I had just latched the clasps on my old suitcase when the clinic's decaying wooden door was blasted from its hinges.

Slade stood in the shadows. He leaned against the doorframe, looking effortlessly handsome and completely unthreatened. "I knew I'd find you."

He stepped inside, his expensive leather shoes groaning on the rotten floorboards.

I instinctively backed away, my hand reaching for the silver scalpel on the table.

But he was too fast. In the blink of an eye, he had crossed the room.

My back slammed against a medicine cabinet, sending glass vials clattering. His large hands pinned me there.

"Where did you think you could run?" he demanded, is voice low and seductive, nuzzling my ear.

I tried to struggle, but there was no room.

Suddenly, the feral look in his eyes receded for a moment, replaced by a flicker of panic.

"For three hours, I couldn't feel you," he pressed his forehead against mine, his voice hoarse. "I thought something had happened to you..."

The heart I thought could no longer be moved gave a painful twinge.

But I quickly snapped back to reality. This was an Alpha's possessiveness, not love.

"Let go of me, Slade."

"Not until you tell me where you're going with that suitcase."

"That has nothing to do with you."

"Nothing to do with me?" he scoffed, his hand clamping around my jaw, tilting my head up so he could smile down at me.

"Every breath you take belongs to the Blackwood Pack. You're mine, Eloise. You don't get to leave until I say so."

"I've repaid my debt to this pack. With my dignity, and with the flower I burned." I looked him straight in the eye. "I am free."

"What did you say? Free?" He released me and pulled a yellowed parchment from his coat.

Slap.

He slammed it down on the dusty clinic table.

"Look at this."

The moment my eyes fell on it, the long list of arguments I had prepared died on my lips.

The parchment was titled in large letters: Guardianship Pact. At the bottom was my mother's elegant signature, next to the embossed crest of the Blackwood Pack.

My mother had told me about her connection to the Blackwood pack.

Twenty years ago, during the pack wars, the then-Luna of Blackwood, Slade's mother, Slone, had fled to the human world and been saved by my mother.

As a doctor, my mother had saved Slone's life.

As fate would have it, their personalities clicked, and they became the best of friends.

Later, when my mother fell gravely ill, she brought a young, orphaned me to the Blackwood Pack, entrusting Slone to raise me.

To give me a legitimate reason to stay in a werewolf pack, Slone saw that I had inherited my mother's gift and wanted to train me as a healer for the werewolf world.

"Don't forget, Eloise. Your mother signed this pact. As long as the Blackwood pack stands, you belong to it as its healer."

A chill ran through me.

I understood that my mother and Slone had devised this as a compromise to ensure I could survive.

But now, it had become the very chain that bound me.

Slade closed the distance again, his fingers tracing my cheek in a deceptively gentle gesture. "Tomorrow night is the bonding ceremony. You must be there."

"Since you were naughty and destroyed the Moonlight Flower, you have to make it up to me," he whispered against my lips. "Prepare a vial of pure restorative essence. Present it to Rosalind. On your knees. Show everyone how much you love your new Luna."

"If you refuse," he released me and adjusted his collar, smirking. "I will burn this clinic to the ground. I know how much you love your mother's trash. Just like you burned that flower."

This clinic held all of my mother's manuscripts, the only things I had left of her in this world.

I looked at him, the man who had been my lover for ten years, now a complete stranger.

"Fine," I heard myself say, my voice unnaturally calm. "I'll be there. I'll give you the 'loyalty' you want."

Slade smiled, satisfied.

"See you tomorrow, Eloise. Wear something nice for me."

His figure disappeared into the night.

I picked up the vial of energy essence from the table, my fingers stroking the cool glass.

"A pact," I whispered, "must eventually be settled."

The Blackwood Pack's sacred altar square had never looked so solemn.

The grounds of the grand bonding ceremony were covered in flowers, but all I could smell was their sickeningly sweet stench.

