Chapter 2

The whispers started three days after the pack meeting.

I first noticed them in the grocery store when Mrs. Henderson, who'd always greeted me warmly, suddenly found her shopping list fascinating as I approached. The silence that followed me down each aisle felt thick and suffocating, broken only by hushed conversations that died the moment I came within earshot.

"Two losses," I caught Sarah Mitchell saying to her sister near the dairy section. "That's not natural. Something's wrong with her."

My hands trembled as I reached for milk, the carton slipping from my fingers and hitting the floor with a wet splat. The sound echoed through the suddenly quiet store, and I felt every eye on me as I bent to clean up the mess.

"Cursed," someone whispered behind me. "Has to be. No Luna loses that many pups unless..."

I didn't wait to hear the rest. I abandoned my cart and fled, my cheeks burning with shame that wasn't even mine to carry.

At home, I found Christopher in his study, door firmly closed. When I knocked, his voice came through cold and distant.

"I'm busy, Irene."

"We need to talk about what's happening in the pack," I said through the wood. "People are saying things—"

"Then maybe you should consider why they're saying them."

The words hit me like a physical blow. I pressed my forehead against the door, feeling the last thread of hope snap inside my chest.

That night, I lay alone in our bed—had been sleeping alone for weeks now—listening to Christopher's footsteps as he moved into the guest room down the hall. The message was clear: even my own mate found me too defective to share a bed with.

The campaign intensified over the following days. Mallory had always been clever, but now she was surgical in her precision. She never said anything directly—she was far too smart for that. Instead, she planted seeds.

"I'm so worried about our Luna," I overheard her telling a group of pack mothers outside the school. Her voice carried just the right note of concern. "Losing children like that... it changes a woman. Makes her desperate. Makes her do things she wouldn't normally consider."

"What kind of things?" Rebecca Foster asked, her voice eager for gossip.

Mallory glanced around conspiratorially. "Well, I probably shouldn't say this, but Christopher mentioned she's been in contact with outsiders. Humans who want to study us. It makes you wonder what else she might be willing to share for the right price."

I stood frozen behind the corner, listening to my character being assassinated with surgical precision.

"Maybe the losses are punishment," old Mrs. Crawford suggested, her voice carrying the weight of pack superstition. "The Moon Goddess doesn't bless unions that aren't meant to be."

"Oh, I would never suggest such a thing," Mallory replied, but I could hear the satisfaction in her voice. "Though it does make one think..."

By the end of the week, I couldn't walk through pack territory without feeling the weight of hostile stares. Children were pulled away from me. Conversations stopped when I entered rooms. The pack members I'd served faithfully for eight years now looked at me like I carried some contagious disease.

The breaking point came at the inter-pack gathering two weeks later. Representatives from three neighboring packs had come to discuss the rogue situation, and tensions were already high. I sat in the back of the meeting hall, trying to make myself invisible, when Mallory rose from her seat with theatrical precision.

"Before we discuss external threats," she announced, her voice carrying clearly through the hall, "shouldn't we address the security risks within our own ranks?"

Alpha Davidson from the Riverside Pack frowned. "What security risks?"

Mallory reached into her purse and withdrew a folder with the kind of dramatic flair that made my stomach drop. "I've been conducting my own investigation into suspicious activities within our pack. What I've discovered is... troubling."

She opened the folder and began distributing papers to the visiting Alphas. "Correspondence between our Luna and known rogue sympathizers. Evidence of information sharing that could compromise all our packs' security."

My heart stopped. I leaned forward, trying to see the papers, but I already knew what they would contain. Forged letters in handwriting that looked remarkably like mine. Fabricated evidence that she'd been crafting for months.

"This is impossible," I whispered, but my voice was lost in the sudden uproar.

"Beta Morrison from the Eastwood Pack can verify," Mallory continued smoothly. "He witnessed Luna Silva meeting with an unidentified male near the territorial border three weeks ago. The same night two of our patrol routes were compromised."

Beta Morrison, a man I'd never spoken to in my life, nodded gravely. "I saw her with my own eyes. Thought it was strange at the time."

The room erupted. Voices rose in anger and accusation. Alpha Davidson stood, his face dark with fury. "You harbor a traitor as your Luna?"

I looked desperately toward Christopher, waiting for him to defend me, to call out these obvious lies. Instead, he sat silent, his face carved from stone, as my world collapsed around me.

"The evidence speaks for itself," Mallory said, her voice cutting through the chaos like a blade. "The question now is what we do about it."