Chapter 001

The Girl Who Fights

CECILIA

Kade came at me for the third time.

I sidestepped him before he could even commit to the swing, grabbed his arm mid-air, and used his own momentum to send him straight into the ground.

He hit the dirt hard, groaning, and stayed there for a moment before rolling onto his back and staring up at the sky like he was questioning every decision that had led him to this point.

The other warriors standing around the training ground went quiet.

I stepped back and rolled my shoulder, waiting.

"Get up," I ordered.

Kade let out a breath. "You know, most people slow down after the second round."

"I am not most people."

He sat up slowly, shaking his head with a short laugh. "No. You are really not."

He got to his feet and stepped back, signalling that he was done. Smart decision.

I turned to face the rest of them, scanning the line. Nobody moved to take his place. They never did after the third round.

They had all learned by now that coming at me tired was worse than coming at me fresh.

"Anyone else?" I asked.

Silence.

Rolan, one of the older warriors, crossed his arms from where he stood at the edge of the ground. "You fight like you have something to prove, Cecilia."

I looked at him. "And you block like you stopped trying two years ago. We all have our things."

A few of the younger warriors bit back smiles. Rolan did not look particularly amused, but he did not say anything else either.

I picked up my water flask from the ground and took a long drink, letting the noise of the training ground settle back into something normal.

Kade was talking to someone behind me. Two of the junior warriors were sparring half-heartedly near the far end. Everything was as it always was.

I found a quieter spot near the edge of the ground to cool down, away from the main group.

I stretched out my arms slowly, working through the tension in my muscles, and let myself breathe.

That was when I heard them.

Two female wolves standing a short distance away, half hidden by the shadow of the equipment shed. They were not sparring.

They were talking, and they were doing it in the low, careful way people do when they think nobody is listening.

I did not turn around. I just stilled.

"She is twenty-two," one of them murmured. "Twenty-two and still unmated. Does that not strike you as strange?"

"Very," the other one agreed. "An Alpha's daughter, at that. You would think the moon goddess would have given her someone by now."

A short pause.

"Unless she did not."

"What do you mean?"

The first one dropped her voice even lower. "Maybe the moon goddess looked at her and decided not to bother. I mean, look at her. She is cold. She does not let anyone close. What kind of mate would even want to deal with that?"

"Or," the second one said carefully, "her wolf is broken. I have heard people say it before. That she cannot shift properly. I mean she can before but not anymore. That something is wrong with her."

I kept my eyes forward. My jaw was tight but my face gave nothing away.

I had heard worse than this before and I would hear worse again. That was simply the truth of it.

But the words still landed somewhere they were not supposed to.

"Too cold to love."

I turned and walked away before they could say anything else.

***

The walk back to the pack house was quiet. Most of the pack was either training or occupied elsewhere, so I had the path mostly to myself. I preferred it that way.

The words those women said followed me without my permission.

I did not want to think about them. I was not the type to sit and pick apart what people said behind my back.

But something about hearing it out loud, in that easy, careless way, like it was simply a fact everyone had accepted, made it harder to shake off than usual.

"Broken. Too cold to love."

My mother had never been cold. That was the thing that came to me unbidden, the memory of her before all the rest.

She had been warm in the way that filled a room. Strong, but warm. Her wolf, Sera, had been one of the most powerful in the Greenville Pack, and yet there had been nothing hard about her.

She had loved openly and without apology.

And then the rogues came.

My chest tightened the way it always did when I went near that memory. I did not let myself go all the way into it. I never did.

But the edges of it were always there, and whenever anyone mentioned broken wolves or things going wrong without reason, my mind went to the same place.

The Redwood Pack.

My father had been in a land dispute with their Alpha right before the attack. That had never sat right with me. Rogues did not simply appear.

They were sent, or they were hired, and the timing had been too deliberate for me to believe otherwise. I had no proof. I had never had proof.

But I had never stopped believing it either.

I exhaled slowly and pushed the thought down.

This was not the time for it.

****

I tried anyway, like I always did when I was alone.

"Lavender."

Nothing.

I reached inward, toward the place where she was supposed to be, the warmth, the presence, the quiet hum of another soul living alongside mine.

