Chapter 1

LYRA

The piece of bread landed at my feet with a soft thud. Someone had already taken two bites out of it.

Another prisoner wrinkled her nose in disgust before kicking it toward me. "You can have it. Even the dogs wouldn't eat something this stale."

Laughter echoed through the prison cell.

I stared at the bread for a long moment before slowly bending down to pick it up. The mold had spread across one corner, and it smelled sour, but that no longer mattered.

Three years ago, I would have thrown it away but now….Now it was the best meal I had seen all day.

I brushed away the dirt with my sleeve and whispered, "Thank you, Moon Goddess."

Just as I raised it to my lips, a loud bang echoed through the corridor and every prisoner froze.

The laughter vanished.

The iron door screeched open, and two guards walked inside. My body reacted before my mind did.

I immediately lowered my head, pressed my back against the cold wall, and tightened my grip around the bread.

The rule was to never look a guard in the eye, never speak unless spoken to, never move too slowly.

Never move too quickly.

Those were the rules that kept me alive.

"Lyra Ashbourne."

The bread slipped from my trembling fingers and for a second, I thought I had imagined it.

No one had called me Lyra in years. Around here, I wasn't Lyra.

I was a Traitor, I was Prisoner 147.

I was the woman who had supposedly betrayed Silvercrest Pack.

The guard frowned impatiently. "Didn't you hear me?"

"I... I heard you." Even my own voice sounded unfamiliar. It hadn't always been like this.

I used to laugh louder than anyone in my father's mansion. I used to spar with the warriors until sunset and beat half of them.

Kael used to complain that I embarrassed the men and my mother would laugh while fixing my messy hair.

Father would clap proudly and tell everyone his daughter was born to become Silvercrest's greatest warrior. Sometimes I wondered if those memories belonged to someone else.

The guard unlocked my shackles. "The Alpha is here."

I stared at him blankly. "The Alpha came to pick you up. You're lucky so hurry and get the fuck up!"

My heart stopped.

Is it Kael? My brother finally came? For three years, I had dreamed about this moment.

Every birthday, every full moon and every winter night when my wounds ached so badly that I couldn't sleep.

I told myself he would come tomorrow, then tomorrow became another tomorrow.

Eventually….I stopped believing because he was the same person who believed a lie and sent me here. The guard shoved a bundle of clothes into my arms.

"Change up."

I unfolded them with shaking fingers, it's a white sweater and blue jeans. The same clothes I had worn three years ago.

The day everything ended.

(Three years ago in Silver Crest Pack Mansion.)

"I didn't do it!" My desperate voice echoed through the Alpha Hall.

"I didn't leak the battle plans! Please believe me!" No one answered me, the entire council chamber was silent.

Warriors lined both sides of the room, staring at me as though I were already guilty. Father stood at the top of the stairs with his hands behind his back.

His face was colder than I had ever seen it and Mother refused to look at me.

She held Selene tightly in her arms instead.

My little sister…..No.

The Alpha family's real daughter who was found months ago before realising I was fake and switched at birth.

She buried her face against Mother's shoulder as tears streamed down her cheeks.

"I... I never meant for this to happen..." She sobbed so pitifully that everyone rushed to comfort her.

"I know Sister hates me."

"I know she thinks I stole all of you away from her."

"But I never thought she'd..."

She broke into louder sobs. "I never thought she'd betray the pack because of me."

I stared at her, my lips moved, but no words came out. Selene knew.

She knew I had never entered Father's study, she knew I had never seen the battle plans.

She knew… ..Because she was the one who had accidentally left Father's office door open that night. She had cried so hard afterward.

She kept saying it was all her fault that I had even hugged her.

"It's okay," I told her. "It was an accident."

I protected her then but now that our rival pack has defeated it with the same battle plans.

Now, she was destroying me.

"I didn't do it," I begged again, my knees giving out beneath me. "Father... Mother... please."

Father slowly closed his eyes. "That's enough."

His voice carried through the hall like a death sentence. "The evidence is clear."

"No!" I crawled forward until I reached Kael. My brother had always protected me. Whenever I got into trouble as a child, he stood in front of me without hesitation.

I grabbed the edge of his uniform. "Brother..."

My tears soaked into the fabric. "You believe me... don't you?"

