chapter 3

Raelin’s POV

The forest doesn’t care that I’ve been rejected.

It doesn’t care about Luna ceremonies or bleeding hearts or the way silk rips on thorns when you run through the trees like your soul’s on fire.

The moon watches, silent. The wind whispers, but doesn’t comfort.

I should’ve stayed. Fought. Screamed.

But I couldn’t.

I couldn’t breathe in that place. Couldn’t look at Mira draped around him like she didn’t just steal everything I’d worked for. Couldn’t stand another pair of eyes pitying me like I was something less now.

So I ran.

And I haven’t stopped.

My bare feet are numb. My lungs burn. The dress is in tatters. The silver thread meant to crown me now glints like a mockery down my arms. The only thing I feel is the bond, still straining in my chest like a thread stretched too tight—

—and then it snaps.

No.

Not snapped.

Burns.

The pain hits fast and brutal, sharp enough to make my knees buckle. My breath rips out of me in a broken sob as I clutch my chest. It’s searing. Agonizing. Like claws inside me raking through my ribs.

My head drops forward and I know.

I know.

Darius is having sex with her.

The bond reacts like it’s being set on fire. My skin pulses with rejection. My core aches in hollow betrayal. I feel him inside her. Not physically—not quite—but spiritually. Through the tie that still binds us.

Every thrust, every groan, every second he sinks deeper into Mira—

It all feels like knives to the gut.

I scream.

It rips through the trees, raw and ragged. My hands dig into the dirt as my body shakes violently.

I should’ve severed the bond.

I should’ve left before the ceremony.

I should’ve never loved him.

Another wave of pain tears through me. I collapse onto my side, gasping, eyes blurring with tears I won’t let fall.

But they do.

They stream down my cheeks, hot and silent.

He didn’t even wait.

He wanted me to feel this.

Another moan echoes in my chest—not mine. Mira’s. Sharp and high. The bond flares again and I cry out. I curl into myself, clutching my stomach as if it’ll stop the bleeding inside me.

I’m dying.

It feels like dying.

And then something shifts.

Not the bond.

Not the pain.

Me.

A heat rises beneath the agony—not physical, but ancient. Something thick and dark and powerful begins to stir in my veins. Like a second heartbeat. Like a voice rising through bone.

It doesn’t soothe the pain.

It feeds on it.

My fingers dig deeper into the soil. My nails lengthen. My pulse slows. The white wolf inside me, quiet for so long, awakens—and it does not weep.

It growls.

I don’t know what’s happening. My limbs tremble. My back arches. The trees blur and flicker, and the air turns thick with energy I’ve never felt before.

Then—

Movement.

I freeze, heart lurching.

A figure stands just beyond the tree line. Tall. Broad-shouldered. Cloaked in shadow and moonlight. He’s not part of my pack. I would’ve known. This man radiates something different—older, colder, and somehow… stronger.

He steps forward once, and I see him clearly now.

Black clothing. Storm-dark eyes. A silver ring on his thumb. A face like carved stone.

Caelan Wolfe.

Alpha of the Nightborn Pack.

What the hell is he doing here?

My breath stutters. I try to move. To rise. To shift.

But the pain comes again—sharp and final. The last echo of Darius and Mira tangled together in my bond.

I collapse with a ragged sound, my vision cracking like glass.

Caelan doesn’t run to me.

He doesn’t flinch.

But his gaze never leaves mine.

And then—

Darkness.