CHAPTER 1
**CHAPTER 1**
*LYRA POV*
**The rain came down in sheets
I didn't feel it.
I stood barefoot in the center of the storm-fang packhouse courtyard, my silver dress clinging to my skin like a second layer of shame. My hair and the flowers I'd spent an hour pinning into place. Stuck to my wet face.
Other wolves gathered silently watching and judging.
I could feel their eyes on me. Heavy, pitiful. Some were amused.
My hands trembled at my sides, but I kept my chin up. I would not cry, not here. Not in front of them.
Not in front of him.
"Lyra."
Kael's voice cut through the rain like a whip crack.
I flinched.
He stood on the stone steps of the packhouse, his presence dominating the space even from a distance. Alpha Kael Stormfang. The male I'd believed was my fated mate. The male who had whispered unbreakable promises to me just days ago.
Now he looked at me like I was a stranger.
No worse, like as if I was nothing
"You need to leave."
His voice was cold and empty.
My wolf shattered inside my chest, clawing at my ribs, begging me to run. To fight, to just do something .
But I couldn't move.
"Kael” My voice cracked. I hated how my voice sounded. How broken it was. "Please. Just explain …
"There's nothing to explain."
He walked down the steps slowly, his gray eyes locked on mine. Each step felt like a countdown. Like the final moments before an execution.
When he stopped in front of me, I could smell him. Pine and smoke. The scent that used to make my wolf purr. Now it made my stomach twist.
"You were never meant to be Luna. I see that now."
Those words hit me hard.
"What?" I whispered.
Behind him, someone moved, a flash of red fabric. A familiar laugh.
Mira.
My own cousin stepped into view, wrapped in a silk robe that barely covered her body. Her dark hair tumbled over her shoulders, still messy from …
No.
My chest tightened. My vision was blurred.
*No. No. No. This can't be happening.
Mira smiled gently yet in a mocking way.
I'm sorry, Lyra, but you have to understand. Kael and I... we have history. You were just She paused, her smile widening. "A mistake."
The crowd murmured.
My knees weakened.
I caught myself before I fell, my nails digging into my palms hard enough to draw blood. My wolf shattered. Thrashed inside me like a caged animal.
The bond.
The mate bond I thought I'd felt with Kael the pull, the warmth, the certainty that it was still there. But now it burned. It hurt so much.
Like my soul was being ripped apart.
This can't be happening. I murmured
*This can't be real.*
But it was.
I had seen them. Together hours ago. Tangled together in the bed we were supposed to share. The bed where I was going to tell him my secret tonight. Where I was going to show him the little stick with two pink lines and watch his face light up.
I felt an intense pain in my belly.
*Our baby.*
I was carrying his pup. A tiny life growing inside me. A piece of him we would've cherished forever.
And he didn't even know.
He would never know.
Because the male standing in front of me, cold, distant and cruel, wasn't the Kael I had fallen in love with. He wasn't the male who deserved to know.
"Kael." I forced myself to look at him. To really look him in the eye. "Tell me this isn't real. Tell me you didn't
"I did."
Two words.
That was all it took.
I staggered back, my breath coming in short, broken gasps. The rain pounded harder. The wolves whispered and became louder.
And Kael just stood there.
Unmoved with no emotion.
How could I have been so stupid?
I had believed so much in him. Believed in us. I believed in the bond we shared that was real.
But it wasn't.
None of it was.
My wolf cried out in pain, and I pressed my palm harder against my stomach. Protecting and Shielding.
*No, I told myself. No, he doesn't get to take this from me either.
This baby, my baby, was mine, not his. Not theirs.
Mine alone .
Get out of my territory. He roared .
Before I have you removed.
Kael's words were final. Unforgiving
My lips parted, but no sound came out.
I wanted to scream. To roar and demand answers.
But I didn't.
Because somewhere beneath the pain, beneath the betrayal, something shifted inside me.
Strength, fury and purpose
I wasn't going to beg. I wasn't going to break down.
Not for him or anyone else
I lifted my chin one last time. My brown eyes met his gray ones, and for a single heartbeat, I let him see everything. The love,the heartbreak and the fury.
Then I turned and walked away .
The crowd stepped back,
No one tried to stop me.
No one said a word.
Every step I took felt heavy. The packhouse lights faded behind me. The voices grew distant.
And as I crossed the border of Stormfang territory, "...drenched and trembling, I wrapped my arms around my stomach.
I'm sorry, I whispered to the life inside me. I'm so sorry.
Sorry that their father betrayed us.
Sorry that I'd ever loved him.
Sorry that we would have to run. That I have to hide you .
But I made myself a promise right then, standing at the edge of everything I'd ever known.
*Kael Stormfang would never see me again.
Neither would he ever know his child.*
I would disappear, I would protect this baby with everything I had.
I would make sure that neither of us ever had to feel this pain again.
The rain washed the tears from my face as I stepped into the darkness.
And I didn't look back.
