My Alpha Rejected Me While I Carried His Pup

The bond broke at exactly 10:47 p.m., three days before our ninth anniversary.

I was standing at Damian's side in the Shadowmere Pack hall, the mark on my neck warm and steady, when he rose from his seat. The firelight caught the planes of his face. Every ranked wolf in the territory had assembled for the annual Banquet — Betas, Gammas, Deltas in formal dress, the air thick with roasted venison and the herb rubs I'd spent a week preparing. I'd arranged every detail personally. The tables. The lighting. The exact spice blend Damian's recovering wolf responded to best.

He'd been cold all evening. Distant. I told myself it was Alpha burdens. Pack politics. The usual weight he carried.

Then he spoke.

"I, Damian, Alpha of the Shadowmere Pack, reject you, Theodora, as my mate and Luna."

The mark on my neck plunged cold.

Not metaphorically. Not emotionally. Physically cold — like someone had pressed ice directly against the scar tissue where his teeth had once claimed me. Then the cold inverted into emptiness. A hollow. A door slamming shut in a room that no longer existed.

My wolf — the faint hum I'd carried beneath my consciousness since awakening — howled. Not out loud. Inside. A sound that tore through my chest and collapsed inward, like a structure losing its foundation all at once.

I staggered.

The hall went silent. Not the polite silence of ceremony. The biological silence of two hundred wolves feeling a Luna bond sever in real time. I could see it on their faces — the flinch, the confusion, the instinctive recoil from something that should not be possible.

Damian kept speaking.

"Analia carries my pup. She will be Shadowmere's new Luna."

His hand settled on her waist. She stood beside him now — when had she moved there? — in a dress the color of fresh blood. Her smile was small and perfect. Damian's Alpha aura blazed around them both, commanding and certain, as if this had always been the plan.

My vision blurred at the edges.

Someone gasped. Whispers erupted across the hall like a wildfire catching. I heard fragments — "rejected" — "the Luna" — "pregnant" — but the words felt distant, muffled, like I was underwater.

I looked down at my hands. They were shaking.

A glass shattered somewhere to my left. I turned toward the sound by instinct and felt a sharp sting across my palm. Blood welled up between my fingers, bright red against my skin. I'd knocked into the broken glass without realizing it.

I looked toward Damian.

Eight years of habit. Eight years of turning to him first when something went wrong. Eight years of being the one he turned to.

He wasn't looking at me.

Analia swayed on her feet. Her hand flew to her forehead. She made a small, breathy sound — "I feel faint" — and Damian caught her before she could fall. His entire focus snapped to her. His wolf surged forward, protective and immediate.

"Everyone attend to Analia," he commanded, his Alpha tone rolling through the hall like a physical force. Wolves moved. Chairs scraped. Someone rushed forward with water.

No one moved toward me.

I stood there, blood dripping from my palm onto the floor I'd scrubbed myself three days ago, and watched my mate — my fated mate, the wolf whose memory I had rebuilt piece by piece after the rogue attack shattered his mind — cradle another she-wolf in his arms.

The hollow in my neck pulsed. Empty. Cold.

Damian's voice cut through the noise again. Still not looking at me.

"Take her to the Omega quarters."

I blinked. My brain struggled to process the words.

Her.

Me.

Two Delta warriors stepped forward. I recognized them — Garrett and Finn, wolves I'd served beside for years, wolves whose mates I'd helped through difficult births, wolves who had called me Luna every day for the past eight years.

Garrett's hand closed around my upper arm. Finn took the other side.

"Luna—" Garrett started, his voice low and uncertain.

"She's not Luna anymore," Damian said flatly. He still wasn't looking at me. His hand was stroking Analia's hair. "Strip her of the title. Move her belongings to the Omega wing by morning."

My bleeding hand pressed flat against the edge of the table. The wood was smooth and cool under my palm. I'd chosen this table. I'd set it. I'd prepared every dish on it.

The pressure helped. Grounded me. Kept me from collapsing.

Garrett's grip tightened — not rough, but firm. "Come on," he said quietly. "Don't make this harder."

I let them pull me away from the table. Away from the firelight. Away from the hall where every wolf in Shadowmere had just watched me be unmade.

As they dragged me toward the door, I looked back once.

Damian was lifting Analia into his arms. She tucked her face against his neck — the exact spot where my mark used to sit on his skin. Her hand rested on her belly. Protective. Possessive.

She caught my eye over his shoulder.

And smiled.