Chapter 1

DANERO’S POV

I stood silent in the darkness and watched the celebrations of Brynwick's female child union to Leonard MacLeod.

My fingers tightened on the hilt of my dagger

She should have been mine.

The joy that erupted around the humans in praises was a mockery, blasphemy to what had been promised to me twenty years ago.

Twenty years. Twenty years since that bastard Brynwick betrayed me. It was a wound that never quite healed, rotting in the marrow of my bones.

It began with a lost traveler… a human, a unique creature we called him at first. Who wandered too far into our lands. He was weak, unarmed, and terrified when we found him. We thought nothing of him, he couldn't transform like us, just another creature trespassing. But when more came to retrieve him… armed, we learned of the humans, and realized they were others of their kind. We stayed our separate ways, none of us taking notice of the other's existence. Highlanders humans ruled their territories, while we wolves ran our woods, and neither of us had felt the need to meet again.

Until all things changed with war.

A brutal war raged between the human clans and the wolves…my wolves. The humans unwittingly invaded our territory, believing they could take us down. But they did not find helpless souls hiding in ambush.

They encountered us…wolves.

We were stronger, faster, and bigger. Victory came easily, and the humans surrendered when they saw the odds.

“Anything you demand, we will give. We owe our lives to you and will repay this debt for generations to come.”

The Highland human kings knelt before me, swearing an oath in blood.

But I asked for nothing. I saw no reason to. They were weak and posed no threat to us. I left the humans to rule their world, unchallenged, while we returned to our forests. They forged weapons for war, and in return, we gave them the herbs they needed to heal their kind.

But then, everything changed and my curse gained a hold.

Many years ago, I died.

Betrayed. Murdered by my own kind.

And the one who struck the deepest wound wasn't just my Beta, or the warriors who once swore their loyalty to me. It was her.

My mate. My Luna, The Love Of My Life.

The woman who once swore to stand beside me for eternity.

I could still remember that night, it was etched into my memory like a wound that never healed.

****

I was leaving for war with the Dragon Claws.

“Be safe, D,” she had cried in my arms, clutching me tightly. “Every night, I will pray… to the gods, to the moon, to anything that will listen. I’ll pray that you come back to me in one piece.”

I held her close as her body trembled against mine.

“I will beg the Moon Goddess to bring you home, to let me wake up and find you beside me, safe and whole. I won’t be at rest until you return.” She cupped my face, her eyes shining with unshed tears. “I love you so much. Losing you… I wouldn’t survive it.”

I wiped away her tears and kissed her, tasting her sadness, her fear, her love.

The war lasted weeks.

But we had won.

By the time I returned to the castle that night, exhaustion weighed me down. My body ached from battle, my mind drained from the lives lost… my men who had fought beside me, who had died for our survival. For our future. For her.

But I never thought she would be the knife in my back.

I stepped into our room, anticipating the warmth of my mate, the sweet scent of lavender and honey she always wore… the scent I had left behind before the war.

But the air was tainted with something else.

Desire.

The unmistakable scent of another male.

I entered our room, anticipating my mate's warmth, the sweet smell of lavender and honey she always wore.

The smell I'd left behind before the war.

But the air was clouded with something different. Desire. The smell of another male. 

My beta. 

A growl rumbled in my throat, but the second I laid eyes on them, it died.

There she lay-my Luna-writhing beneath him, her golden hair splayed across the furs, her lips parted as she moaned his name. Not mine. His. 

My chest narrowed. My body turned to stone. 

She had always been mine. She was my mate, chosen by the goddess. We were tied by something glorious than love. And yet, in that moment, none of it mattered.

She had given herself to another. 

My so-called beta turned to me with a smirk, unbothered by my presence, as if my pain was nothing more than an amusing spectacle.

"You're back early," he said lazily, as if I had simply walked in on a casual conversation instead of the most sickening betrayal of my life.

My Luna didn't even try to hide. She didn't reach for a sheet to cover herself, didn't even look ashamed. She only smiled at me,

"You should've died on the battlefield," she murmured, her voice, that of pity.

"It would've been easier for you."

Rage erupted in my belly, my vision clouded red. My wolf howled, demanding vengeance, demanding blood. But before I could shift, before I could rip him apart, the door behind me burst open.

Guards. Warriors. My own men.

They had planned this.

They all had planned this.

I barely had time to react before the first blade digged into my side. Pain— searing—ripped through me. I turned, my claws unsheathing, fangs bared, ready to fight my way through them. 

But then she spoke again. 

"Stop," my Luna ordered. 

And they did. 

Then she rose from the bed, her bare skin dazzling. Slowly,  She walked to me, her hands grazing my jaw.

I could smell my beta on her.

"I loved you once," she whispered. "But you were never meant to lead."

I didn't have time to process her words before she dived a dagger into my chest.

The pain was instant. Blinding.

My knees buckled, my breath catching as the silver spread through my veins like fire. I gasped, reaching for her, for anything, but she stepped back, watching me with cold eyes, eyes I couldn't recognize.

Standing next to her, my beta crossed his arms over his bare chest, gratified with the sight of me crumbling.

"Kill him," he commanded.

And they did.

They dragged me into the great hall, my body broken. The whole clan stood before me—wolves I had led into battle, warriors who had sworn fealty to me. None of them moved to intervene. None of them met my eye.

I was no longer their Alpha. I was no longer anything to them.

My beta stepped forward, grasping my chin and forcing me to look up at him. "You were never strong enough, you let the human roam unchecked." he sneered. "The goddess made a mistake choosing you."

He turned to the clan, his voice raising so all could hear.

"This is what happens to weak Alphas. This is what happens to those who do not deserve the throne." He yelled to everyone.

And with that, he digged his own sword deep into my heart. 

I felt everything.