I stood alone in the shadows below the altar, holding the vial of "doctored" energy essence.

The star of the evening, Rosalind, approached me, wearing a gown that seemed woven from moonlight. She carried herself with the full grace of a future Luna.

She stopped in front of me and held up her left hand, deliberately flashing it before my eyes.

On her finger was a massive ring.

It was set with a flawless moonstone.

Ten times larger, ten times purer than the one Slade had destroyed.

"See," Rosalind's voice was soft, for my ears only. "This is the difference, Eloise. Some stones are meant to be crushed. Others are meant for a crown."

I stared at the stone and replied numbly, "Congratulations. It suits you."

Slade walked over, dressed in a sharp ceremonial uniform, a golden wolf head embroidered on his chest.

His gaze passed over me and landed on Rosalind.

"What are you talking to my healer about?"

"It's time. Let's go."

He offered his arm, and Rosalind took it.

They walked toward the altar, looking like the perfect couple.

Just as the High Priest raised the sacred staff, as the union of purebloods was about to be sealed, a deafening explosion tore through the night sky. A floodlight tower at the edge of the square exploded without warning.

"Attack! It's Rogues!"

Someone screamed. Immediately, black-clad rogues swarmed in from all directions, armed with modified firearms and silver knives.

Chaos erupted. The attackers were clearly well-prepared.

A dark metal sphere, its fuse hissing, was thrown with precision toward the high platform.

It exploded in mid-air, releasing a cloud of purple smoke.

It was a bomb filled with wolf venom dust.

The bomb's trajectory was wickedly precise, aimed at the central point between Slade, Rosalind, and me.

Upon impact, the high concentration of wolf venom dust would be enough to instantly corrode our respiratory systems.

There was only a second to react, but that second stretched into an eternity.

Slade moved.

I watched him charge forward, instinctively reaching out my hand, thinking he would grab me first, just as he had in every moment of danger for the past ten years.

This time, he glanced at me, but his hand went past me.

He seized Rosalind by the waist, pulling her into a protective embrace.

To get a faster burst of speed, to push Rosalind further away, to absolute safety...

He used me as a springboard, kicking off my body to propel himself and her to safety while sending me flying into the center of the blast.

The shockwave, thick with purple dust, exploded.

I was thrown backward, my back hitting the cold stone steps of the altar with brutal force.

The purple smoke instantly filled my lungs.

For werewolves, wolf venom is a weakening agent. But for a human, a high concentration of it is a corrosive poison that eats away at the lungs.

Every breath felt like swallowing hot coals. The wolf venom dust invaded my lungs, viciously corroding my insides.

My vision began to blur. Blood poured from my mouth and nose.

In the moments before my vision faded to black, I forced my eyes open one last time, looking toward the high platform.

Through the spreading smoke, I saw Slade carrying an unharmed Rosalind toward the cover behind the altar.

He was anxiously asking if she was frightened.

In a daze, I thought I saw him glance back at me.

But what did it matter? He had sacrificed his "asset," the one he himself had kicked into a cloud of poison.

"Blackwood warriors, take care of these rogues!" Slade roared, unleashing his Alpha command.

The battle raged on, while I lay in a pool of my own blood.

As darkness finally fell, I wondered if Slade, even for a second, felt a flicker of remorse for the woman who had soothed him night after night.

But then again, his actions had already shown his choice.

And for me, this was a kind of release.

The smoke cleared. The red glow of the emergency lights painted the ruins in shades of blood.

Slade stood in the center of the altar, facing a formidable Alpha of equal stature.

Killian Thorne, Rosalind's father, the Alpha of the Thorne Pack.

"I need an explanation," Killian's accusatory voice rang out. "My daughter nearly died on your territory."

"The attackers will pay the price. Every last rogue will be hunted down," Slade replied.

"Not enough."

Killian's gaze swept across the chaos, finally settling on me where I was propped up against a stone pillar.