There was only silence. The same silence that had been there for as long as I could remember.

I had stopped being surprised by it. But I had never stopped hating it.

My mother's wolf had been extraordinary. And I had nothing.

I shook my head and kept walking.

Darcy was standing at the entrance of the pack house when I arrived, her arms folded, her expression already carrying the look she wore when she had news I was not going to enjoy.

"Your father wants to see you," she said.

I stopped in front of her. "Now?"

"Now."

I looked at her for a moment, searching her face for something that would tell me what kind of meeting this was going to be.

She gave nothing away, which told me everything.

I nodded once and walked inside.

My father hardly sent for me except it was very important. And this must be something that seems my presence.

CHAPTER 002

The Weight of a Name

CECILIA

My father's study always felt smaller than it actually was.

It was not a small room. It had high ceilings, wide shelves lined with books and old pack records, a desk that had been in our family for three generations.

But whenever I walked into it for a serious conversation, the walls always seemed to close in a little.

I shut the door behind me and stood across from his desk.

Bonn did not look up immediately. He was reading something, or pretending to. I waited, because I knew this man and I knew his silences.

This one was deliberate. He was gathering himself before he spoke, which meant whatever was coming was something he had already prepared for.

He finally set the paper down and looked at me.

"Sit."

"I am fine standing."

He held my gaze for a moment, then let it go. "The pack is talking, Cecilia."

"The pack is always talking."

"Not like this." He leaned back in his chair, folding his hands on the desk. "The elders called a meeting two days ago without me. Do you know what that means?"

I did. It meant things had moved past whispers and into something more formal.

"They are questioning whether an unmated Alpha's daughter can be trusted to lead," he continued. "Whether the pack's future is secure if the person meant to inherit has no mate, no stability, no—"

"I have stability," I cut in, keeping my voice even. "I train with the warriors every morning. I handle border disputes. I sit in every council meeting you allow me into. My stability is not the question here."

"It is to them."

I looked at him. "And to you?"

He did not answer straight away. He turned his head slightly, his eyes moving to the window.

Outside, I could hear the distant sounds of the pack going about its day. Normal ordinary sounds.

His silence was its own answer.

Something tightened in my chest, but I did not let it show.

"I am not going to mate someone just to quiet gossip," I said. "That is not a good enough reason."

"Cecilia—"

"It is not." I kept my tone steady. "You taught me to be careful about who I let close. You taught me that trust is earned. Now you want me to hand myself to a stranger because a few elders are restless?"

Bonn finally looked back at me, and his expression was tired in a way that went beyond the conversation. "It is not a few elders anymore. Pack members are starting to speak openly. Some of them are saying—" He stopped and pressed his lips together briefly. "Some of them are saying you are cursed. That the moon goddess has turned her back on you."

The words hit differently than I expected them to. Not because I had not heard them before, but because hearing my father repeat them, sitting behind his desk in his formal voice, made them feel more real than they had any right to.

I said nothing.

"I need you to take this seriously," he said quietly.

"I do take it seriously. I just refuse to solve it by making a decision I cannot undo."

He exhaled and I walked out.

****

Darcy was leaning against the wall directly outside the door. Of course she was.

She took one look at my face and straightened. "How bad?"

"He repeated the curse rumour to my face."

She winced. "So bad then."

I started walking and she fell into step beside me without being asked.

That was the thing about Darcy. She never needed to be asked. She simply knew when to follow and when to give space, and she had spent enough years beside me to read the difference without being told.

"The elders held a meeting without him," I said, keeping my voice low as we moved through the corridor. "They are questioning my fitness to lead."

Darcy was quiet for a moment. "I had heard something about that. I did not want to say anything until I was sure."

I glanced at her. "You should have told me."

"I know. I am sorry." She meant it. "But Cecilia, the rumours really have been getting louder lately. It is not just idle talk in corners anymore. People are saying it openly now, in the market, at the pack hall. I heard two women at the healer's yesterday saying your wolf is broken and that no man would want to take on a wolfless mate."

I stopped walking.

Darcy stopped beside me.

I stared at the wall ahead of me for a moment, not really seeing it. I was thinking about Lavender. About the silence I reached into every single day and found nothing waiting there. About the fact that I could not even argue with what people were saying because I did not have a good enough answer for it myself.

