The morning after my awakening, the house felt smaller, tighter, as if the walls themselves were recoiling from the change within me. My father paced in the hallway, his eyes sharp and calculating, but there was something new beneath the anger: fear.
"You… you were meant to be controlled, Raelia," he hissed, gripping the banister as he tried to steady himself. "Your mother… she—she—"
I froze. The name echoed in my mind. My mother. All my life, I had been told she abandoned me. That she had left me to this cruelty.
But as I looked into Father's eyes, I saw the truth in his hesitation, in the way his voice faltered. He had never told me the whole story.
"I want to know the truth," I said quietly, my voice steady, though my heart pounded. "Why was I left with you? What happened to her?"
Father's hand shook, and his jaw tightened. "You don't… you don't understand. She—she died. It was… my doing."
The words landed like a stone in my chest, heavier than Kael's rejection ever could be. My mother… my mother hadn't abandoned me. My father had taken her from me.
My brother's sneer faltered, replaced by a flicker of fear. He had never thought I would realize the truth, or survive the awakening of the white wolf within me.
I looked down at my hands, at the fur that shimmered faintly in the morning light. All my life, I had been told I was nothing. That I was weak. That I didn't belong.
And yet… here I was. Stronger than either of them could ever imagine.
"You thought controlling me would keep me small," I said, voice rising, tinged with power and fury. "But I am not yours. I am not his. I am… mine."
Father's hand clenched into a fist. My brother's tail twitched in anger and fear. I could feel their jealousy radiating off them in waves, but it didn't touch me. Not anymore.
I had always been special. My mother had been a white wolf too, and now her legacy ran through my veins. The truth about her—and about myself—was finally awakening. And with that awakening came something else: a sense that my life was about to change in ways I could not yet comprehend.
Somewhere beyond this house, beyond my father, beyond the pack I had been born into, something—or someone—was waiting for me. Someone who would see me not as weak, not as a burden, but as I truly was: rare, powerful, and destined for more than this life.
And I would be ready.