A week of confinement in the East Wing felt like a slow, agonizing death. I hadn't eaten a full meal in days. The violent bouts of nausea came in relentless waves, leaving me trembling on the cold bathroom tile. I thought it was the poison of our rotting mate bond. I thought my body was simply failing under the weight of River’s constant rejection. Inside my mind, my wolf, Maeve, was nothing but a silent, shivering shadow.

Then, the frantic screams erupted from the pack garden.

The sheer terror in the voices pulled me from my bed. Ignoring River’s strict orders to remain out of sight, I stumbled down the grand staircase and pushed open the heavy glass doors leading to the courtyard.

The crisp autumn air was tainted. Beneath the familiar scent of damp earth and pine, a bitter, acidic odor burned my nostrils. Wolfsbane.

A crowd of pack members stood in a wide, terrified circle on the manicured lawn. I pushed through the frozen warriors, my bare feet sinking into the cold grass. What I saw made the blood drain from my face.

River was on his knees. In his massive arms lay Leilany. Her body convulsed violently, her eyes rolled back into her head, and thick white foam bubbled past her pale lips. The sickeningly sweet scent of jasmine and peaches was drowned out by the lethal poison radiating from her pores.

Beside River’s knee, a crumpled piece of parchment fluttered in the wind.

"Alpha," a trembling Delta warrior whispered, pointing to the paper. "She left this note... She said the Luna’s cruelty... she said she couldn't take the bullying anymore."

River snatched the forged note. His broad shoulders went completely rigid. When he slowly lifted his head to look at me, my breath caught in my throat. His irises weren't their familiar, warm golden brown. They were completely pitch black. His inner wolf had taken over, driven into a blind, irrational frenzy by the sight of the dying Omega he had sworn to protect.

"You did this," River snarled. His voice wasn't his own; it was a demonic, layered growl that shook the yellowing leaves on the trees. "Her blood is on your hands, Serena."

"River, no," I choked out, stepping forward. I held my empty hands up in surrender. "I haven't left my room in seven days. I swear to the Moon Goddess, I had nothing to do with this!"

"Stay back!" he roared, clutching Leilany tighter to his chest.

"Please, just listen to me!" I took another desperate step toward my mate, needing to snap him out of this blinding delusion.

But River didn't see his Luna. He didn't see the woman he had loved since childhood. He only saw a threat to the fragile creature in his arms.

He lunged forward.

I braced myself, expecting him to shove me away. I expected the crushing, suffocating weight of his Alpha aura to force me to my knees once again.

I didn't expect the sickening sound of flesh tearing.

Slash.

Time stopped. The horrific sound echoed in my ears, drowning out the gasps of the surrounding pack. A sudden, blinding fire erupted across my stomach. I looked down, my mind unable to process the horror.

Four deep, jagged claw marks ripped horizontally across my abdomen. My pale sweater instantly soaked crimson, the hot, thick blood spilling over my trembling hands.

River stood frozen. The black receded from his eyes, replaced by a sudden flash of raw, unadulterated shock as he stared at his own blood-soaked claws.

Before he could even speak my name, my knees gave out.

I hit the grass hard. The pain was absolute, tearing through my physical body and ripping straight into my soul.

"Luna!" Beta Marcus’s voice shattered the paralyzing silence. He sprinted across the lawn, dropping to his knees beside me. His large hands pressed desperately against my torn flesh, trying to stem the massive flow of blood. "Get Healer Elena! Get her to the infirmary! Now!"

The world blurred into muted colors and distorted sounds. I felt myself being lifted into Marcus's arms, rushed down the sterile white hallways of the packhouse. The metallic smell of my own blood choked me, pulling me into a merciful darkness.

When I finally blinked against the harsh fluorescent lights, I was lying on a metal cot. The searing pain in my stomach was tightly bandaged, but it was eclipsed by a hollow, agonizing void echoing deep within my womb.

Healer Elena stood over me. Her medical apron was covered in my blood, and heavy tears streamed relentlessly down her face.

"Elena?" I whispered, my voice barely a dry rasp.

"Oh, Luna..." she sobbed, her shoulders shaking violently as she gripped the edge of my bed. "I tried. Goddess, I tried so hard to save it."

"Save what?" I breathed. A new, terrifying coldness gripped my heart.

Elena took my trembling hand in hers. She looked at me with a pity that shattered whatever was left of my soul. "You were pregnant, Serena. You were carrying the Alpha's pup."

The words hung in the sterile air, heavy and fatal.

"But the trauma..." She choked on a sob, her eyes dropping to my bandaged stomach. "The depth of the Alpha's claw wounds... I'm so sorry, Serena. The pup is gone."

Inside my mind, Maeve let out one final, blood-curdling wail before falling completely silent. The relentless nausea of the past week hadn't been our rotting bond. It had been my baby.

My fated mate hadn't just struck me. He had slaughtered our unborn child to protect a lying rogue.

