No Longer Participating in Alpha’s Game
The night before our Mating Ceremony, my fated mate, Alpha Ryker of the Howling Moon Pack, ordered me to give him the Moon Soul Crystal—the very thing that protected my pack, the Willow Creek Pack.
He said he needed it to power up the Howling Moon Pack's Blood Moon Altar.
He also promised he'd keep me and my people safe.
But he didn't know that we, the healers of the Willow Creek Pack, can only create one Moon Soul Crystal in our entire lives. Making one takes a crazy amount of moon energy.
It's the treasure that keeps our pack alive.
My mother, worried about me using up my moon energy while I was pregnant, gave up her own Moon Soul Crystal instead.
But just three months after Ryker and I were mated, she got sick, fast. She was dying.
I knelt in front of Ryker, crying, begging him for the Silverleaf Herb from the Howling Moon's forbidden grounds. It was the only thing that could save my mom.
But he just looked at me, his eyes full of disappointment, and kicked me away.
"I asked for the Moon Soul Crystal to test you," he snarled. "And just as I thought, you married me for our pack's treasures! Your mother's not sick. You're making it all up!"
"You don't deserve to be the Luna of the Howling Moon Pack!"
It wasn't until after my mother died, when he was arguing with me, trying to kick me out of the pack, that my mother's things fell and scattered everywhere. Her Soul Stone, the symbol of a wolf's spirit, shattered.
That's when he finally realized he was wrong. He fell to his knees, begging me not to leave, crying for me to forgive him.