Moonbound to the Alpha

The Pack

The rogue’s dark blood had dried into a stiff crust on Rhea’s hands by the time she followed Lucci down the far side of the mountain ridge.

Every sudden rustle of brush made her shoulders tense, her fingers instinctively curling into fists.

"Are we…heading there right away?" she asked, her breath rising in thin white puffs against the cold.

"Yes," Lucci said, not slowing his pace. "They already know what happened. They've been waiting, Rhea. They need to see you with their own eyes."

Rhea felt an uneasy twist in her stomach. "Are they actually going to accept me? A half-blood who hasn't even shifted?"

Lucci paused, stepping over a fallen pine log before turning to look at her. "They will. Most of them, anyway."

They hiked for another hour, climbing higher until the trees thinned into a wide, crescent-shaped ridge buried under a layer of mountain fog. Lucci stopped at the edge of the clearing, threw his head back, and let out a howl.

For a second, there was only silence. Then, answering howls erupted from the fog all around them, echoing off the valley walls.

Shapes materialised out of the mist, one by one. Men and women of different ages stepped into the clearing, their movements completely silent on the damp earth.

A tall woman stepped out from the center of the group. A heavy silver braid hung down past her waist, and her pale eyes pinned Rhea where she stood.

"Lucci Reyes," the woman said. "You bring an outsider to the ridge during a waning moon?"

"She isn't an outsider, Isla," Lucci said, stepping slightly in front of Rhea. "She's a Calderon."

Low murmurs broke out among the pack, heads turning as dark gazes locked onto Rhea.

"Calderon?" Isla repeated, her eyebrows drawing together. "The bloodline we thought died out five years ago?"

"She's awakening," Lucci insisted. "She stood her ground against a rogue last night and put it down."

Isla narrowed her eyes, taking two slow steps forward to inspect Rhea’s blood-caked knuckles. "Surviving a feral scout doesn't make her pack."

"I'm not asking you to hand me anything," Rhea said, her voice surprisingly steady as she stepped out from behind Lucci. "Just give me a chance to pull my own weight."

The pack rustled again at her tone. A young man with sandy hair and a thick scar running over his left eye let out a sneer. "Looks fragile to me. She'll break the first time a rogue pack runs us down."

Rhea’s jaw tightened, but she kept her mouth shut, meeting his stare until he looked away.

Isla studied Rhea’s face for a long, uncomfortable moment before looking back at Lucci. "Fine. She stays in the lower huts. She trains with the scouts tomorrow at first light. We see what she's made of. But if she slows us down or puts the ridge at risk—"

"She won't," Lucci cut in cleanly.

That night, they led her to a settlement of rough-cut wooden cabins hidden in a deep ravine, protected on three sides by sheer rock walls. They assigned her a bare room in a shared wooden hut—no electricity, no heater, just a low cot and a rough wool blanket.

Rhea didn't sleep. Every groan of the timber walls and distant snap of a twig kept her awake, her senses dialed so high her skin prickled.

At first light, the door swung open. Lucci stood in the frame beside Isla and two broad-shouldered scouts.

"Up," Isla commanded, tossing a heavy leather satchel onto the cot. Inside was a rolled canvas waterskin, a piece of dried meat, and a hunting knife with a bone handle. "Time to see if that Calderon blood is real or watered down."

They jogged out of the encampment without another word. Isla set a brutal pace, driving them deep into the rough terrain. Rhea focused on the rhythm of Lucci's boots ahead of her, forcing her burning lungs to adapt, refusing to let a gap form between them.

Two hours in, Isla pulled up at the edge of a rocky ravine. "First test," she said, turning to Rhea. "The old winter den is somewhere in these woods. Find it before the sun drops behind the western ridge."

Rhea wiped sweat from her forehead, staring into the endless wall of dark hemlock trees. "What am I looking for? Is there a trail?"

"You won't find it with your eyes," Isla said coldly.

Lucci caught Rhea’s eye, giving her a faint, imperceptible nod. "Listen to the ground, Rhea."

Before she could ask anything else, Isla and the two scouts melted back into the brush, leaving her completely alone in the silent woods.

Rhea took a slow, deep breath of the freezing air. She closed her eyes, letting the noise of her own anxious thoughts quiet down.

The forest was not silent. Beneath the wind, she felt that same low, vibrating hum she had learned during her midnight training. She turned her head toward the west, where the air felt slightly warmer. She opened her eyes and started walking.

Hours dragged by. She scrambled over slick granite boulders, picked her way through briar patches that tore at her sleeves, and tracked the subtle scent of wet rock through the trees.

By late afternoon, gray clouds rolled in, blocking the sun and plunging the forest into a damp, freezing twilight. Her legs felt like lead, her breath came in ragged gasps, and a cold knot of doubt began to creep up her throat.

You're just lost, a voice inside whispered. You're a human playing in the woods.

"No," she muttered aloud, digging her heels into the dirt. "I'm finding it."

She pushed up a steep embankment, her fingers digging into the cold mud, until the trees cleared slightly near a granite cliff face. Nestled right under a rock overhang, half-covered by thick lichen and fallen fir branches, was a narrow cave entrance.

She crept forward, her hand resting on the knife hilt at her waist.

It wasn't just a cave. The entrance was ringed with weathered animal skulls and stones carved with the same symbols from Lucci’s father’s book.

She had found it.

Rhea slid down against the cool stone wall of the den, letting her head drop back. The air inside felt heavy, ancient, and protective—like stepping into a room that had been waiting for her to return for years.

When she made it back to the pack clearing at dusk, her clothes were torn, her face was smeared with mud, and her hands were raw. Isla was standing near the central fire pit, her arms crossed over her chest.

Rhea walked straight up to her, reached into her pocket, and dropped a carved stone symbol from the den’s archway into Isla’s open palm.

Isla looked down at the stone, then up at Rhea. "Luck, or blood?"

"Does it matter?" Rhea asked, her voice raspy. "I found it."

A tiny, almost invisible curve touched the corner of Isla’s mouth. "No. What matters is you didn't run home."

Around the fire, the other pack members watched her, but the hostility in their eyes had softened into a quiet curiosity.

Later that night, Rhea sat on a flat rock at the edge of the camp, staring down at the silver pendant in her hands. A shadow fell over her, and Lucci sat down beside her.

"Isla said you made it back twenty minutes before deadline," he said quietly.

"I still feel like a target," Rhea murmured, not looking up. "Like I'm just waiting for them to decide I don't belong."

"You belong here," Lucci said. He leaned in, his voice dropping so low only she could hear it over the crackle of the flames. "The old blood in this mountain recognizes you."

"What happens if the blood moon comes and I can't shift?" she asked, her voice barely a whisper. "What if I fail?"

Lucci reached out, his warm, rough fingers taking her chin and turning her face toward his.

"Then we fall together," he said simply. "Because the rogues are gathering on the north ridge, and the moon rises in two weeks. But you won't fail, Rhea. I won't let you."