Home / The Cursed Lone Wolf They All Despised / Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

All Chapters of The Cursed Lone Wolf They All Despised: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

16 Chapters

Chapter 1

Twelve years after I died, the first thing to react to me was the wolves.Before anyone in the stone hall saw my face, the guard wolves at the doors rose together. Their ears flattened. One backed into its handler hard enough to scrape claws across stone. Another let out a low, uncertain growl and then abruptly tucked its tail.A faint smell moved through the hall.Burned pine. Wet ash. The same smoke that had filled my lungs the night I died.Moonlight thickened around the open doors, and I walked out of the forest mist.Someone recognized me first."Erin?"A chair slammed backward."That's impossible. She died twelve years ago."Another voice came immediately after it, sharper and uglier."Of course the final trial would drag that curse back. If Erin hadn't leaked our border routes twelve years ago, the sanctuary never would have burned."The old accusations returned as easily as if no time had passed at all.I looked down at the leather cord around my wrist. A small silver stone was

Chapter 2

The second Moonlight Trial wasn't about guilt.It was about old debts.The stone wall filled with the winter records from the border sanctuary twelve years ago.Game, medicine, treatment for old injuries, pay for patrol work. Every entry appeared on a white screen made of moonlight.Vera's face changed at the very first line.For twelve years, the pack had told the same story.Before Ryan was recognized as part of the High Alpha's bloodline, he had been a boy of unknown origin on the border. No pack would pay to treat his old wounds. No one wanted to share precious winter game with a stranger who might leave at any moment.Vera was the one who secretly helped him.She brought him medicine and meat. She even shared her own training supplies.Over the years, the pack began treating Vera as the woman who had earned the right to stand beside Ryan. She had been there when he woke, there when he entered the High Alpha's territory, and there through every succession trial that followed.Peopl

Chapter 3

The third trial took us back to a succession qualifying test from twelve years ago.Vera and I had both just turned eighteen.The Blackwood line chose young wolves from every territory and tested their tracking, route planning, pup rescue skills, and judgment under pressure.Vera had earned the highest score three times in a row.I was famous for coming in last.Or at least, that was what everyone believed.Moonlight rebuilt the old warehouse around us.My younger self was sorting equipment when Vera came through the door.She tossed her ID tag onto the table."Use mine tomorrow."I didn't look up."I'm not going."Vera laughed."Fine. Don't go.""Mara's medicine request still hasn't been approved this month. And the new pups at the sanctuary aren't officially on the protection list yet."I stopped what I was doing.She walked closer and pushed the ID tag toward me."You're smart, Erin.""You know whose word matters more. A packless lone wolf's, or the daughter raised by the Blackwood

Chapter 4

The Moonlight Trials made all of us retake the old succession qualifying test.The scent of a missing pup was scattered through the forest.Each participant had a limited time to choose a route, spot false tracks, and plan an escape.Ryan's place in the final trials depended on this round.No one dared treat it like a game.Vera seemed calm at first.She even volunteered to lead."I'll take the east side."Someone nodded right away."Tracking was always your best event."Vera smiled.But once we entered the woods, she slowed more and more.At the first fork, she said the pup had gone north.Wrong.At the second, the scents of wild animals and adult wolves crossed. She hesitated for a long time, then chose east.Wrong again.The others began to look at her differently."Vera, are you okay?"She had gone pale."The earlier trials must have thrown me off."Then she looked at Ryan.Before, all she had to do was look a little unwell and Ryan would take care of her first.This time, Ryan ask

Chapter 5

The fifth trial sent us back to the border sanctuary for packless wolves.Moonlight rebuilt the low wooden gates, the herb racks, the crooked fence, and the cabins exactly as they had stood twelve years ago.Before anyone appeared, I heard a pup crying somewhere inside.The sound was thin and frightened, the kind a very young wolf made when it could smell fire but did not know where to run.I looked toward the nearest cabin. The windows were dark. There was no one inside yet.Then the smell of ash reached me.The fire had not started in the memory, but for one second I saw black handprints on the inside of the glass, small enough to belong to children. I blinked and they were gone.I stopped at the gate.This had been the only real home I'd ever known.It was also the place where I had burned to death.When Mara Stone stepped out of the nearest cabin and saw me, her face changed at once."Erin, sweetheart."She hurried over and wrapped me in a tight hug.I knew she was only part of the