For a long time...He said nothing. Then he gently removed my hand from his sleeve.

"You lived as the Alpha's daughter for eighteen years." His voice was frighteningly calm.

"Selene lost eighteen years with her real family." I stared at him in disbelief.

"What does that have to do with this?"

He finally looked at me…There wasn't a trace of warmth left in his eyes. "She's too weak to survive prison even if she has done it "

My breathing stopped. "So..."

"You'll go in her place."

Everything inside me shattered, so he knew she did it but because I'm not the real daughter, I'll have to go to prison for her sake?

"Kael..."

"I'll bring you home before long."

...

(Back to present)

The memory disappeared as quickly as it came. I looked down at the oversized sweater hanging loosely over my body.

He had said "before long but three years had passed. Three years of broken bones, hunger, of waking up screaming after another nightmare.

Three years of pretending the woman crying in the corner every night wasn't me.

The prison gates slowly opened and Sunlight poured over my face. It was so bright that my eyes watered immediately. I took one hesitant step outside and fresh air filled my lungs.

I had forgotten what freedom smelled like then I saw him.

Kael Ashbourne, he's standing beside a black SUV. The silver Alpha crest glimmered proudly on his chest.

He looked stronger than before and more mature. Exactly what Silvercrest needed.

For one foolish moment, I forgot everything. I forgot the bruises hidden beneath my sleeves, every night I had fallen asleep hungry and the promise he had broken.

My heart whispered the words I had repeated every day for three years. My brother came for me.

I smiled, it was small and fragile but it was real.

"Brother..." He looked at me like I escaped a hell hole. His eyes swept over my thin body, my loose clothes, my tangled hair...

Then he frowned.

"Why did you take so long?"

The smile froze on my lips. "I..."

"Get in the car Lyra." That was all he said.

He didn't check on me or asked me how I survived those years. I lowered my head and whispered.

"...Thank you for coming."

He looked irritated. "Don't misunderstand." His voice was as cold as winter. "The Alpha King has ordered every unmated female werewolf to gather in three days. He's searching for his destined mate."

"If your name wasn't still on Silvercrest's registry, I wouldn't have come."

My fingers tightened around the hem of my sweater…So that was why, not because he remembered me but because I had become another name on a list.

I forced a smile. "I understand."

I slowly walked toward the SUV. The first step sent a sharp pain through my left leg.

The second nearly made me lose my balance.

The bones had never healed properly after the guards shattered them during my second winter in prison.

I kept walking slowly and carefully, every step hurt, before I reached the passenger door, Kael let out an impatient sigh.

"What now?"

I looked at him apologetically. "My legs were injured in prison..." He cut me off with a cold laugh.

"So you're still doing this?"

I blinked."...doing what?"

"This act." His voice grew harsher with every word. "You've always known how to make people pity you."

"I wasn't—"

"You expect me to believe prison turned the strongest fighter in Silvercrest into someone who can't even walk?"

His eyes were full of disappointment. "No, Lyra. I know exactly who you are. You spent eighteen years enjoying Selene's place in this family and ended up betraying us because you feel entitled. You wore the clothes that should have been hers." He stared at me like I shouldn't have existed and tears burned my eyes.

"You received Mother's love, Father's teachings, and my protection and when Selene finally came home, she never complained but you?" He looked at me as though I disgusted him.

"You couldn't even let her have a peaceful life."

I felt my throat tighten. "I never wanted to take her place, I didn't ask to be switched at birth. I didn't betray the pack either. I swear to you, Brother, I never—"

"Enough!" His voice startled me so badly that I instinctively took a step back.

"You still refuse to admit what you've done."

He opened the driver's door and stepped inside. "If you don't want to come back, then don't."

"You know the road. You can walk."

The SUV roared to life and dust rose into the air as the vehicle sped away, leaving me standing alone outside the prison gates.

I watched until it disappeared. Then I looked down at my shaking hands.

I started walking. Then a car slowed behind me. It rolled alongside me and stopped just ahead of my shoulder. Dark, low.. looking like a model I didn't recognize.

The driver's window was already down.

I turned just enough to see him. His eyes dropped briefly to the brand burned into my right wrist and then came back to my face without any change in expression.

"Get in," he said.