The Fifteenth Morning

Chapter 4: Who Killed My Mate?

The nightmares were back.

It was the same dream that had haunted me for three years. I saw him again. My first husband, Adrian. He was lying on our mating bed, his face pale, blood coming from the corner of his mouth, staining the white sheets. His beautiful grey eyes, which once looked at me with so much love, were filled with pain and fear. He tried to reach for my hand. His last words to me were not "I love you." They were a warning. "Don't trust them, Elara. Don't trust..."

I woke up screaming, my body covered in cold sweat, my heart beating so fast I thought it would burst.

Silver light filled my bedroom. My new marks, the ones that appeared after I became the Blessed Luna, were glowing violently. The whole room was bathed in moonlight, even though it was midnight and there was no moon outside.

The door burst open with a loud bang.

Rhys ran inside, his sword in his hand, his black shirt half open, his chest heaving. His wolf Kaos must have felt my fear through our new, weak mate bond. "What happened? Who is here? Who hurt you?" he roared, his icy blue eyes scanning the room for an enemy.

I was sweating, shaking, tears running down my face. "Adrian... I saw Adrian... He was bleeding..."

Rhys's face hardened. He lowered his sword. He thought I was having another panic attack about my past. "Elara, Adrian is dead for three years. Stop torturing yourself. It was heart failure. The healer said..."

"He was murdered, Rhys!" I shouted, and this time my voice was not weak. It echoed with power. The silver light pulsed. "He didn't die because of a curse! He didn't die because of me! Someone poisoned him! My dream... it was not a dream. It was a memory. Adrian was trying to tell me!"

Rhys looked shocked. His anger faded into confusion. "Poisoned? Our pack healer said it was heart failure. A natural death. No wounds. No poison in his blood test."

"The same healer who works for your mother?" I said, my eyes narrowing. I stood up. My legs were still shaking, but my wolf Lyra was giving me strength inside.

His mother. Luna Margaret. The woman who hated me the most from day one. The woman who called me a gold-digger, a wolfless orphan who trapped her precious son. The woman who smiled at Adrian's funeral.

My wolf growled inside me, her voice clear now, not faint like before. "Follow the scent, Elara. The killer's scent is still in that room. I can smell it. Bitter. Dark. Old. Go now."

I got up. My white nightgown was sticking to my sweaty body. "I need to go to the old Luna's chamber. Right now."

"It's midnight," Rhys said, frowning. "That chamber has been locked for three years."

"Are you coming as my husband or are you scared of your mother?" I challenged him, looking straight into his icy blue eyes. For the first time, I was not scared of him.

He clenched his jaw, his own wolf flashing in his eyes, and then he followed me without another word.

We walked through the dark, silent corridors of the Blood Moon pack house. The torches were dim. Luna Margaret's old room was at the end of the east wing. It was locked for three years after Adrian's death. The door was covered in dust. No one entered, not even servants. It was said Luna Margaret could not bear to see her son's things.

I broke the lock with my new strength. It was not hard. My hand glowed silver and the metal lock melted like wax.

The room smelled of dust and old perfume, heavy and suffocating. And something else. Something that made Lyra snarl inside me. A bitter, dark herb smell, hidden under the perfume.

Wolfsbane. The most dangerous poison for werewolves. A poison that can kill a wolf from inside without leaving a mark. No wounds. No struggle. No symptoms. Just looks like heart failure. The perfect murder weapon for a werewolf.

I found it. Under the old, dusty bed, hidden behind a loose wooden plank, a small glass bottle. Half empty. The liquid inside was dark brown. With a small, handwritten label that had faded with time. "For Adrian's tea - for his heart. - M"

But Adrian never had a heart problem. He was the strongest warrior in the pack. He ran ten miles every morning. His heart was perfect.

"What is this?" Rhys picked it up, his hands shaking as he read the label. His face turned white. "M... M for Margaret? My mother?"

Just then, the door opened with a slow creak. Luna Margaret stood there in her silk nightgown. She was not surprised to see us. She was not shocked. She smiled. A cold, cruel smile that made my blood freeze.

"So the wolfless widow finally found it," she said calmly, as if we were discussing tea. "After three years. I thought you were too stupid to ever look."

"You killed him!" Rhys roared, his voice breaking. The sword in his hand trembled. "You killed your own son! Your own blood! He was your son!"

"He was going to make you Luna!" Margaret shouted suddenly, pointing her manicured finger at me, her face twisted with pure hatred. "A wolfless orphan with no bloodline! No wolf! No family! I told him to reject you! I told him you were a curse! But he loved you! He said you were his blessed mate! That you were chosen by the Moon Goddess! So I had to kill him! A weak Alpha who loves a wolfless girl does not deserve to be Alpha! He was shaming our bloodline!"

My whole world shattered into a million pieces.

She killed him because he loved me. Because he chose me over his mother's pride.

My silver marks, which were glowing white, suddenly turned black. My pure moonlight turned into a dark, angry, terrifying storm light. The air in the room became heavy, hard to breathe.

"You... killed... my mate," I whispered. My voice was no longer mine. It was layered with Lyra's voice, ancient and powerful.

The entire pack house started shaking. Pictures fell from the walls. The torches outside blew out. My power was no longer blessed and gentle. It was cursed with pure, unfiltered rage. The floor under my feet cracked.

Margaret laughed, even though her body was shaking. "What will you do, little girl? Kill me? You are still just a wolfless orphan..."

She didn't finish.

Because I lifted my hand, just slightly, and her body lifted into the air, ten inches off the ground. She gasped, clutching her throat, her feet kicking.

"I am not just a girl!" I said, my eyes pure black silver, two moons eclipsed by rage. My hair was floating around me like a storm. "I am not wolfless! I am the Blessed Luna! And you just confessed to killing an Alpha! To killing your own son!"

Rhys looked at me, terrified. Not of his mother choking, but of what I was becoming. "Elara, don't. Don't become a murderer. Don't become like her. Please."

I looked at him, tears of silver blood coming from my glowing eyes, burning my cheeks.

"Should I forgive her, Rhys? Like I forgave everyone for three years? Like I forgave them when they threw stones at me? When they made me eat leftovers? When they called me cursed?"

The whole pack had gathered outside the room now, watching in horror. Warriors, omegas, elders, children. Everyone was watching their new Luna holding their old Luna in the air.

What will Elara do? Will she kill Luna Margaret and become the villain they always said she was? Will she show them that the Blessed Luna can also be a cursed Luna? Or will she show mercy and become a true Queen who is better than them?

The choice was mine. And for the first time in my life, I had the power to make it.

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