Silver Falls Series: Omega Rising

PROLOGUE

When I think of home, I think of Silver Falls. The lush thick forests, the ever still water of the crystalline lake, and the harmonious unity of my pack. The pack I oversee at the side of my fierce and loyal mate and the Alpha of our pack, Axel Erikson.

I wasn’t always Ivy Erikson, Luna of the Silver Falls pack. In fact, I wasn’t always a pack member. I was born into slavery as a low-level omega to the Blood Lake pack eighteen years ago.

My parents were torn apart by feral rogues when I was just two years old, leaving no choice but for me to be raised in the pack orphanage with the rest of the forgotten children.

I always dreamed of the day. The fated day when I would turn eighteen, get my wolf, and find my true mate. Fairytales don’t always work out like that, though, do they?

A week before my eighteenth birthday, my dreams came to an abrupt and crashing halt when Dax Forrester, son of the Alpha, approached me during dinner clean up. “I’ve met my mate, and I’ve chosen to reject her. You will accept me as your mate next week at your aging.”

Dax was the worst of the worst. He was eight years my senior and a total tyrant. He beat on anyone he deemed below him and disrespected any authority, usually getting away with it, thanks to being the Alphas heir.

What I didn’t understand was how he thought he could just claim me. Unless one is an Alpha, we are forbidden by the moon goddess to select our own mates. We either accept or reject them, and if rejected, we live loveless, forced to forever remain alone. Rarely would a wolf reject their fated mate. They either had a valid reason or were intrinsically broken...

The night before my aging, news broke fast when it was discovered Alpha Donovan was murdered in cold blood, making Dax Forrester the packs new Alpha. Daxs mother was blamed for the murder and banished from the pack. Throughout It all, Dax bared no emotion. It dawned fast on me that this was Daxs doing and that I needed to leave before I became his broken and imprisoned mate forever.

So I did the worst betrayal a wolf can do. I left my pack that very night. I took nothing with me but myself, and I didn’t stop running. I spent two weeks as a lost rogue on the run. I had gained my wolf the sixth night away and spent all my time in my carnal form.

The freedom came to an end, however, when I was caught hunting within Silver Falls territory and brought forth to the Alpha to be executed.

Forced onto my knees with a silver shackle burning my wrists I waited for the Alpha to say the words and end me, instead he spoke the single word that saved my life, and brought my dreams back from the grave.

“Mate” he growled in a primal timbre...and ripped the shackle free of my wrists. All wolves in attendance fell to their knees, as he lifted me from mine.