"I am not mating a stranger to make people comfortable," I said finally.

"I know."

"I mean it, Darcy."

"I know you do." Her voice was gentle. "I am not arguing with you. I am just telling you what I heard so you are not walking into things blind."

I nodded once and kept walking.

She did not follow this time. She knew I needed the rest of the walk alone.

Three days passed.

I kept to my routine because routine was the only thing that made sense when everything else felt like it was slowly shifting beneath my feet.

Training in the mornings. Pack duties in the afternoons. And having meals I barely tasted. Sleep that came later than it should have.

On the fourth morning, a packhouse servant found me after training with a short message.

My father wanted to see me again.

I knew before I even opened the door that this was different.

I could not have explained how. When I walked into the study and saw my father already seated, already still, already watching the door like he had been waiting for some time, I knew.

This was not the same conversation as before.

I sat down this time.

Bonn looked at me for a moment before he spoke. "The pack's debt is worse than I have let on publicly."

I kept my expression neutral. "How much worse?"

"Significantly." He opened a ledger on the desk and turned it toward me.

I looked at the numbers and said nothing, but my stomach dropped quietly.

I had known we were struggling. I had not known it had reached this point.

"We have been managing it for two years," he continued. "But we are running out of ways to manage it. If something does not change within the next several months, we will start losing things."

I leaned back slowly. "What are you proposing?"

"A partnership. A real one, with a pack strong enough to pull us level." He paused. "I have been in discussions. There is an Alpha who is willing."

Something told me to brace myself.

"Alpha Cassian," he said. "Of the Redwood Pack."

The room went very quiet.

I do not know how long I sat there without speaking. It could not have been more than a few seconds, but it felt longer.

Every thought I had arrived at once and then scattered, and underneath all of it, beneath the shock and the fury that was already building, something else moved.

Lavender.

For the first time in longer than I could remember, I felt her. Not clearly. Not fully. Even she could not stay silent for this.

I looked at my father. "No."

"Cecilia—"

"No." I said it again, without any room for negotiation. "Of every pack and Alpha in every territory available to you, you chose that one."

"I chose the one that can help us."

"They killed my mother." My voice did not shake. I was proud of that. "You were in a land dispute with their Alpha right before the rogues came. I have never believed that was a coincidence and neither should you."

"We do not have proof of that."

"I do not need proof to know what I know."

Bonn's jaw tightened. "This is not about what happened years ago. This is about what happens to this pack in the next six months if we do nothing."

"Then let me do something." I leaned forward. "Trade routes. We open new ones with the Ashford Pack and the Merin territory. We increase production on the southern farmlands. We renegotiate the eastern border agreement and free up resources we have been sitting on for three years. I have thought about this, Father. I have actual proposals."

I laid it out. All of it. Every idea I had been turning over in my head for months, waiting for a moment when he might actually listen.

He listened.

And then he shook his head.

"It is not enough," he said quietly. "Not fast enough and not enough. I have already considered these options."

"Then consider them harder—"

"Cecilia." His voice dropped. "If you refuse this arrangement, I will have no choice but to give the Alpha position to someone who will not."

He held my gaze.

"I will give it to your cousin, Lila."

Chapter 003

Blood and Smiles

CECILIA

I was still inside my own head when I walked out of the study.

Lila was standing in the corridor.

I stopped.

She turned at the sound of my footsteps, and the smile that crossed her face was immediate.

"Cecilia." She moved toward me, her voice soft. "I heard. I am so sorry. This whole situation must be incredibly uncomfortable for you."

I looked at her. "News travels fast."

"You know how this packhouse is." She gave a small, sympathetic shake of her head. "I just want you to know that I am here for you. Whatever you need."

She looked like she meant it. She sounded like she meant it. Her eyes were gentle and her posture was open and there was nothing I could point to and say, there, that is the lie.

But I had known Lila my whole life. And something about the way she was standing there, already in the corridor, already turned in the right direction, already wearing that expression before I had even fully come through the door, did not sit right with me.

I kept my face even. "Thank you, Lila."

