The night he called me nothing

*CHAPTER 1: THE NIGHT HE CALLED ME NOTHING*

My name is Ani Grey, and I was born without a wolf.

In Blood Moon Pack, that’s not a weakness. It’s a shame everyone has to carry. At sixteen, every girl in my class shifted, heard their wolf whispering inside their head. I heard nothing. Just silence.

They called me the Wolfless Omega. The Pack’s Embarrassment. The daughter of the best healer we ever had, who died giving birth to me.

I had only one hope left. My eighteenth birthday. The night the Moon Goddess reveals your fated mate.

If the Goddess gave me a strong mate, maybe his strength would finally wake my wolf.

My mate was Alpha Kade Black.

Kade was twenty-three, already an Alpha. Six foot four, black hair, golden eyes that could make any wolf submit. His wolf was a giant black beast that had never lost a fight.

The mating ceremony was held under the full moon. The whole pack formed a circle. Elder Marga chanted the old blessing.

I stood at the edge in my mother’s old white dress. It was too big, but it was the only beautiful thing I owned. My hands were shaking so hard I had to fist them.

Kade walked into the center without a shirt, just black ceremonial pants. His aura was so heavy the younger wolves bowed their heads. He looked bored, like he wanted this night to be over.

Then he inhaled.

His head snapped up. His golden eyes turned pitch black. His wolf was rising. He scented me.

For one second, his eyes softened when they landed on me. He saw me.

My heart leapt. “Kade…”

The whole pack held its breath.

Then his expression twisted into pure disgust.

He stepped back from me like I was contagious.

“No,” he said, loud enough for every wolf to hear. “Absolutely not.”

A murmur rippled through the crowd.

“My fated mate is a wolfless weakling? I’m Alpha of Blood Moon! I need a Luna with a wolf, who can give me strong heirs! Not a broken Omega who can’t even shift!”

Elder Marga stepped forward, pale. “Kade, the old law—”

“I don’t care about the old law!” he roared, his voice breaking into his Alpha wolf voice. The ground shook. “I, Alpha Kade Black, reject you, Ani Grey, as my mate and as my Luna!”

The rejection hit like a blade. I felt the fragile silver thread of the bond snap inside my chest. I collapsed to my knees in the dirt, blood dripping from my nose.

Kade looked down at me, his golden eyes cold as ice.

“You are nothing, Ani. Weak. Unworthy. You will never be my Luna. You will never be the mother of my pups.”

He turned and walked away, leaving me bleeding in my mother’s white dress.

Luna Rhea ran to lift me, but I pushed her away. Something inside me that had begged for eighteen years finally stopped begging.

I wiped the blood, stood up on shaking legs, and shouted at his back.

“I, Ani Grey, accept your rejection! And I leave Blood Moon tonight! I will never come back!”

Absolute silence fell.

Leaving a pack as a wolfless girl into rogue territory at night is suicide. Kade stopped for half a second. I thought he might turn.

He didn’t.

That night it rained. I packed one bag — my mother’s healer journal and her silver staff. The guards at the border laughed.

“Open the gate,” I said. “I am no longer Blood Moon. I am rogue.”

They opened it, certain I would die by morning.

I walked into the Black Forest, rejected, bleeding, wolfless. That was supposed to be the end.

It wasn’t.

I collapsed near the White River, ready to let the darkness take me. An old woman found me — not a wolf, a forest witch.

She touched my forehead and whispered, “Not wolfless, child. Caged. Such a powerful white wolf, locked with wolfsbane since birth. Who did this to you?”

She poured white light into my chest. The pain was indescribable, like every bone breaking and reforming.

And then, for the first time in my life, I heard her.

A roar inside my head.

_“Finally! I’ve been screaming for eighteen years! They locked me to protect you!”_

I shifted that night. Not a weak wolf. A giant white Alpha female, silver-tipped fur, furious golden eyes. Bigger than most males. Stronger than Kade’s beast.

I was never wolfless. I was hidden.

---

Five years later, they call me the Ghost Healer.

I run a clinic on the edge of the White Lands, in neutral territory where no Alpha law can touch me. I wear a white mask and cloak. No one knows my real name. I am the only healer who can cure a witch’s curse.

I am twenty-three now. I have a wolf. I have power. And I have a son.

The door was kicked open this afternoon. Two warriors dragged in a stretcher.

“He’s dying! Save him!”

On the stretcher was a man covered in blood. Huge. Black hair longer now, thick beard, scars all over his chest. A black curse mark rotting over his heart.

Even half-dead, I knew that aura.

Kade Black. Twenty-eight now. The man who called me nothing.

He didn’t recognize me. Why would he? The wolfless girl was supposed to be dead.

But his wolf did. Even unconscious, his chest rose, his nose twitched, and his black wolf let out a low, agonized whine.

_Mate._

Kade’s golden eyes snapped open, blurry with fever, and locked onto my masked face.

“Your scent…” he rasped, his large hand grabbing my wrist.

And then from the back room, a sleepy little voice called out, “Mama? Is the noisy patient okay?”

My blood ran cold.

A little boy walked out, rubbing his eyes. Five years old. Snow-white hair. And the most dangerous golden eyes I’d ever seen.

The exact same golden eyes as the man bleeding out on my table.

Kade’s blurry gaze moved from me to the boy.

“Your… son?” he whispered..