CHAPTER 3 — The Girl They Abandoned

POV: Lyra

Selene had promised that by sunrise, I wouldn't even be pack anymore, and I was about to find out she meant every single terrifying word.

The celebration had already begun before I even reached the end of the courtyard, and loud cheers rose up behind me while drums echoed through the whole village, beating a rhythm that felt like nails being driven into my skull.

Someone shouted from the center of the crowd, "Long live Alpha Rowan and Luna Selene!" and those words hit me like another rejection, sharp, brutal, and impossible to ignore.

I didn't turn around because If I looked back, I knew my weak heart would betray me, and I would see Rowan standing proudly beside the woman who had stolen everything from my life.

My chest still burned where our Mate Bond had been so cruelly severed, and every single breath hurt because of it, as if my ribs were closing in around damaged lungs.

The strange, heavy silence inside my mind frightened me even more than the physical pain, desperate for a sign of life. 

I whispered, "Luna?" into the dark corners of my consciousness, hoping against hope to hear something back from my wolf but nothing answered me, there was no comforting voice, no gentle warmth, only a vast, terrifying emptiness.

I wrapped my arms tightly around myself and continued walking down the dark path through the village as people stopped whatever they were doing to stare at me as I passed, some looked away quickly with guilty, shame-stricken faces, while others didn't even try to hide their smug smiles or whispers.

A young warrior standing near a torch whispered loudly enough for every word to reach my ears, "So that's the pathetic girl the Alpha rejected tonight." He said.

His friend laughed harshly before adding, "I always told you he would never choose an Omega-born nobody to sit beside him on the high seat."

"I almost felt sorry for her when the alpha spoke," one of them said, shaking his head.

Almost! The other replied with a snort, and their cruel laughter followed me down the road as I kept my chin up and kept walking.

I refused to cry where they could see me since I had already lost my dignity, my future, and my wolf tonight, I would not give them the satisfaction of seeing my tears.

When I finally reached the familiar wooden door of my little cottage, my footsteps stopped dead and at the front door stood wide open, swinging slightly in the night breeze, and my heart sank heavily at the sight of it.

"No," I whispered, the word escaping my throat as a breathless plea, and I hurried forward, terrified of what I might find inside.

The inside of my home had been completely ransacked and emptied, every cupboard had been torn open, and the soft woolen blankets my mother had sewn by hand before she died now lay ruined and soaked in the mud outside. 

My books, the few treasures I owned, had been thrown haphazardly into the yard, and broken ceramic dishes covered the ground all around me.

 As if someone had torn through my life on purpose to leave a message that even the small wooden wolf Rowan had carved for me years ago, back when things were pure and sweet between us, back when he looked at me like I hung the stars, had been snapped cruelly into two pieces.

I dropped hard to my knees in the dirt, my fingers trembling violently as I picked up the broken wooden carving and I saw that the crack ran straight through its heart, mirroring my own shattered chest.

Heavy footsteps approached from behind me in the yard, and for one foolish, desperate second, hope flared hot in my chest, because maybe, just maybe, Rowan had come to explain himself after all.

But when I stood up and turned around, I saw three young pack warriors standing near my broken gate instead, and none of them older than twenty, carrying themselves with arrogant authority.

One of them crossed his arms over his chest, sneering down at me. "The Alpha ordered this house to be cleared out immediately." He said.

I stared at him, my voice hollow and trembling. "What?" I asked, looking around the devastation in disbelief.

"This cottage belongs to the future Luna now," he said, his eyes drifting hungrily toward the distant celebration lights. "That isn't you anymore, Lyra, you have no right to stay here." He added.

Another warrior stepped forward and kicked carelessly at one of my remaining packing boxes, spilling my clothes across the dirt. "You should pack whatever scraps are left and leave before sunrise because the pack doesn't need constant reminders of failed mates dragging down our reputation." He said.

The third warrior looked genuinely uncomfortable, shifting his weight from foot to foot and avoiding my eyes completely. "Come on, let's go," he muttered quietly to the others, pulling on his friend's sleeve. "We've done enough damage here already. He said.