"Of course." She fell into step beside me as I started walking, which I had not invited her to do. "It is a strange choice, is it not? The Redwood Pack of all places."

I did not respond.

"I suppose Uncle Bonn has his reasons," she continued, her tone thoughtful. "Alpha Cassian does have a strong pack. Very well managed, from what people say in council circles. His numbers are good, warriors are well trained and he keeps things running tightly." A brief pause. "He has quite a reputation."

I glanced at her. "You seem to know a lot about him."

She lifted a shoulder lightly. "I pay attention at gatherings. It is worth knowing who the strong Alphas are."

She said it easily. Like it was nothing.

Then, almost as an afterthought, she added, "I actually met him once but briefly, at the Silvermont gathering two seasons ago."

I kept walking but I was listening to every single word now.

"He was not what I expected," she said, and something in her voice shifted just slightly. But I caught it. "He is very— present. You know how some Alphas walk into a room and you feel it before you even see them? He is like that." She laughed a little and waved her hand. "Anyway. I am sure you will form your own opinion. I should not be going on like this."

She smiled again and turned at the next corridor, heading in a different direction. "I mean it, Cecilia. I am here if you need me."

And then she was gone.

I stood there for a moment, watching the empty corridor where she had just been.

She had described him like someone she had studied. Like someone she had not stopped thinking about since that gathering.

Every detail she gave had been specific, considered, and just a little too fond for a casual acquaintance.

I filed every single word away and went to find Darcy.

I found her in the small room off the east wing that she used when she was not on duty.

She was sharpening a blade and looked up the moment I walked in.

"Close the door," I said.

She set the blade down.

I told her everything about the corridor, the smile, the conversation and Darcy listened without interrupting, which was one of the things I valued most about her.

When I finished, she was quiet for a moment.

"I am not surprised," she said finally.

"You knew?"

"Not the details. But the general shape of it?" She nodded slowly. "It is not exactly a secret among people who pay attention. Lila wanted Cassian. She made her interest known before any of this arrangement started but your father refused to put her forward." Darcy paused. "Alpha Bonn directed it toward you instead."

I stared at her. "And nobody told me this."

"Would it have changed anything?"

Probably not but that was not the point.

"There is more," Darcy said, and her voice took on a careful quality. "She has not accepted it quietly. People have noticed that she finds reasons to ask about him. About the Redwood Pack, about anyone who has had contact with Cassian or his wolves. She positions herself in conversations where his name comes up." She met my eyes. "She has been doing it for a while."

I sat down on the edge of the chair near the door.

I thought about Lila standing in that corridor already there, smiling and talking about him like she could not quite help herself.

Lila wanted Cassian.

Lila wanted my Alpha position.

Two things. Both of them things she believed she had a right to.

And now both of them were being handed to me, which meant that in Lila's mind, I was standing in the way of two things that were supposed to be hers.

That was not a cousin I could afford to leave with any kind of power.

Darcy seemed to follow my thoughts without me speaking them. "If your father gives her the Alpha position," she said quietly, "what happens to this pack?"

I did not answer.

"Cecilia." Her voice was not sharp, but it was serious. "I am not asking to push you. I am asking because I think you already know the answer and you are trying not to look at it."

I looked at the floor instead.

I thought about the pack. Not the elders, not the gossip, not the debt. The actual people who had no idea what was being decided behind closed doors right now and were simply going about their lives, relying on the fact that the people above them were making good decisions.

Lila had never cared about any of them. Not in any way that was real. She cared about what leading them would give her. The title. The authority. The position.

If she took over, everything I had spent my life building and protecting would go to someone who saw it as a prize.

Darcy said nothing. She just let me sit with it.

And I sat with it for a long time.

***

Then I stood up.

I did not say anything to Darcy. I did not need to. She read my face and gave me a short nod, and I walked back out into the corridor and made my way to my father's study.

I opened the door without knocking.

Bonn looked up from his desk.

"I will do it," I announced. "I will mate Cassian."

The breath he let out was long and slow, like he had been holding it for days.

He straightened in his chair and looked at me with something that might have been relief.

"You are making the right decision," he said.

I said nothing to that.

I just turned and walked back out praying I'd really made the right decision.