Kieran POV
I'm teaching a rejected wolf how to fight when Vesperine arrives with news that changes everything.
"Block!" I shout at the young male trembling before me. "If you hesitate, you die. Again!"
He lunges. I sidestep easily, sweeping his legs. He hits the ground hard.
"Better. But still too slow." I offer my hand, pulling him up. "You're thinking like prey. Think like a predator."
Around us, fifty wolves train in the Veilwood clearing—my pack of outcasts. Rejected mates. Exiled criminals. Wolves the world threw away.
I gave them a home. A purpose. A second chance.
Fifteen years I've built this sanctuary, hidden deep where my half-brothers can't find me.
Thaddeus and Cassian Ironhart. The golden twins who helped destroy me.
"Alpha Kieran!" Vesperine strides into the clearing, her midnight hair wild from riding hard. "We need to talk. Privately."
Vesperine is my best fighter, but she splits her time between my pack and working as a mercenary guard. Usually, she only comes back when something important happens.
I dismiss the trainee and follow her into the forest.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing's wrong. Everything's perfect, actually." She grins viciously. "Your brothers just got destroyed. Publicly. At the Lunar Council."
My wolf perks up, interested despite myself. "By who?"
"Their mate. Well, Thaddeus's mate. Elowen Miravel."
The name means nothing to me. "And?"
"She invoked the Law of Broken Faith. Rejected all three of them—Thaddeus, Cassian, and Alaric Ravenspur."
I stop walking. "Three Alphas? At once?"
"At once. Presented evidence of their crimes, cut her palm on the Council stone, severed every bond. They collapsed screaming. She walked out like a queen."
I should feel satisfaction. My brothers suffering after what they did to me fifteen years ago—framing me for murder, providing false evidence, watching me get exiled.
Instead, I feel curious.
"What kind of Omega breaks three Alphas?"
Vesperine's grin widens. "The interesting kind. She's wolfless, twenty-three, brilliant as hell, and completely done with Alphas who treat her like a tool."
"Wolfless?" That surprises me. "And she survived rejecting three bonds?"
"Didn't even flinch. Just ice and steel. It was beautiful."
We reach my cabin—simple, hidden, home for fifteen years. Inside, Vesperine pulls out a flask and takes a long drink.
"There's more," she says. "Elowen's entering the Crimson Mating Hunt in two weeks. I'm escorting her."
The Hunt. I haven't thought about that tradition in years.
My father's dying words echo in my mind: "Find a true mate before reclaiming your birthright, Kieran. Don't let what your brothers did make you bitter and alone. Promise me."
I promised. Then spent fifteen years hiding in the Veilwood, building my outcast pack, avoiding anything resembling a mate bond.
"Why are you telling me this?" I ask carefully.
Vesperine studies me with those sharp amber eyes. "Because you've been alone for fifteen years. Because your father's dying wish was for you to find a mate. Because this Omega—Kieran, she's special. Strong. Broken but not destroyed. She reminds me of you."
"I'm not interested in some traumatized Omega looking to heal—"
"She's not looking to heal. She's looking to disappear. To be anonymous and free." Vesperine leans forward. "The Hunt is masked. Anonymous. You could meet her without the weight of who you are, who she was. Just two wolves following instinct."
"I don't have instincts anymore. My wolf is half-dead from the wolfsbane poisoning."
"Then prove it. Enter the Hunt. If nothing happens, you leave. But if the Moon Goddess has plans—"
"The Moon Goddess abandoned me when my brothers framed me for killing their youngest sibling."
"Did she? Or did she just take fifteen years to bring you the right wolf?"
I want to say no. Want to stay hidden in my sanctuary, away from the political world that destroyed me.
But something in Vesperine's story hooks into me. An Omega who rejected three Alphas. Who walked away from power and status to choose herself.
That takes strength I rarely see.
"Tell me about her," I hear myself say.
Vesperine smiles like she's won.
For the next hour, she tells me everything. How Thaddeus married Elowen for land, then ignored her for his lover. How Cassian seduced her as part of a bet. How Alaric kidnapped and manipulated her.
How she survived all of it and still stood strong enough to destroy them publicly.
By the end, my wolf is pacing restlessly inside me—something he hasn't done in years.
"She deserves better," I say quietly.
"She deserves someone who sees her worth. Who won't use her. Who understands what it's like to be betrayed by people you trusted."
She's describing me. And she knows it.
"The Hunt starts in two weeks," Vesperine continues. "I can get you registered. Anonymous entry. Silver wolf-mask. Nobody knows Kieran Nighthollow is alive anyway—you'll just be another masked Alpha."
"And if I meet her? If this bond Vesperine thinks exists actually snaps into place?"
"Then you decide if you're brave enough to trust again. Both of you."
I walk to the window, staring out at my pack. Fifty broken wolves who trusted me to lead them.
I rebuilt my life from exile. Created something good from devastating loss.
Maybe Elowen Miravel is doing the same.
Maybe we're meant to find each other in that forest.
Or maybe I'm being a fool, chasing a dying father's wish and Vesperine's romantic ideas.
"Register me," I say finally. "Anonymous. Silver wolf-mask. But Vesperine—don't tell her. Don't hint. If we meet, it has to be genuine. Not orchestrated."
"Wouldn't dream of it." She stands, clasping my shoulder. "For what it's worth? I think she might be exactly what you need. And you might be exactly what she needs."
"Or we'll both walk away disappointed."
"That's the risk of the Hunt. But Kieran—you've been hiding for fifteen years. Maybe it's time to live again."
She leaves before I can argue.
I stand in my cabin, thinking about a wolfless Omega brave enough to reject three Alphas. Thinking about my father's final wish. Thinking about fifteen years of exile and loneliness.
Two weeks until the Hunt.
Two weeks to decide if I'm ready to risk my heart again.
That night, I dream of honey and wildfire. Of storm-grey eyes turning gold. Of a voice that says my name like a prayer instead of a curse.
I wake with my wolf howling inside me—actually howling, alive in a way he hasn't been since the wolfsbane torture.
He wants something. Someone.
"It's just a dream," I tell him. "She probably won't even notice us in the Hunt. Two hundred wolves, all masked—"
My wolf doesn't care. He's awake. Alert. Hunting.
And suddenly, I know I'm going to that Hunt.
Not because Vesperine suggested it. Not because of my father's wish.
But because my half-dead wolf just woke up for the first time in fifteen years, and he's screaming one word:
"MATE."
Impossible. I haven't even met Elowen Miravel.
But my wolf knows something I don't.
And in two weeks, in the Veilwood, under the blood moon, I'm going to find out if he's right.
Or if this is the Moon Goddess's cruelest joke—making a broken Alpha believe he deserves a second chance at love.
I register for the Hunt the next morning.
The silver wolf-mask arrives a week later. I stare at it, running my fingers over the cold metal.
This mask will hide my scars. My identity. Everything that makes me Kieran Nighthollow, the exiled Alpha.
Behind this mask, I'm just another wolf looking for his mate.
And maybe—just maybe—that's exactly who I need to be.
Seven days until the Hunt.
Seven days until I find out if broken Alphas and wolfless Omegas can find something real in the chaos.
Or if we'll just break each other worse than we already are.
My wolf howls in anticipation.
For the first time in fifteen years, I howl back.