Luna was deep in conversation with Sarah about pack healing traditions when the commotion started. Shouts erupted from the perimeter guards, followed by the sound of vehicles approaching through the forest. Her newly awakened wolf senses immediately went on high alert, picking up scents that didn't belong—gasoline, expensive cologne, and something else that made her hackles rise.
"What's happening?" Luna asked, rising from her seat in the pack's informal medical center.
Sarah's expression had gone grim as she listened to the distant voices. "Someone's breached our outer defenses. That shouldn't be possible—the pack lands are warded against human detection."
Kane's voice boomed across the settlement, his Alpha authority carrying clearly in the mountain air. "All pack members to defensive positions. We have uninvited visitors."
Luna followed Sarah outside, where a crowd was already gathering near the main lodge. Through the trees, she could see the approaching convoy—three black SUVs with government plates, moving with the kind of precision that spoke of military or law enforcement training.
"Luna Blackwood!"
The voice that rang out from the lead vehicle made Luna's blood run cold. She knew that voice, had heard it whisper sweet words and make promises about their future together. But there was something different about it now—harder, more commanding, with an edge that she'd never noticed during their two years together.
"Marcus," she breathed.
The SUVs came to a stop just outside the main settlement area, and Marcus Stone stepped out of the passenger seat of the lead vehicle. Even at this distance, Luna could see that he looked exactly as she remembered—tall and lean, with brown hair and intelligent brown eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses. He wore a perfectly tailored charcoal suit that probably cost more than most people made in a month, and he moved with the confident stride of someone accustomed to getting his way.
But there were differences too. The easy smile she remembered was gone, replaced by something colder and more calculating. And the men who emerged from the other vehicles weren't the federal agents she might have expected—they were something else entirely, moving with a lethal precision that made her wolf spirit bare its metaphorical teeth.
Kane appeared at Luna's side, his massive frame radiating protective fury. "How the hell did they find us?"
"I don't know," Luna whispered, but even as she said it, a terrible suspicion was forming in her mind. Marcus wasn't just here by accident. This wasn't some desperate search by a worried fiancé. This was planned, coordinated, and far too well-informed.
Marcus began walking toward the settlement, his hands raised in a gesture of peaceful intent that Luna didn't buy for a second. "Luna, I know this looks bad, but I need you to come with me. There are things you don't understand, dangers you're not aware of."
"Stay back!" Kane's voice carried the full weight of his Alpha authority, and Luna saw several of the armed men shift nervously. Even humans could sense when they were in the presence of a true predator.
But Marcus didn't seem intimidated. If anything, he looked almost amused. "I'm not here to fight, Kane Silvermoon. I'm here to retrieve my fiancée and return her to her proper life."
"I'm not your fiancée anymore, Marcus," Luna called out, stepping forward despite Kane's protective instincts. "That engagement ended the moment I discovered who I really am."
Marcus's expression softened, and for a moment, Luna caught a glimpse of the man she'd thought she loved. "Luna, sweetheart, I know this must all seem very overwhelming. Discovering you have some... unusual heritage... it's a lot to process. But you belong in the human world. You have a career, a life, a future with me."
"A future built on lies," Luna shot back. "You knew, didn't you? You knew what I was before I did."
Something flickered across Marcus's features—too quickly for a human to catch, but Luna's enhanced senses picked it up. Guilt, maybe, or calculation. "I suspected there might be something unusual about your background," he admitted. "Your adoptive parents were quite mysterious about your early childhood. But I loved you regardless of what you might be."
"Loved me?" Luna's voice rose with anger she didn't fully understand. "Or loved what I represented? What I could give you access to?"
Marcus took another step forward, and Luna noticed that his men had subtly repositioned themselves to flank the pack's defensive positions. This wasn't a rescue mission—it was a tactical operation.
"Luna, you're being paranoid," Marcus said in the same reasonable tone he'd used during their relationship when he wanted to convince her she was overreacting. "These people have filled your head with supernatural nonsense. You're a human being with an unfortunately complex genetic background. Nothing more."
"She's the lost princess of the Silver Moon Pack," Kane snarled, moving to stand protectively in front of Luna. "She's our rightful Alpha, and she's under pack protection."
Marcus's laugh was cold and dismissive. "She's a corporate lawyer with a law degree and a mortgage. She drinks overpriced coffee and works sixty-hour weeks and gets motion sickness on boats. She's human, Silvermoon. And humans belong in human society."
Luna felt something twist in her chest at Marcus's words. Not because they hurt, but because they were so obviously designed to hurt. This was the man she'd planned to marry, the man she'd shared her bed and her dreams with for two years. And he was using her own insecurities as weapons against her.
