket of midnight clouds. I breathe in the cold, pine-laced air and land my fist hard against the bark of a tree. Over and over. My bruising knuckles ache, but I don’t stop.

Pain is better than silence.

I can’t seem to breathe deeply enough. It's as if something’s pressing on my chest, invisible and heavy.

Father says a Beta’s heir must be forged, not raised. I was taught to strike, to track, to endure.

And I do—every day.

But tonight, I’m breaking.

I pivot and deliver a high kick that sends a crack up the tree trunk. Splinters flake off like snow. The ache in my chest tightens, not from exhaustion, but fury. Why now? Why this?

The moonlight shifts, and in its silver glow, I catch my reflection in a shallow puddle near the roots. My face is streaked with sweat and dirt. My eyes—Father’s eyes—full of fight and fire. And something else I hate admitting: fear.

A low rustle stirs behind me. I see its shadow. I spin, fists raised, but it’s only a fox darting through the brush. Still, my wolf rises in response. She makes my ears alert. Restless.

She senses what I already know.

Something is coming.

When I return to the house, my boots are soaked and my fingers numb. I move like a shadow along the hall, still too wound up to face anyone. I hear my parents speaking in the study.

I pause.

Their voices are low and urgent. I press my ear to the crack in the door.

“She’s not ready,” my mother says. Adrienne always sounds calm, even when she’s breaking. “Selene is still just a girl in so many ways. You don’t understand what this union will cost her. She won't do it.”

“We don’t have a choice,” Father—Beta Ronan—says. “Theron’s breathing down my neck. Without this alliance, he could push me out entirely.”

Alliance. The word strikes like a slap.

“Then let her wait for her fated mate,” my mother pleads. “At least give her that choice.”

“He’s not offering time. He’s encouraging to have her marry an Alpha.” A pause. “Ethan Alaric.”

The name slices through me like a blade.

“She’ll hate us,” Adrienne whispers.

“Better she hate us than our family stripped of everything.”

I stumble back from the door, and my pulse pounds. I grip the wall to steady myself as the blood drains from my face.

Ethan.

The boy I humiliated once before, the boy who never forgot.

I remember the day as if it were yesterday.

We were ten and he was already taller than me, already crowned by the weight of his father’s name. I was scrappy and wild, more wolf than girl even then.

“Fight me,” I said, grinning. I was eager to show my skill.

He laughed. “You’ll cry.”

But I didn’t cry. I knocked Ethan flat on his ass, fast and clean.

He didn’t speak to me again that day. Or the next. Only glared and boiled. When we crossed paths after that, his tone turned sharp. His smile vanished. That day marked the start of our quiet war.

And now, he’s to be my husband? What about my mate? I haven't found my fated mate yet. When I meet him, I won't be his.

Later that night, I sit on the veranda steps, arms wrapped around my knees, watching the stars blur through the tears I won’t let fall.

Mother finds me there.

She doesn’t speak at first. Just sits beside me and lays her hand over mine. Her touch is warm, soft—nothing like the way Father grips my shoulder when giving orders.

“You know,” she says gently, “when you were born, your father wanted a boy.”

I snort. “No surprise there.”

“But when he held you,” she continues, “he said, ‘This one will be stronger than any son.’ And you are, Selene. You’ve never let anyone mold you.”

I stare ahead, swallowing hard. “Except now.”

She brushes my hair back. “Being strong doesn’t mean never bending. It means knowing when to rise—and when to grow. You can be both sword and silk, darling. Just like the moon.”

I don’t answer. I want to believe her. But all I feel is trapped.

Just before dawn, a knock sounds at the front doors.

Father opens it to find a figure in formal robes standing there, a messenger bearing the sigil of the Crimson Moon Pack.

He bows low.

“Alpha Ethan Alaric arrives at sundown,” he announces. “Prepare the Beta’s daughter.”

The words echo like thunder in my skull.

I am no longer Selene, wild and unclaimed. I am a pawn now, bound to a future I didn’t choose.

After he leaves and before my mother can get me ready, I slip into the forest again. Barefoot. No blades. No armor.

The air is cool against my skin, and the sky is painted with the fading blush of night. The moon still lingers, faint, but watching. Always watching.

A single white moth flutters past me and lands on my shoulder. It stays there, wings trembling, then lifts off and disappears into the trees.

My grandmother once said that moths were drawn to danger. To fire. That they couldn’t help but follow light—even if it burned them.

I stand. So be it. Let the Alpha see me. Let him try to shape me.

Let him learn what happens when you try to leash the moon.