The agony of his steel slicing through my flesh. Including death wrapping itself around me, until I could no longer breathe.

And then… darkness.

But fate is never so easily rewritten.

It was under the blood moon that I returned.

Witches congregated in the accursed woods. They had come to resurrect their beloved Alpha, the one they had chosen over me.

They cut runes into the earth, spoke incantations, hallowed their blood to the goddess in his stead. 

But the goddess had shown mercy and not chosen him.

She had chosen me instead. I do not know why myself.

I clawed my way from the grave, my skin aflame from a power my body had never known before.

I was no longer the man they'd murdered.

Neither was I fully anything else either.

They trembled when they saw me. The scent of their fear was heady, filling my lungs like some sweet poison. They had called their supposed alpha, but the goddess had returned them their forsaken king.

One by one, I hunted them, the warriors who had turned their backs upon me, the elders who had stood silent.

I walked into the great hall where they feasted, where they celebrated my death and their Alpha resurrection. The moment I stepped through the doors, the room fell silent.

My Luna gasped, scrambling back as if the ghosts of the dead had risen to claim her. 

She was right. 

"You…"

Her voice whispered on a trembled breath.

"You're dead." 

I smiled. "Not anymore." 

And then, I made them all suffer. 

By dawn, the castle was mine again. 

By dusk, my enemies lay dead.

I showed them no quarter. I didn't let them plead. They had torn my heart from my chest, and now I returned the favor.

My Luna was the last.

She tried to plead. Tried using the bond we once shared, the love I once felt for her. But I was not that man anymore.

He had died the night they betrayed him.

And the one who stood before her now?

I was something far worse now.

"I once loved you," I'd told her, the words tasting bitter upon my tongue.

Then I ended her.

The throne was finally mine again.

But the gift of life had a curse coming with it. No she-wolf I had claimed could bear my heirs. My pack thinned out, our numbers got weaker, while the goddess didn't utter anything. They called me the mortal Alpha.

A king who rose from the grave, untouched and unscathed. Yet, not even the strongest among them goes without his luggage.

Mine was a curse.

For the gift of life came with a terrible price.

No she-wolf I had claimed could bear my heirs.

I tried, at first, to dismiss it as misfortune. A tragedy, yes, but nothing unnatural. After all, some wolves were simply not meant for motherhood. Yet, as the years passed, five hundred precisely.

My pack thinned, my warriors grew restless.

I watched my soldiers age and die, their once-strong bodies succumbing to time. I watched my pack evolve, generations rising and falling like the tide.

But I remained untouched.

The cursed Alpha they called me.

I endured while the world around me withered.

An old witch once told me I would only find peace when I sired an heir. Yet no future Alpha was born…no child of mine to carry my name beyond the ages.

I was eternal. But alone.

And the goddess, in all her wisdom, uttered nothing.

And so, I sought answers in my own way.

"It will be different with me," Elira had said. But the moon never blessed our union. No heir. No future.

"Why does the moon remain silent?"

She'd lowered her head, her hands trembling.

"I have failed you."

"Yes. You have." I turned away, dismissing her.

Then came another—a golden-haired warrior, the daughter of my second Beta.

"The goddess smiles upon me," she had sworn. Yet, one night, I found her kneeling before the altar, hands bloodied, praying for a child that would never come.

I turned my back on her too.

Then came the third, her laughter which once filled my halls, wit as sharp as the daggers she carried. She was young, her womb unscarred.

But hers, too, remained empty.

I sought others, maidens of my clan, daughters of the most fierce of my warriors, even priestesses who swore the goddess whispered to them. Night after night, I lay with them, determined to rid myself of this curse.

Rowena, too, daughter of an elder, trembling while I took her upon a bed of wolf pelts.

Mireille, with hands as soft as rose petals and her quiet sobs, promised to another before I claimed her as mine.

Nessa, the wild thing, her body sculptured with runes of fertility as she rode me beneath the full moon, swearing she could feel life quickening inside her.

Lies.

All of it.

One by one, they failed me.

And I began to wonder…was it them, or was it me?

Had the goddess put a hex upon my seed? Had she returned my life to me only to make certain that my line would end with me?

I asked questions. The elders said nothing. The witches, fearful of my ire, spoke only of punishment from the gods.

So, in the aftermath of the war for the first time, i appealed to the Highlanders' human guarantee.

"Bring me a human woman…one strong enough to carry my blood."

It was not possible at first. Human women were frail, not fit to carry the child of a wolf.

Until I found her… Moira.

A priestess of the goddess. A woman whose blood was said to be blessed by holy hands. A healer.

She was the key to my curse.

And then Brynwick a human lord fell ill.

Desperately, dying, he came to me and begged for Moira.

He vowed anything and everything—if only i would give him her.

I agreed… on one stipulation.

"Your firstborn daughter shall be mine."

Brynwick swore it. His firstborn, bound to the Shadowfangs. A daughter to be reared among the wolves, to carry on my blood and secure the loyalty between humans and wolfs.

But fortune was cruel.

Brynwick's wife bore a son. At least that was what i was made to believe.

And rather than honor his vow, Brynwick hid her and fed me lies.

"Our men are in position. Guard rotations have been mapped." Fergus my second in said appearing beside me.

"My lord, shall we move now?"

"Not yet."

My fingers curled around the hilt of my dagger. "Three days, Three days of peace. And then, I will take back what was stolen from me."

I turned away.

"Send word to the Shadowfangs clan," I commanded Fergus. "Tell them the pieces are in motion. We will have our human breeder be fulfilled."

Soon, very soon, I would remind these highlanders why their ancestors had once trembled at the mere mention of the Shadow werewolf. And my future Luna and breeder would finally take her place beside me, whether she or her father wished it or not.

The night was ours. And soon, she would be too.