"You're right," Luna said quietly, and she saw triumph flash across Marcus's face. "I am all of those things. But I'm also something more."
She let her wolf spirit come forward, just enough to make her eyes flash silver and her voice carry otherworldly authority. "I'm Luna Silvermoon, heir to the royal bloodline, and you're trespassing on pack lands."
Marcus's confident expression faltered slightly, but he recovered quickly. "Impressive parlor tricks, Luna. But they don't change what you really are, or where you really belong."
"And where exactly do I belong, Marcus?" Luna stepped out from behind Kane's protective bulk, drawing on every ounce of courtroom presence she'd ever possessed. "In your bed? In your trophy case? Or in whatever cage your real employers have prepared for me?"
The mask slipped completely for just a moment, and Luna saw something cold and predatory flash across Marcus's features. "You always were too smart for your own good," he murmured, so quietly that only Luna's enhanced hearing could pick it up.
Then his public face was back in place, concerned and loving and utterly false. "Luna, you're clearly not thinking rationally. These people have brainwashed you, convinced you that you're something you're not. Come home with me, and we'll get you the help you need."
"The help I need?" Luna's voice was dangerously quiet. "What kind of help, Marcus? Therapy to convince me I'm delusional? Medication to suppress my awakening abilities? Or something more permanent?"
"If necessary," Marcus said, and this time he didn't bother to hide the threat in his voice.
The pack members around Luna began to shift and growl, their wolf instincts responding to the obvious menace. Kane's transformation was already beginning, his human features taking on lupine characteristics as his protective fury overwhelmed his control.
"You made a mistake coming here," Kane said, his voice distorting as his vocal cords changed. "Luna is pack now. She's family. And we protect our family."
Marcus reached into his jacket, and Luna's enhanced senses caught the metallic scent of weapons being readied by his men. "I really hoped we could do this the easy way," he said with what sounded like genuine regret. "Luna always responded better to persuasion than force."
"Marcus, don't," Luna said urgently. "These people are innocent. If you have a problem with me, it's between us."
"Oh, but it's not just between us anymore, is it?" Marcus's smile was sharp as a blade. "You've made yourself part of their world, which makes them part of ours. And we have very specific policies about supernatural threats to national security."
"National security?" Luna's legal mind immediately began parsing the implications. "Marcus, who do you work for?"
"The same people I've always worked for, Luna. The ones who've been keeping this country safe from monsters for over a century." Marcus's hand emerged from his jacket holding what looked like a sleek, futuristic pistol. "The Human Protection Council sends its regards."
Luna's world tilted sideways as the pieces clicked into place. The mysterious funding that had allowed her adoptive parents to hide her identity. The convenient way Marcus had entered her life just as she was establishing herself as a lawyer. The fact that he'd found the pack lands despite their supernatural protections.
"You," she whispered. "You're the one who's been watching me. You're the reason I was hidden all these years."
"Very good," Marcus said approvingly. "We've been monitoring you since childhood, Luna. Making sure you stayed dormant, stayed human, stayed safe. We had such hopes that you'd never awaken, that you could live a normal life and never become the threat your bloodline represents."
"Threat?" Kane's voice was barely recognizable now, more growl than speech. "She's no threat to anyone."
"She's the last royal heir to the most powerful werewolf pack in North America," Marcus replied calmly. "In the right hands, she could unite every supernatural faction on the continent. In the wrong hands..." He shrugged eloquently. "Well, we can't allow that possibility to exist."
Luna felt rage building in her chest, hot and clean and absolutely justified. "So you planned everything. The job at the law firm, our relationship, the engagement—all of it was surveillance."
"Not all of it," Marcus said, and for the first time, his voice held a note of what might have been genuine emotion. "I wasn't supposed to actually fall for you, Luna. That was... an unexpected complication."
"But not enough to stop you from betraying me."
Marcus's expression hardened. "My feelings for you don't change what you are, or what needs to be done. Come with me willingly, and I can promise you'll be treated humanely. The Council has facilities where you can live comfortably while we study your abilities and ensure you're not a threat."
"And if I refuse?"
Marcus gestured to his men, who had now openly drawn their weapons—sleek, advanced-looking guns that Luna suspected were designed specifically for supernatural targets. "Then we take you by force, and anyone who tries to stop us becomes collateral damage."
Luna looked around at the pack members who had welcomed her home, at Kane who had waited twenty years for her return, at Sarah who had held her as a child. These people were her family now, her responsibility. And Marcus was threatening to kill them because of what she was.
The silver crystal from her awakening trial was in her pocket, warm against her palm. She could feel power humming through it, power that might be enough to protect the pack. But using it would mean fully embracing her supernatural nature, abandoning any hope of returning to her human life.
