Sera's Pov
Elder Ignatius's voice remained steady, but every word he spoke dragged across my skin like the edge of a dull blade. There was no emotion in his face—only the calm resolve of a man who had carried too many stories like this one.
"Some people just couldn't accept it," he said. "A wolf with such a bright future, such incredible power... and she gave it all up to live with a wizard. Simply because he was her mate."
I felt my brow tighten, not out of judgment, but because I could already hear the condemnation in those imagined voices. The disbelief. The entitlement. That brittle, old kind of pride that turned to hatred when defied.
"They believed she should have rejected him," Ignatius went on. "They thought she owed her life to the pack. That she should've chosen a 'worthy' wolf to continue her line, not a wizard. And they hated her for not doing so."
I shifted in my stance, feeling a familiar tightness coil in my chest.