The sterile smell of the infirmary suffocated me. Elena’s quiet sobs were the only sound in the room, but inside my head, the silence was deafening. Maeve, my beautiful, spirited inner wolf, was gone. She hadn't just retreated; she had shattered into a million irreparable pieces the moment our mate’s claws tore into our womb.

My baby. Gone.

A hollow, cavernous ache radiated from my bandaged stomach. The grief didn’t just break me—it incinerated me. It burned away the devoted, forgiving Luna and left behind a creature forged of pure, unadulterated agony.

Then, a violent commotion erupted in the hallway.

"Get out of my way! Let me see her!" River’s voice roared through the walls.

He was coming. The man who slaughtered our unborn pup for a lying rogue was coming to demand my submission again. Panic spiked in my blood, but it was quickly swallowed by a cold, absolute resolve. I couldn't let him use his Alpha command on me. Not ever again.

I reached up to my throat. The mating mark pulsed against my fingertips, a cruel, mocking reminder of a sacred bond that had brought me nothing but death.

I extended my claws. They were trembling, dull from lack of use, but fueled by a mother's devastating heartbreak. I dug them deep into my own flesh, right over the crescent-shaped scar.

"Luna, no!" Elena shrieked, lunging forward.

"I, Serena..." I gasped, blood welling hot and thick over my knuckles. I stared blindly at the locked door as it began to shudder under River's weight. "...finally and forever reject you, Alpha River."

With a guttural scream, I ripped my hand down.

Flesh tore. Hot blood sprayed across the pristine white sheets. The mate bond snapped like a heavy, steel cable in my chest. The spiritual backlash was blinding, a soul-deep tearing that tasted like ash and copper. But beneath the excruciating pain, there was a sudden, violent liberation. The heavy chain around my neck dissolved.

The heavy oak door splintered inward just as Beta Marcus stepped out from the shadows of the infirmary's supply closet. His eyes were wide, locked in horror on my ruined neck and the blood pooling on my collarbone. He looked at the shattered door frame, then back at me. The loyalty to his Alpha warred viciously with the horrific injustice he had just witnessed.

Marcus made his choice.

He darted forward, grabbing my waist and hauling me to my feet while Elena shoved open the emergency exit.

"Take her," Elena sobbed, pressing a thick wad of gauze against my bleeding throat. "Run!"

The brutal winter air hit me like a wall of ice. Snow crunched beneath my bare feet as Marcus practically carried me into the dense pine forest. My torn abdomen screamed in agony with every step. My freshly mangled neck bled freely, staining Marcus’s shirt crimson. I was fading fast, my body shutting down from the catastrophic blood loss and the shock of a severed fated bond.

"Just a little further, Serena," Marcus panted, his voice thick with shame and sorrow. "Stay with me."

We broke through the tree line. The frozen creek lay before us—the border of the Silver Lake Pack. My birth pack. My home.

"Go," Marcus whispered, stopping at the edge of the ice. He gently pushed me forward, tears freezing on his cheeks. "May the Goddess protect you."

I stumbled blindly across the frozen water. Behind me, I heard the distant, earth-shattering howl of an Alpha realizing his mate bond was permanently dead. But it didn't pull at my soul anymore. It was just noise.

As my bare feet hit the opposite bank, massive wolves burst from the snowy bushes. Silver Lake border patrols. I recognized the silver-grey fur of my older brother just as my knees finally gave out. I collapsed into his shifting, human arms, the darkness dragging me under.

Warmth. The faint, comforting scent of cedar and vanilla.

I blinked open my heavy eyelids to stare at the familiar wooden beams of my childhood bedroom. My father, Alpha Vincent, sat beside the bed. His face, usually so stoic and proud, was aged with fresh lines of terror. My mother knelt on the floor, her face buried in the blankets, weeping silently against my hip.

"Serena," my father rumbled, his voice cracking as I stirred. "My beautiful girl. What did he do to you?"

I slowly moved my hand to my stomach. Flat. Empty. I moved it up to my neck. Thickly bandaged. Free.

I looked into my father's eyes, and the dam broke. I told him everything. I told him about the ninety-nine times River came home reeking of the rogue Omega. I told him about the forced submissions, the public humiliations, and the staged poisoning. And finally, with a dead, hollow voice, I told him about the claws that tore my unborn pup from my womb.

The temperature in the bedroom plummeted.

My father stood up slowly. His Alpha aura exploded outward, a lethal, suffocating pressure that rattled the windowpanes and made the floorboards groan. But unlike River’s aura, it didn't crush me. It wrapped around me like a heavy, impenetrable shield.

"Call the council," Alpha Vincent snarled to his Beta standing guard at the door. "Sever every trade route. Burn the alliance treaties. Any Crescent Moon wolf that steps foot near our borders will be slaughtered on sight."

He looked down at me, his eyes burning with a father's protective fury. "River has declared war on this family. And I will make him drown in the ashes of his own pack."

I closed my eyes, letting out a long, shaky breath into the quiet room. The Crescent Moon Luna was dead. But Serena of Silver Lake was finally breathing again.