Not that Marcus was offering her much of a choice.
"There's a third option," Luna said quietly, her hand closing around the crystal. "One you haven't considered."
"Oh?" Marcus raised an eyebrow. "And what would that be?"
Luna smiled, and let her wolf spirit shine through her eyes like silver fire. "You could leave my lands immediately and never come back. And if you're very, very lucky, I might let you live long enough to deliver that message to your Council."
Marcus's laugh was genuinely amused. "Luna, sweetheart, you're one woman against a trained tactical team. Even with whatever party tricks you've picked up, you're still—"
He never finished the sentence. Luna called on the power in the crystal, and silver light exploded outward from her position. Not the chaotic overflow from her trial, but focused, controlled, devastating. The light hit Marcus's men like a physical force, sending them flying backward into the trees. Their advanced weapons sparked and died, fried by the supernatural energy.
Marcus himself was protected by some kind of personal shield device, but Luna could see the shock and fear on his face as he realized what he was actually dealing with.
"Impossible," he breathed. "The readings never showed this level of power."
"Maybe your readings were wrong," Luna said conversationally, silver light still dancing around her fingers. "Or maybe you never understood what you were really looking at."
Marcus fumbled for his radio. "Control, this is Stone. I need immediate backup. The target is not contained, repeat, the target is not contained."
A voice crackled back through static: "Negative, Agent Stone. You are to complete the mission with current resources."
Luna saw something like panic flash across Marcus's features. "Control, you don't understand. She's not what we thought. Her power levels are off the charts. I need supernatural containment units."
"Agent Stone, you have your orders. Bring in the asset or eliminate the threat. Your choice."
The radio went dead, and Marcus stared at it in disbelief. Then he looked up at Luna, and she saw something she'd never seen in his eyes before—genuine fear.
"They're going to leave me here," he said wonderingly. "They're going to sacrifice me to cover their mistake."
"That's what happens when you work for monsters," Kane said, his voice returning to normal as the immediate threat seemed to pass. "They eat their own when it's convenient."
Marcus looked around at his unconscious men, at the pack members surrounding him, at Luna blazing with supernatural power like a goddess of war. "Luna," he said desperately, "we can work something out. I can help you disappear, create new identities for you and your people. The Council doesn't have to know—"
"The Council already knows, Marcus," Luna said sadly. "They've known exactly where I am since the moment I awakened. The only question is whether they'll come after me with a scalpel or a sledgehammer."
She let the silver light fade, but kept the crystal ready in her hand. "You have a choice to make. You can go back to your masters and tell them that Luna Silvermoon is no longer hiding. That she's claimed her birthright and will defend her people against any threat. Or..."
"Or?" Marcus's voice was barely a whisper.
"Or you can stay here and face the consequences of twenty years of lies." Luna's expression was cold as winter moonlight. "Either way, Marcus Stone, this is the last time you'll set foot on pack lands."
Marcus looked around one more time, calculation flickering behind his eyes. Luna could almost see him weighing his options—a disgraced return to an organization that might eliminate him for his failure, or throwing himself on the mercy of people he'd spent years deceiving.
In the end, pragmatism won out. "This isn't over, Luna," he said, backing toward his vehicle. "The Council won't stop. They can't afford to let you unite the supernatural factions."
"Then they'll learn what it means to threaten my family," Luna replied simply.
Marcus dragged his unconscious men into the SUVs and drove away, leaving only tire tracks and the lingering scent of fear to mark his passage.
As the sound of engines faded into the distance, Kane moved to Luna's side. "Are you all right?"
Luna was quiet for a long moment, processing everything that had just happened. Her relationship with Marcus, her engagement, the future she'd planned—all of it had been built on surveillance and lies. The Human Protection Council had been watching her since childhood, controlling her life, preparing for the day when she might become a threat.
But more than that, they'd just declared war on her and everyone she cared about.
"No," Luna said finally. "I'm not all right. But I will be."
She looked around at the pack members who had stood ready to fight for her, to die for her if necessary. These people barely knew her, but they'd accepted her as family. They'd offered her everything Marcus had pretended to give—love, loyalty, belonging.
"Kane," she said quietly, "call a pack meeting. It's time I stopped running from who I'm supposed to be."
"Luna?"
She turned to him, and Kane saw something new in her silver eyes—not just acceptance of her heritage, but embrace of it. The lost princess was finally ready to become a queen.
"The Council wants a war," Luna said, her voice carrying the authority of twenty generations of royal bloodline. "Let's give them one they'll never forget."
End of Chapter 7