Pain exploded through my chest.
I gasped, fingers clawing into the furs as a violent surge tore through me sharp, sudden, and unfamiliar. It wasn't the hollow agony of rejection.
This was different.
This was calling.
I sat upright, breath coming in ragged bursts as heat flooded my veins. My heart pounded wildly, each beat echoing with a presence that was no longer just nearby but connected.
Across the forest, miles away,
Alpha Marcus staggered.
He gripped the stone railing of the Blackclaw Pack house, eyes blazing as a vicious pulse ripped through his chest. The mark where the mate bond once existed burned so violently, lighting up like a wound torn open again.
"What is this?" he growled.
The bond was supposed to be dead.
Yet something was moving.
Something answering.
Back in the cave, I pressed a trembling hand to my chest as a whisper brushed against my mind deep, commanding, and impossible to ignore.
Maria.
I froze.
Kael's voice.
Not spoken aloud. Inside me.
My wolf surged in response, no longer broken, no longer silent. She lifted her head, golden eyes blazing within my soul, recognizing him in a way that terrified me.
"No," I whispered. "This isn't real."
But my body betrayed me.
The air shimmered, moonlight spilling unnaturally through the cave entrance as a silver glow wrapped around me. Symbols flared faintly beneath my skin,ancient markings I had never seen before, burning and alive.
Kael appeared instantly.
He crossed the cave in a blur, grabbing my shoulders as power crackled around us. "It's starting," he said, voice tight.
"What's starting?" I cried.
"The awakening."
Across the distance.
Marcus roared.
His wolf slammed violently against the inside of his mind, fury and confusion mixing with a sudden, realization.
The omega he rejected.
Wasn't gone.
And worse,
She was bonding.
"No," he snarled, eyes darkening. "She belongs to me."
The bond burned again, but this time it recoiled, rejecting him.
Back in the cave, I collapsed into Kael's arms as the power surged uncontrollably. He held me firmly, anchoring me as the ground trembled beneath our feet.
"Listen to me," he said, his forehead pressing against mine. "Your bloodline is waking. That Alpha felt it,and he will come."
Fear sliced through me. "I don't want him near me."
Kael's eyes flashed dangerously. "Then he will learn what it means to challenge a Lycan King."
The glow faded slowly, leaving me shaking and weak. Kael eased me back onto the furs, his expression dark with resolve.
"You are not just my territory now," he said quietly. "You are my responsibility."
"What am I?" I whispered.
He looked at me for a long moment.
Then, softly, reverently, he said, "You are the Moon's chosen."
The Moon goddess child.
And somewhere far away, Alpha Marcus fell to his knees,finally understanding the magnitude of what he had thrown away.
The stone floor bit into his skin, but he barely felt it. His chest burned as if claws were tearing him open from the inside. His wolf howled in agony, slamming violently against his mind not in rage, but in loss.
The magnitude of what he had thrown away crashed down on him with terrifying clarity.
"Mara was never weak". He said.
The bond hadn't broken because she was unworthy, it had recoiled because he was.
Visions assaulted him without mercy.
Silver moonlight.
Ancient power.
A presence so vast it made his Alpha strength feel laughable. At the center of it all,
She is no longer the quiet omega who lowered her gaze and swallowed her pain. No longer the girl who begged silently to be chosen
She stood radiant in his mind, wrapped in power that did not belong to any pack,power that bowed only to the Moon itself.
His wolf whimpered.
We rejected our Luna.
"No" Marcus rasped, fingers digging into the stone as terror seeped into his bones. "That's impossible."
But the bond answered him not with warmth, not with longing,
With rejection.
For the first time since becoming Alpha, fear settled deep in his soul.
Because the presence he felt wrapped around Maria was not his.
It was ancient.
Royal.
A Lycan.
And Marcus finally understood the truth that would haunt him for the rest of his life.
He had not just rejected his mate.
He had rejected the future Queen of Wolves.