Chapter 4

Back at the pack house, Damian called an assembly. He set the document on the long table. The elders sat on either side, and none of them spoke up for me.

My shoulder was wrapped in a simple bandage, and the burn on my arm still throbbed. I kept my mother's moonstone fragments in a small pouch against my chest.

Scarlett was seated to Damian's right, dressed in the Luna gown with its skirt sweeping across the chair beside her.

"Sierra, don't drag this out. Everyone's busy," Damian said.

I stared at the document. "What if I don't sign?" I asked.

Damian tapped his fingers on the table. "Martha will be sent out of the Healer Hall, and you'll be left without the pack's protection."

Cain Foster, one of the elders, frowned. "Alpha, she's the daughter of the last Alpha."

Scarlett cut in, "That's exactly why she should know better. Her parents sacrificed for this pack. She shouldn't hinder its future over an empty title."

As she finished speaking, she flashed me a gentle smile.

That was the thing about Scarlett that got under my skin the most. She pretended to care for the pack, and expected everyone to buy her innocent act even after destroying me.

When I picked up the pen, Damian's shoulders relaxed a little.

"Making the right choice is better for you, too," he said.

The pen touched the paper, yet I didn't put down my signature.

I broke the pen in two.

Ink splattered across the agreement, blotting out the Alpha's mark with a black blot.

Gasps echoed around the table.

Scarlett stood up. "How dare you destroy the Alpha's decree!" she snapped.

I set the broken pen back on the table. "I'm not signing."

Damian stood up, the chair scraping against the floor with a harsh screech.

"Sierra, don't force yourself into a dead end," he warned.

"You're the ones who forced me into a dead end," I shot back.

"You think you can survive after leaving this pack?"

"No need to worry about me, Alpha."

This time, I didn't call him by his name.

He caught on, and his impatience shifted into a cold, simmering fury.

"Take her back to the servant quarters. She's not to leave without my order," Damian said to the guards.

Two werewolves stepped forward, about to take me away.

I didn't resist.

Scarlett followed me to the door, lifting the hem of her Luna gown. When she got close, she leaned in and whispered only for me to hear, "You actually think refusing to sign is going to stop anything?

"At the mating ceremony, you'll be groveling at the foot of the stage, handing me my crown. And Damian will be the one to put the mark chain around my neck."

I stopped in my tracks. "You're afraid of me."

Her smile faded. "Me? Afraid of you, a wolfless?" she scoffed.

"You're afraid I won't give up."

Scarlett lifted her hand, ready to slap me, but the guards pretended not to see.

Before her slap could land, Damian's voice rang out from the hall. "That's enough."

Scarlett instantly dropped her hand, feigning grievance. "I was only trying to help her figure it out."

Damian looked at me. "Sierra, make sure you really think it through tonight. I'll come for your answer myself tomorrow."

Then, the door to the servant quarters was locked behind them.

*****

Later that night, Martha came to me, clutching a small bottle, her body frail.

"Sierra, are you really going to use this?" she asked.

The liquid inside was inky black.

The Severance Potion was finally ready.

I held her hand. "I can't let him use you against me anymore."

Martha's eyes were red. "The severance potion isn't some ordinary poison. When the mate bond is broken, your wolf spirit will be tormented along with you. Most wolfless don't make it through."

"I've got nothing left to lose."

"Sierra, you've still got yourself."

That made me freeze for a long moment.

I pressed the moonstone fragments into her hand. "Hold onto them for me. If I don't make it, bury them beside my mother's grave."

Martha shook her head, her tears falling onto the back of my hand. "Don't say something like that."

I pushed open the window and slipped out of the servant quarters.

The guards were switching shifts in the front hall. No one expected a confined, wolfless Omega to dare escape.

The edge of Darkwood Forest was behind the pack house.

As I stepped into the forest, the mate bond throbbed painfully, like Damian's will was clawing at me one last time, refusing to let me go.

In the distance, the pack house was glowing with bright lights.

Inside, the werewolves were all over Scarlett's Luna gown, prepping for her big moment and erasing every trace of me.

I twisted off the stopper.

My tongue went numb the second the potion touched it.

Agony tore through my chest. Damian's bond was ripped raw from my bones.

I collapsed into the mud, my fingers clawing at the wet earth.

Back at the pack house, Damian was in the elders' hall, listening to Cain give his patrol update.

All of a sudden, he grabbed his chest, his face going ghostly pale.

Scarlett hurried to catch him. "Damian, what's wrong?" she blurted.

He shoved her aside, doubled over, and coughed up a mouthful of dark blood.

At the exact same time, the dormant wolf soul inside me awakened after eighteen years.

An ancient, foreign voice resonated in my bones. "It's finally broken."

The first patch of pure white wolf fur began to bloom along my arm.

Deep in the forest, every low-ranking wolf bowed low to the ground at the same moment.

I could hear my bones shifting, the ancient seal shattering, and Damian's first hoarse cry as the bond between us snapped.

"Sierra!" Damian roared.