The first warrior laughed, a harsh, ugly sound, "she's lucky we're even letting her stay on pack grounds for one more night," he spat. Then, without another word, they turned and walked away into the dark, leaving my entire life scattered across the ground.

I slowly knelt back down and began gathering my belongings into a single sack, but no one came to help, not my neighbors, not the elders, not even the wolves whose children I had nursed back to health during sickness.

The village that had once felt like a warm, protective home suddenly felt freezing cold and terrifyingly unfamiliar.

As deep darkness settled over the valley, I carried my last box inside the stripped room, and the cottage echoed with hollow silence since barely any furniture was left standing.

I sat down on the bare wooden floorboards and hugged my knees tightly to my chest, acutely feeling the empty space beside me.

That empty space reminded me of all the quiet evenings Rowan had spent right here, back when we ate simple meals together, laughed without fear, and dreamed about a future that would never happen.

I closed my eyes, and a bittersweet memory surfaced unbidden: our first hunt together in the border woods, when I had been nervous and missed every single target.

 Rowan had laughed until he couldn't stand, leaning against a tree, then walked over and handed me his bow. "Our Luna doesn't quit when things get hard," he had said, his eyes shining with encouragement.

Immediately, drawing on his belief in me, I hit the bullseye on the next try, and he had cheered louder than anyone else in the hunting party.

Another memory followed closely behind, aching in its beauty: our first kiss beneath the old Moon Tree, moonlight filtering softly through the emerald branches onto his smiling face as he gently held both my hands. 

"No matter what happens in this world," he had whispered fiercely that night, his voice thick with emotion, "this tree will always remember our promise, I'll never choose anyone but you, Lyra." He had said 

A single, heavy tear slipped down my cheek and landed on my hand. "I believed you," I whispered into the empty, dark room, "I believed every word." I said.

Outside, the celebration continued unabated, with lively music drifting through the open window. 

Numbly, I stood up and walked over to quietly close the heavy wooden shutters, that was when a small detail caught my eye, a small woven basket resting right beside my doorstep that I hadn't seen earlier, I frowned at it, hesitating for a moment.

I knelt and opened the lid, and inside was fresh, warm bread, a bottle of steaming herbal tea, two crisp red apples, and a folded piece of cloth wrapped carefully around seasoned dried meat.

There was no note attached and no signature, but a sad, grateful smile touched my lips. "Mira," I whispered softly, because only my best friend knew that I always drank mint tea after crying to calm my throat. 

But I understood immediately why she hadn't come herself because helping me openly or even being seen near my ruined home would have made her a target of Selene's wrath too, and even this small, quiet kindness carried a heavy risk.

I clutched the basket tightly against my chest and whispered into the night air, "Thank you," the words barely leaving my lips.

Suddenly, a violent, freezing breeze swept through a crack in the shutters, making the single candle on my table flicker wildly and die, every single hair on the back of my neck stood up on end, someone was outside the cottage.

My breath caught in my throat, moving carefully, I walked slowly toward the window and peeked through a tiny gap in the wood, at the edge of the forest, just beyond the bright perimeter of the village lights, dark figures were moving silently between the ancient trees like ghosts.

They wore heavy black cloaks that completely hid their faces, and each carried strange, heavy weapons that glowed faintly with a harsh red light beneath the moonlight, they weren't from the Blackwood Pack and judging by their stance and weapons, they weren't from any neighboring pack either.

One hooded figure stepped out of the shadow of the pines and climbed onto a high rocky hill overlooking the village.

He watched the distant celebration in total silence for a long moment, and then his masked gaze slowly turned away from the festivities and locked directly onto my cottage, straight onto my window.

A deep, unnatural chill ran straight through my body and the stranger slowly raised his head toward the full moon, and his deep, resonant voice drifted through the night air like a heavy warning I could feel echoing deep inside my bones.

"Tonight, the Blessed Blood awakens," he said, his voice carrying an ancient, terrifying power.

I didn't fully understand the foreign words, but somehow, standing completely alone in the dark with everything I loved already stripped away, I knew down to my soul exactly who he meant.