"That human," he pointed a finger at me from across the square. "She is your weakness. She distracted you at a critical moment."

However absurd, the powerful always need a scapegoat.

Killian took a step forward, the clash of their Alpha auras sparking in the air.

"Our alliance is built on strength. An Alpha who allows a human to interfere with his judgment is not trustworthy. Unless..."

He delivered his ultimatum.

"Eliminate this liability before the official marking ceremony. Otherwise, the Thorne Pack withdraws its support, and our alliance is void."

Slade was silent.

The moment seemed to stretch on forever.

Finally, he slowly turned. The last flicker of conflict in his eyes died out, replaced by the cold logic of a ruler.

He called for Lucas, his voice low, yet it hit me harder than the wolf venom. "Begin the operation. The target is Eloise Vance."

Tears I didn't know I had left to cry streamed down my face, mixing with the taste of blood in my mouth.

The ultimate tragedy was this: I wasn't defeated by another woman, but by his own ambition and his so-called greater good.

My broken body was all but dragged to the herb garden I once treasured.

It had been my sanctuary. I never imagined it would become my grave.

Rosalind was already waiting for me.

She stood before the ruined Moonlight Flower bed, holding an exquisite silver dagger.

Behind her stood two burly werewolf enforcers.

"Slade told me to purify this place. Since you have to die, you might as well die in the place you loved most."

"And don't blame him," she said. "For the future of the pack, a stain like you must be cleansed."

She waved a hand. "Do it. Make it look like an accident."

The two werewolves closed in on me.

In their eyes, I was just a lamb to the slaughter.

But I wasn't.

I am a healer. I know how to save lives, which means I know even better how to take them.

From a hidden pocket in my dress, I pulled out two pre-filled syringes.

They contained a specially prepared, high-concentration dose of a powerful anesthetic.

As the first enforcer lunged, I endured the searing pain of my broken ribs and twisted, plunging the needle precisely into his carotid artery.

He collapsed without a sound, a boneless heap on the ground.

The second enforcer froze for a split second. I used the opening to jab the other syringe deep into his thigh muscle.

Rosalind screamed and stumbled backward, her delicate face twisted in fear.

"You... you used poison! You're insane!"

"You killed them!"

She brandished the dagger wildly, accidentally nicking her own arm.

Blood welled up.

I picked up the daggers the two enforcers had dropped and stood up straight, covered in blood. "It's an anesthetic. I haven't killed them."

"Help! Slade! Help me!"

Rosalind suddenly began to wail, clutching her arm. "Eloise has gone mad! She's trying to kill me!"

I scoffed. What a masterful actress.

Pack enforcers in their wolf forms rushed in, their growls vibrating through the ground as they circled me.

Slade strode over. He saw the two unconscious pack members on the ground and the trembling, bleeding Rosalind.

Finally, he saw me, holding a dagger.

This time, his eyes were utterly frozen.

Rosalind threw herself into his arms, sobbing hysterically. "She tried to kill me! She said she was going to poison everyone who ever took you from her! Slade, I'm so scared..."

Slade held her, his gaze falling on the "weapon" in my hand.

"Eloise!"

"You dare to harm the future Luna?"

He condemned me without giving me a chance to speak.

"Lucas," he summoned his Beta.

"Yes, Alpha."

"She has offended the future Luna, poisoned members of the pack, and attempted murder within our territory."

"By the Old Laws, prepare the Ritual of Shame."

Lucas's face went white. "Alpha... are you sure?"

"The Mark of the Hunted will erase her pack scent, making her the primary target for every rogue and predator for miles around."

"Throwing an unprotected human into the wilderness with that mark... that's a death sentence."

I lay in the dirt, looking up at the Alpha who had once promised to protect me for life.

Our gazes met for a fleeting second before he spoke the words that condemned me.

"She is a healer. She has ways to survive. She won't die."

"But she needs to learn her lesson. She needs to know her place."

"Prepare the ritual. Immediately."