Chapter 1

“Aurora, have you thought this through? Once Vanguard Legion’s closed training begins, you’ll be cut off from all contact with the outside world, not temporarily but permanently. No phone calls, no messages, and no pack bond. This is no joke,” Captain Vance reminded me solemnly.

I didn’t hesitate at all.

“Captain, train me to be your best soldier. I won’t let you go into that program alone.”

He looked at me for a long time, and something in his eyes softened—it was the kind of pride and clarity that came from having seen too much.

He stood up and placed his hand on my shoulder.

“That’s my soldier,” he said, letting out a breath of relief. “But you need to understand what this means. Vanguard Legion requires you to be with them for a minimum of five years, and the training there is brutal enough to break even an Alpha-level werewolf. I’ve seen it with my own eyes.”

My father, Arthur, had said the same thing to me years ago. I was ready back then, and I was even more ready now.

“My dad made it through,” I said. “And so will I.”

The muscle in his jaw tightened. He reacted like that every single time my father was mentioned. They used to be comrades-in-arms in the same trench, so he knew better than anyone why I chose this path, and he had never once tried to discourage me.

He fell silent for a moment before asking the question I had long been expecting. “Does Grace know? Does Caleb know?”

Two faces came to my mind—the way Mom’s eyes immediately turned dull whenever she looked at me, and the way Caleb always looked right through me, never actually seeing me.

The wolf inside me let out a low rumble. It was not a whimper, but more so a final farewell.

“They won’t care,” I said. “Honestly? They’ll probably pop a bottle of champagne to celebrate.”

Captain Vance stared at me for a long time with a complicated look in his eyes. It was an expression he only showed on rare occasions, filled half with guilt and half with helplessness.

Then, I picked up the classified non-disclosure agreement and signed my name on it.

“Go back and pack your bags,” he said. “At three in the afternoon tomorrow, I’ll send a car to pick you up.”

When I stepped onto the lawn of that villa, laughter drifted out from the windows—the kind of relaxed, carefree laughter that only happened when people forget anyone existed outside their inner circle.

I bit my lip and pushed open the door. As soon as I walked in, the laughter died instantly. Three pairs of eyes landed on me at the same time.

Caleb put down the apple pie he was slicing. He glared at me, as if he had declared me guilty long before I could say anything.

“Apologize to Chloe right now. You ruined her coming-of-age ceremony. The whole thing was blown because of you. And running off without a word after causing a scene? What on earth did you even learn out in human society?”

My hands, hanging at my sides, quietly clenched into fists.

I knew they wouldn’t believe me. They never did. Yet, something inside me that hadn’t entirely vanished made me say it one last time.

“I didn’t push her.”

Those words lit a fuse inside Caleb. His eyes turned a deep shade of red that only appeared when an Alpha lost control, and his presence immediately became intimidating.

“We all saw it with our own eyes–”

Mom turned to Chloe first, her voice filled with tenderness as she tucked a strand of hair behind Chloe’s ear.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart. I will make her apologize.”

Then, those eyes turned toward me, and the warmth in them disappeared.

“Bad luck follows you everywhere, and so do lies. I witnessed it with my own eyes. How dare you make excuses? Good God, I truly don’t know how I ended up with a daughter like you.”