The air in the Silver Moon Pack house usually smelled of cedar and home. Tonight, it was a suffocating cocktail of expensive perfume and nervous sweat. But beneath the floral notes, I could smell it—the sharp, metallic tang of betrayal. It was a scent I was too naive to recognize as a trap until the cage door snapped shut.
I stood in the shadows of the grand ballroom's arched doorway, my fingers trembling as I smoothed the fabric of my dress. It was a faded silk gown, a hand-me-down from my cousin that had been buried in the back of my closet for years. On anyone else, the lace might have looked vintage; on me, the "Omega charity case," it was just a reminder of everything I had lost.
Today was my eighteenth birthday. In our world, eighteen was the threshold of fate. It was the day our wolves finally woke, and more importantly, the day the Moon Goddess whispered the name of our fated mates.
"Don't get your hopes up, Seraphina," a voice sneered from behind me.
I didn't have to turn to know it was Tanya, the Beta's daughter. She swept past me, her gown shimmering with crystals that probably cost more than my father's medical bills. "Even if you do shift, you'll probably be some mangy runt. A weak wolf for a weak girl."
I bit my lip until I tasted copper, refusing to give her the satisfaction of a flinch. My father had once been a high-ranking warrior, a lion among wolves, until a rogue attack left him paralyzed and our family stripped of our dignity. Since then, the pack hadn't just treated us like a burden; they treated us like a contagion.
Suddenly, the heavy oak doors at the far end of the hall swung open. The room went deathly silent—the kind of silence that precedes a lightning strike.
Killian Blackwood walked in.
He was the future Alpha, a man carved from muscle, arrogance, and shadows. His dark hair was swept back, and his golden-brown eyes scanned the room with a predator's cold intensity. He was breathtaking, and he was the person I feared most. Killian had led the pack of boys who spent their childhoods making my life a living hell, and tonight, he looked ready to finish the job.
Then, the world shifted.
A scent hit me like a physical blow to the solar plexus. It was the smell of a forest after a summer rain—cool, earthy, and laced with the intoxicating richness of dark chocolate.
Inside my mind, a voice that hadn't existed seconds ago let out a low, melodic hum. It wasn't a growl; it was a song of recognition. "Mate," the voice whispered, vibrating in my very marrow. Our King.
My heart hammered against my ribs so hard I thought the bone would snap. I looked up, and my eyes locked with Killian's. He stopped dead. His pupils dilated until his eyes were two pools of midnight, and the air between us seemed to hum with an invisible, electric current.
For one beautiful, delusional heartbeat, I thought the universe was apologizing. I thought the Moon Goddess had tied us together to heal the scars he had helped create. I took a small, tentative step forward, my hand instinctively reaching out for a connection I had craved my entire life.
Killian's expression shifted. The shock in his eyes didn't turn to warmth; it curdled into pure, unadulterated disgust. He looked at my cheap, frayed dress, my trembling hands, and my lowly position by the door as if I were a stain on his polished floor.
He didn't walk toward me. Instead, he reached out and snatched Tanya's hand, dragging her flush against his side. She smirked, a victor's glint in her eyes, though she hadn't even reached her eighteenth birthday yet.
Killian cleared his throat, his voice amplified by the raw weight of his Alpha command. It echoed off the marble walls, stripping the air from my lungs.
"Members of the Silver Moon Pack," he began, his voice cold and terrifyingly steady. "As I prepare to take my place as your Alpha, I must prioritize the strength of our bloodline. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link."
He looked directly at me. The bond in my chest screamed—a raw, aching pull that begged him to see me, to choose me.
"I, Killian Blackwood, future Alpha of the Silver Moon Pack, hereby reject you, Seraphina Evans, as my mate and future Luna. You are a disgrace to the title, and I will not have an Omega runt weakening my legacy."
The rejection hit me like a physical whip. I heard a sickening crack in the center of my soul as the fated bond snapped. I gasped, clutching my chest as I collapsed to my knees. It felt like someone had reached into my ribcage and physically uprooted the part of me that was meant for him.
The room didn't erupt in outrage. It erupted in snickers.
"About time," I heard someone mutter. "Imagine an Omega as our Luna? We'd be slaughtered before the next full moon."
Killian stepped closer, his shadow looming over me as I struggled to breathe. He leaned down, his voice a venomous whisper meant only for my ears. "Get out of my sight, Sera. If you're still on pack grounds by sunrise, I'll consider it a challenge to my authority. And we both know you wouldn't survive my mercy."
He turned his back on me, leading Tanya toward the dance floor as the music resumed, mocking my agony with its upbeat tempo.
I scrambled to my feet, my vision a blurred smear of tears and shame. I bolted. I ran past the judgmental faces, out the grand doors, and into the freezing, honest air of the forest.
I ran until my lungs burned and my legs felt like lead weights. I reached the edge of the Silver Falls cliff, the moonlight bathing the world in a ghostly, uncaring glow. The pain of the rejection was a fire in my blood, but something else was beginning to take its place.
A heat. A searing, white-hot heat that started in my marrow and radiated outward, melting the ice in my veins.
I fell into the snow, my bones beginning to pop and snap with the violent rhythm of a shift I had never been prepared for. It didn't feel like the painful, messy transitions the elders described. It felt like an explosion.
I let out a scream, but it didn't come out human. It was a roar that shook the very trees, a sound of ancient, forgotten power.
As I looked down at my paws in the moonlight, I didn't see the grey or brown fur of a runt. My coat was as white as the falling snow, but it didn't just reflect the moon—it seemed to bleed moonlight, each strand of hair glowing with a cold, divine electricity.
I wasn't an Omega. I wasn't a burden.
I was a White Wolf. And the pack that had just discarded me had no idea they had just declared war on a legend.