The moon was bleeding again.
Not in the way Kai had seen before — pale light dripping red in the reflection of his eyes — but as though the sky itself was wounded. A deep, crimson haze bled across the night, turning the stars into pinpricks of dying embers. Every wolf in the clearing shifted uneasily, fur bristling as their instincts screamed at them to run.
But Kai did not run.
He stood at the edge of the stone dais, his hands clenched, watching as Selene moved into the glow of the moon's strange, bleeding light. Her presence was different now — almost too heavy for the air. She wasn't just Selene anymore. She was something older… something that had slept for centuries and was now stretching its claws.
"You've felt it too, haven't you?" she said, her voice low but carrying in the night air. "The gods are awake."
The words sent a ripple of unease through the gathered pack. Wolves glanced at one another, and some even lowered their heads in submission without knowing why. The bloodline in Selene's veins — the one she herself had only just learned of — was not just royal. It was divine.
And it terrified them.
Kai took a step forward, his eyes locked on her. "What did you do, Selene?" His voice was sharp, but it was laced with something else — fear, not of her, but of what she might now be tethered to.
She shook her head. "It wasn't me. It was always there. My mother kept it hidden. My father… he wasn't just Alpha. He was the vessel for Fenrius."
At the name, every elder in the circle went rigid. Fenrius. The God-Wolf of the First Hunt. The one whose hunger had almost devoured the world before the gods bound him in chains of moonlight.
But the chains had rusted.
Before Kai could speak, another voice cut through the tension. "And you think you're the only one with divine blood?"
They turned.
Darian stepped into the moonlight — Kai's old rival, now fully revealed as something more than just a threat to Selene's heart. His aura shimmered faintly, the air around him bending with quiet power. "My blood sings with that of Lykaris, the God of War. And unlike you, Selene, I don't fear my inheritance."
The crowd of wolves split, their loyalty fracturing in real time. Some stepped toward Selene. Others toward Darian. The air was thick enough to choke on.
Selene's eyes narrowed. "If Lykaris is awake, then the chains on Fenrius won't hold much longer." She looked at Kai, and there was something desperate in her gaze. "When Fenrius rises, the world will burn unless we stand together."
Darian smirked, his sharp canines catching the moonlight. "Or we can let the gods decide who survives. Survival of the fittest — wasn't that always our way?"
The challenge in his tone was obvious, but it wasn't just aimed at Selene. It was aimed at Kai. The rivalries here weren't only about gods or bloodlines. This was about dominance — over the pack, over the world, and over Selene herself.
Kai stepped down from the dais, his shadow long in the moonlight. "Careful, Darian. You've always mistaken arrogance for strength."
Darian tilted his head. "And you've always mistaken restraint for weakness."
The pack murmured again, sensing the inevitable clash. But before the first blow could fall, the ground shook beneath them.
The earth split, and a voice — not human, not wolf, but something older than either — thundered in the air:
"MY CHILDREN… THE HUNT BEGINS."
It was Fenrius.
The god's presence crashed over them like a tidal wave. Wolves dropped to their knees, some whimpering, others snarling in confusion. Selene gasped, clutching her head, her body shuddering as though the voice was inside her bones.
Kai caught her before she fell, but when she looked up at him, her eyes were no longer just hers. They glowed gold — the mark of a god's vessel.
"You can't fight him, Kai," she whispered, her voice trembling. "Not without becoming what you fear."
And Kai knew what she meant. The secret he'd kept buried for years — the reason his blood burned hotter, why his strength had always been beyond even the strongest Alphas — was because his own lineage wasn't pure wolf.
It was older.
It was monstrous.
Darian laughed darkly. "Looks like the three of us have a dance with destiny."
The bleeding moon pulsed above them, and somewhere deep below, the chains of moonlight groaned under the weight of something ancient and hungry.
And when they broke, no rivalries would matter.
Only survival.