CHAPTER FOUR: BEFORE THE CURSE

Cane's POV

The guards dragged her toward the stake, and I did not move.

I stood on the platform in my crimson and gold robes with my hands clenched at my sides, watching her kick and twist and snap her teeth at them.

“Let go of me!” Thalia screamed.

Seraphina’s hand rested on my arm, but I could barely feel it. I could only feel the hollow where the bond used to be.

It had opened in my chest the moment the Priestess lowered her arms, and it had not closed. She had told me in front of the whole pack that whenever Thalia suffered, it would feel as though a part of me was missing. I had thought they were only words. Now it sat inside me like a dull, cold ache, and nothing I did could ease it.

My wolf, Kyle, had not spoken to me since she screamed.

“Say something,” I muttered.

He stayed silent. The first torch was brought forward, and all I could think about was her laughing.

***

Four years ago, Thalia used to dance barefoot in the training fields after everyone had gone home. I used to pretend I needed extra time with my blade just so I could watch her.

“You’re terrible at pretending,” she called out one afternoon.

I looked up. “At what?”

“Training. You’ve been watching me for ten minutes.”

“I was checking your footwork.”

She laughed. “Cane, I’m dancing.”

“I noticed.”

I crossed the field, caught her around the waist, and tackled her into the grass. She shrieked and shoved at my shoulder, laughing until she could barely breathe.

“Get off me!”

“Admit you were watching me too.”

“Not a chance.”

I looked down at her with sunlight caught in her auburn hair and wanted to tell her everything. I did not. She was the Alpha’s daughter, and she was everything I was not allowed to want.

***

Then her mother died.

Luna Evelyn was loved by everyone. She cared for every wolf in the pack, and she carried herself with a grace that made the pack house feel like a home. The morning it happened, she said she was going to visit the elderly past the eastern woods.

“I’ll come with you,” I offered.

Evelyn smiled. “Go train, Cane. Thalia will be with me.”

The patrols had cleared those woods that week, and no rogues had been reported. By afternoon, the news came that the Luna had been slain in an ambush, and only Thalia had come back.

I still think about that offer, and about what might have happened if I had pushed.

The whispers started before Thalia was even out of bed. ‘She ran.’ ‘She left her mother behind.’ ‘She’s the reason the Luna is dead.’

That night I found her by the river with her knees pulled to her chest, staring at the water.

“Thalia,” I said quietly. “You don’t have to say anything to them, but tell me what happened.”

Her fingers tightened around her knees. “I ran.”

“You were sixteen.”

“I ran, Cane.” Her voice cracked. “Please don’t tell me it wasn’t my fault.”

I wanted to argue. Instead I stood there, useless, while she walked off into the dark.

She never denied the whispers or explained what had happened. She came back with a fresh cut above her brow and shut herself away from everyone, and somewhere in that silence, I started to believe them.

She had trained since she was twelve. I could not understand how someone like her could let her mother die and say nothing.

***

That was when I let Seraphina in.

She had always been kind, but after that, she was always there. She sat beside me on the training bench the next morning.

“You didn’t sleep,” she said.

“That shouldn't bother you.”

“I’m worried about you.” Her hand covered mine. “You can’t keep defending her, Cane.”

“She’s grieving.”

“So are you. But she won’t even deny it. What am I supposed to believe?”

“That she’s innocent until we know the truth.”

Her thumb moved slowly over my knuckles. “You always want to save people. It’s one of the things I love about you.”

I should have pulled my hand away. I did not.

After that, we trained together every day. She told me it was not my fault, that it was all Thalia’s fault, and she said it so often that I stopped arguing.

***

Two years ago, I was walking near the eastern border when the scent hit me. Rain and sand, wild lavender, and something deeper underneath.

“That’s her!” Kyle cried, circling in my mind. “That’s our mate!”

I followed it until I found her kneeling by a stream, scrubbing blood out of a warrior’s tunic. Her hair was tangled and her sleeves were torn. The Alpha’s daughter had become a servant.

She looked up and met my eyes, and for a moment I felt hope. Maybe the Goddess was not cruel. Maybe she was giving me a second chance to be deserving of her.

Then Seraphina’s voice filled my head. ‘She let her mother die. She is cursed.’

I forced the bond down. “Be careful out here,” I said.

Thalia stared at me. “Go.”

I turned and walked away before she could see my hands shaking.

That evening, I told Seraphina the truth. She was quiet for a long time, then she smiled.

“I see.”

“That’s it?”

“What do you want me to say?” She picked up her practice sword. “Train with me.”

She came at me like she wanted to break something, and by the end my ribs ached and blood ran from my lip.

A few days later, the Alpha called me to his chambers.

“You have been raised to lead Greenwood,” Marcus said, standing by the window. “An Alpha cannot choose with his heart alone. I have chosen your Luna.”

“You mean Thalia?” I asked, hating how hopeful I sounded.

“Seraphina is your Luna.”

“Thalia is my mate.”

“I know.” His voice did not change. “But Seraphina is the Luna this pack needs. If you refuse, you will not be Alpha.”

I looked at the floor. “I understand.”

I wanted to be Alpha, and I told myself I could live without a fated mate. For two years I watched Thalia carry laundry past me and scrub the floors of the great hall, and I never told her what she was to me.

***

Last night, she walked into the clearing barefoot, in rags, and I could not take my eyes off her.

The bond was suffocating. Every breath I took tasted like her. She stepped forward, her eyes fixed on mine.

“You feel it,” she whispered.

I almost nodded. Instead, I looked at her and said the words that cut my throat on the way out.

“I reject you, Thalia, Omega of Greenwood Pack, as my mate.”

I watched her fall while the pack laughed. I hated them for it. I hated myself more.

This morning, I asked the Alpha to end the bond. I told myself it was for her, a clean break so she would not spend whatever time she had left aching for me. I repeated it until it sounded true. But it had not been clean. It had only been torn.

During the ritual, I heard her scream, and Kyle paced inside me like a caged animal, begging me to go to her.

I stood beside Seraphina and smiled. I kissed her to prove it was what I wanted, but it was not love. It was duty and fear and a desperate need to believe I was not a monster.

Then the Alpha pronounced the sentence. Seraphina had asked for the flames last night, and I had gone stiff behind her and said nothing. Today I said nothing again.

The guards reached the stake. Seraphina squeezed my arm and smiled up at me, and I smiled back like a perfect prince, like a man who had made the right choice.

The torch touched the wood, and the hollow in my chest opened wider.

“You did nothing,” Kyle said.

“I couldn’t…”

“You could have said one word.”

The flames climbed the stake, and Thalia closed her eyes. I stood there, smiling, and watched.