Dad looked very pleased with my "compliance". After all, openly challenging the Council's decision was a major taboo among werewolves, even for a pure-blood like me.

Linda also smiled with satisfaction.

After they left, Ella stayed behind.

"Ivy, let me help you pack your things," she said.

She stood meekly before me, releasing an artificial, overly sweet scent. But as her gaze swept around the room, they held an unconcealable greed—the kind a lesser wolf had for resources above their reach.

"I also didn't expect the Council to make us swap rooms."

Ella looked up with a challenging glint flashing in her eyes. "Ivy, doesn't your wolf really feel like tearing me apart now? After all, I just stole your fated mate, and now I'm taking the room you've lived in for ten years."

I suppressed the urge inside me to teach her a lesson and turned to get my suitcase.

Suddenly, Ella let out an exaggerated scream and fell hard onto the floor. "Ivy…"

When she fell, her arm happened to hit the corner of the desk inlaid with silver wire. Silver had a strong burning effect on werewolves, so her skin instantly turned a burned purplish hue.

"Ivy, what are you doing?" someone yelled.

Ethan, relying on his keen hearing as an Alpha, instantly burst through the door. His expression was dark—a sign of his rising anger—as he carefully picked Ella up.

"Ethan, I'm fine. Ivy didn't mean to do it," Ella cried while forcing a pained, light laugh. "It doesn't hurt at all."

"You're burned, and you say it doesn't hurt?" Ethan looked at the wound on her arm, his eyes filled with pain.

When he turned to look at me, his golden pupils abruptly contracted, and a cold chill emanated from him.

"Ivy, if you have any grievances, take them out on me. Don't hurt Ella. She's a fragile she-wolf who just shifted—unlike you, who was born a noble pure-blood werewolf and lacks nothing."

I thought my emotions would no longer be swayed by the mate bond. I also thought I would never shed another tear over Ethan.

But in the end, I was still just a she-wolf whose bond wasn't fully broken. I didn't have a body made of steel, nor a heart that was unbreakable.

Ethan was an ally who grew up with me. He was also my fated mate, an arrangement blessed by the Moon Goddess herself, for three years.

However, in just a few short days, he fell in love with a young she-wolf who just completed her first shift, all because it was "a novel feeling".

Now, he saw me as a vicious and heartless werewolf.

I didn't want to cry. If anything, I wanted to laugh. Yet my tear ducts ached, swollen and ready to burst.

"Ethan, has your nose stopped working? Can't you smell what kind of person I am, or the stench of lies coming off her?" I sneered.

Ethan's brow furrowed slightly. He looked at me with the scrutinizing eyes of an Alpha, though his expression seemed to soften slightly.

Ella suddenly let out a whimper, sounding like an injured pup. "Ethan, don't fight with Ivy because of me. It's okay. She has every right to be angry with me…"

Ella cried softly, acting as if she had been wronged in the worst way. The sight stirred the overflowing protective instincts within Ethan.

His gaze upon me finally froze over completely as he said, "You're jealous that my wolf chose Ella, jealous that I treat her well, and jealous that all the pack members adore her.

"Ivy, you've changed. Now, your heart has been twisted by jealousy, just like those depraved Rogues."

After he said this, he turned and left, carrying Ella. He left behind a room mixed with the scent of his angry pheromones.

I watched their retreating figures and suddenly realized my tears had dried up at some point.

I suppose that was a good thing. These past days, I had cried many times because of the mate bond that was about to break.

From now on, I wouldn't feel sad over him or shed a single tear anymore.

…

That evening, our group chat for the younger members of several families within the pack—"Wolf Den"—suddenly became lively.

Ethan had posted a message in the group, saying, "I suddenly feel like completing the marking ceremony. What should I do?"

The group instantly erupted into a commotion.

"Ethan, are you finally going to officially become mates with Ivy under the Moon Goddess's witness?"

"Time to start calling her the Luna, right?"

People in the group started tagging me one after another.

"Congratulations, Ivy! Why not treat us to some moonlight wine?"

"Ethan, when is your and Ivy's grand marking ceremony?"

The group chat was chaotic, with many messages starting to flood the screen.

I was just about to post a message to clarify that I wasn't the future Luna, and that the one Ethan wanted to mark wasn't me.

However, Ethan beat me to it.

"You've all got it wrong. I never said the mate my wolf chose was Ivy."

After saying that, he added Ella to the group. Then he tagged everyone and said, "Take a good look. This is the future Luna of the Silvermoon pack."

The clamoring group chat suddenly fell silent, as if an Alpha had cast a silencing command.

For a long while, no one spoke.

That was when Ethan sent another message.

"Why is everyone silent? Greet your future Luna. That's an Alpha's order."

The people in the chat began greeting Ella sparsely, carrying a clearly awkward and submissive tone.

After thinking about it, I sent over a message as well.

"Congratulations. May the Moon Goddess bless you both."

Following that, I immediately left the group chat, thus severing my contact with them.

I had just left the group when Ethan's call came through. As he was an Alpha, I couldn't refuse him.

"Ivy, come over right now," he demanded.

"Where?"

"You know where. The pack house."

I scoffed. "What for?"

"To apologize to Ella."

"Why should I apologize?"

"You leaving the group like that is an open provocation. Do you realize how the other families will see her now?" Ethan's tone was harsh, carrying the usual forcefulness of an Alpha.

"I don't want others to slander her. My wolf chose her as my mate, and I need to give her the rightful status. She's innocent. She shouldn't bear the reputation of a homewrecker because of your recklessness."

Even though I no longer let his actions rattle my emotions, the phantom ache of being rejected now spread through my chest.

My fingers trembled slightly as I gripped the phone, and my nails nearly transformed into claws, threatening to pierce my palms.

When I spoke, my voice trembled too. "Ethan, you can't use your Alpha authority to bully someone like this. What right do you have to treat me this way? You were the one who first abandoned our fated bond. I felt your rejection, yet I did nothing. I even congratulated you. Isn't that enough?"

I stubbornly refused to cry or show weakness to him, but my voice still carried a sob.

There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone. It was as if the wolf inside him felt unsettled in that instant.

"Ivy, I can let your disrespect slide this time, but I hope you remember—Ella is innocent. Don't take your anger out on her or hurt her."

He then ended the call.

I sat on the carpet as my whole body shook. On the nightstand was a photo of my mother. In the picture, she was looking at me gently and lovingly.

My mother had been a highly respected and high-ranking healer of the previous generation.

Suddenly, I burst into tears and threw myself over, hugging the photo frame tightly. Through a layer of cold glass, I lightly pressed my face against my mother's.

My tears kept falling, and in the photo, my mother seemed to grieve for me too.

I didn't want to cry anymore. I didn't want to worry Mom, who had already returned to the Moon Goddess's embrace.

Once the anniversary of Mom's passing was over, I would take the moonstone necklace she left me and leave the Silvermoon pack forever—whether it was to become a lone wolf with freedom, or the Luna of another pack.