Chapter 6

The enemy pack came faster than I remembered.The first howl had barely ended when bodies crashed through the trees. Paws struck hard earth. Someone screamed near the eastern fence. Then flame caught the side of a cabin and ran up the dry boards so quickly it looked alive.The Moonlight Trial did not only show us the past. It gave it back its smell and sound.Smoke scraped the inside of my throat. Burning resin snapped in the walls. Somewhere behind the cabins, pups were crying hard enough to lose their voices."Enemy pack!""Get the pups out first!"It was happening exactly as it had twelve years ago.Vera's first response was to search the crowd."Erin's gone," she said, too quickly. "She's the one who sold our routes last time. She must have gone to—"The front door of the nearest cabin burst open before she could finish.A pup stumbled out on all fours, coughing black smoke. A second came behind him. Then a third.My eighteen-year-old self came out last.Blood had soaked one should

Chapter 7

Several people tried to pull Ryan away from the place where the fire had vanished.His wolf refused to move.The black shadow that had slept for twelve years scraped at the stone until pale lines appeared beneath its claws. When someone stepped too close, it bared its teeth without even looking at them.Then it howled again.The sound was lower this time, almost broken.No adult wolf in the hall mistook it for ordinary grief. A fated mate was not supposed to vanish from a wolf's soul without leaving a wound. Ryan's wolf had carried that wound in silence for twelve years while the man himself remembered nothing.Ryan stayed on his knees.The trial was still connected to him, and fragments of memory continued breaking through the moonlight around us.I saw myself asleep beside his wolf after his first shift.I saw him eating the meat he had threatened to throw away.I saw the roof of the sanctuary, his arm around my waist, both of us looking over a border neither of us thought would beco

Chapter 8

The next Moonlight Trial pulled up Ryan's medical records after the fire.Silver wound.Severe smoke inhalation.Traumatic memory loss.And one detail almost no one had wanted to discuss in twelve years: Ryan's wolf had gone dormant after the fire and had never fully returned.That was also why, no matter how often people treated Vera as the woman destined to stand beside him, Ryan had never completed a true mate bond with her. His wolf had never answered.The healer's old record gave the likely reason. Severe silver wounds, smoke inhalation, and extreme emotional trauma could temporarily sever a wolf's conscious awareness of a fated mate.Ryan stared at the words for a long time.His wolf had not rejected me twelve years ago. Ryan had lost access to the part of himself that still knew me.The records continued.When the rescuers found him, he was gripping half of a burned leather cord.A scrap of Erin's coat was caught between his fingers.Even unconscious, he hadn't let go.Someone s

Chapter 9

Vera finally began to panic.Each round of the trials stripped away another layer of the life she'd built.She knew better than anyone that if Ryan kept digging, the fire from twelve years ago would eventually reach her.Not long after the next round began, someone rushed to find Ryan."Vera triggered a trap in the woods.""She's stuck, and her leg is hurt."Ryan paused for only a second before heading there.The others clearly relaxed.For twelve years, whenever Vera got hurt, Ryan had always been the first one there.This time was no different.But when he reached the edge of the woods, he didn't go in right away.Vera's lowered voice came from inside."Make it a little worse."Another woman hesitated."Won't that look too obvious?""He'll come."There was even a hint of laughter in Vera's voice."Responsibility is Ryan's weak spot.""As long as I actually get hurt, even a little, he won't turn his back on me."Ryan stood in the shadows without moving.After a short silence, the woma

Chapter 10

No one spoke when the Moonlight Truth Test began.Ryan stood in the center of the hall.He didn't let Vera explain first.The evidence appeared piece by piece.The succession records Erin had earned for her.The winter game and medicine.Mara's testimony.The truth about who had dragged Ryan out of the burning cabin.And the half of the leather cord in his medical records.Last came the words Ryan had just heard for himself.Erin had to disappear.Almost all the color had left Vera's face.Ryan asked his first question."Did you know my true bloodline twelve years ago?"Vera was silent for several seconds."No."Her wolf stepped back at once.Everyone saw it clearly.Ryan continued."Did you order Erin to take the succession qualifying test under your identity?""She only helped me a few times.""Answer yes or no."Vera bit her lip."No."Her wolf backed away again.The third question."Did you give the border sanctuary's routes to an enemy pack?"This time, she didn't answer right awa

PREV

NEXT

SCAN CODE TO READ ON APP

DMCA.com Protection Status