The Unclaimed Luna

Chapter 3: The healing Ward

The scent of wolfsbane and honey hit Sera first.

Her healing ward. She'd know that combination anywhere, the bitter herb she used to draw out infection, the sweet salve for burns. Someone had been working while she was unconscious. Making poultices, preparing tinctures, doing the work she should be doing.

Sera tried to open her eyes and found her body wouldn't cooperate. Everything felt heavy, distant, like she was buried underwater. The mate bond pulsed in her chest, steady and strong and uncomfortably present.

Matthias was close. Very close.

She managed to crack her eyes open. The healing ward's ceiling swam into focus, rough wooden beams, dried herbs hanging in bundles, the way she'd organized it three years ago when the old healer had finally trusted her enough to let her redesign the space.

A warm weight pressed against her right side.

Sera turned her head slowly, fighting through the fog of whatever pain medicine someone had given her. Matthias sat in a chair pulled up to her bedside, his upper body slumped forward onto the mattress, one hand wrapped carefully around her uninjured forearm. He was asleep, or something close to it, his breathing deep and even.

He looked terrible.

Dark circles shadowed his eyes. His hair was matted with dried blood, hers, probably, from carrying her. He wore loose pants and nothing else, and his bare shoulders were covered in scratches and bite marks from the fight with the rogues.

He hadn't left her side long enough to tend his own wounds.

The realization made something twist in Sera's chest. She tried to pull her arm away, but the movement sent pain lancing up from her elbow. She gasped, and Matthias was awake instantly.

His head snapped up, eyes finding hers. For a moment, they just looked at each other. Then his hand tightened on her arm, gentle, but unmistakably possessive.

"You're awake." His voice was rough with exhaustion. "How do you feel?"

"Like I was mauled by rogues." Sera's throat was dry, her words scraping out. "How long?"

"Two days."

Two days. She'd lost two days lying here while the ward undoubtedly fell apart without her. "My patients,"

"Are being handled." Matthias reached for a cup of water on the bedside table, held it to her lips. "Drink."

Sera wanted to argue, but her throat felt like sandpaper. She drank, and tried not to notice how carefully he supported her head, how his thumb stroked against her temple while she swallowed.

When she finished, he set the cup aside but didn't move back. His hand stayed in her hair.

"Your arm is healing," he said. "Slowly. Your wolf is still too weak to shift, but the wounds are closing on their own. Elder Roslyn says You'll have scars."

"I know." Sera had seen the damage before she passed out. Deep punctures, tearing in the muscles. Even with full wolf healing, marks like that left their signature behind. "It's fine."

"It's not fine." Something dark moved across Matthias's face. "You were attacked in the heart of pack space during a ceremony. While I was supposed to be protecting you."

"You can't protect someone you don't claim." The words came out more bitter than Sera intended. She was too tired to guard her tongue, too wrung out to pretend the last seven years hadn't happened. "That's not how this works."

Matthias's jaw tightened. "I know that. Now."

"Now," Sera repeated. "After I nearly died."

"Yes." He didn't flinch from the accusation. "After I felt you dying through a bond, I'd spent seven years pretending didn't exist. After I ran fast enough that I tore muscles in my wolf form because the thought of losing you was,"

He stopped. Swallowed hard. His hand was trembling slightly against her hair.

"What?" Sera pushed, because she was tired and in pain and done with half-truths. "Inconvenient? Bad for pack morale?"

"Unbearable." The word came out raw. "The thought of losing you was unbearable, and I have no right to feel that way, I know. But sitting here watching you struggle to breathe, wondering if you'd wake up."

"Stop." Sera pulled her arm free from his grip, ignoring the pain. "You don't get to do this. You don't get to reject me for seven years and then act devastated when I get hurt."

"I'm not acting."

"Then what do you call the last seven years?" Her voice was rising, and she should probably lower it. There were other patients in the ward, separated only by curtains, but she couldn't make herself care. "What do you call standing next to me at every ceremony and pretending I was invisible? What do you call taking other women to your bed while I feel every moment through a bond you refused to complete?"

Matthias flinched like she'd struck him. "I never,I haven't been with anyone in five years."

Sera's breath caught. "What?"

"Five years." He wouldn't meet her eyes now. "The bond made it impossible. Every time I tried, I could feel you on the other side of the connection. Feel your pain. I couldn't," he broke off. "I haven't touched anyone in five years."

The confession hung between them.

Sera didn't know what to do with it. Didn't know how to reconcile the image of Matthias she'd built, cold, distant, taking pleasure in what he wanted while she suffered, with this truth. Five years of celibacy. Five years of feeling her through the bond he claimed to have walled off.

"You still rejected me," she said finally. "You still made me stand beside you at every ceremony like some kind of ghost Luna. Still let the pack whisper about how pathetic I was."

"I know," Matthias's hands curled into fists on his thighs. "I thought I was protecting you. I thought if I kept my distance, if I never completed the bond, you'd be safe from becoming what my mother was. Weak. Vulnerable. A liability that got people killed."

"Your mother wasn't weak."

"She died because my father hesitated." The words came out harshly. "We were under attack. She was wounded. He could have sent reinforcements, could have ordered a tactical retreat, could have done a dozen things that would have saved the pack. But she was his mate, and the bond made him irrational. He tried to save her himself, and while he was distracted, twelve wolves died."

Sera had heard the story before. Everyone in Silverpine knew how the old Alpha and his Luna had fallen. But she'd never heard from Matthias. Never heard the way his voice broke on the word "twelve."

"How old were you?" she asked quietly.

"Fifteen." Matthias's jaw worked. "Old enough to understand that the mate bond had killed them both. That love made my father weak when the pack needed him strong."

"So you decided to be strong instead." Sera's anger was draining away, replaced by something that felt dangerously close to understanding. "Even if it meant destroying us both slowly."

"Yes." He finally looked at her, and his eyes were hollow. "I watched you deteriorate for seven years. Watched your wolf get weaker, watched you lose weight, watched the light go out of your eyes. I knew what I was doing to you. I just thought it was better than the alternative."

"Better than loving me?"

"Better than losing you," the admission came out barely, in a whisper. "If I never claimed you, you'd never be the weakness that got the pack killed. You'd never be the liability my mother was. You'd be safe."

"I wasn't safe," Sera gestured at her bandaged arm. "I was dying. Just slower than if the rogues had finished the job."

"I know that now."

"Do you?" She pushed herself up against the pillows, gritting her teeth through the pain. "Because from where I'm sitting, you made a choice seven years ago that's been killing us both. And now you're sitting here acting like you're the one who suffered."

"I'm not," Matthias stopped. Started again. "You're right. You suffered more. You suffered everything. I at least had the option of walling off the bond, of pretending it didn't exist. You didn't have that choice."

"No," Sera agreed. "I didn't."

They sat in silence. Outside the curtained area, Sera could hear the normal sounds of the healing ward, quiet conversations, the rustle of bandages, footsteps moving between beds. Her world continues without her.

"The rogues," she said finally. "Did you catch the man? The one who was still human?"

Matthias's expression hardened. "He got away. But we captured two of the wolves alive. They're in the holding cells."

"Have they talked?"

"Not yet." Something dangerous flickered in his eyes. "But they will."

Sera knew that tone. Knew what it meant when an Alpha spoke with that particular edge. She should probably object, torture was technically against pack law, but she couldn't quite make herself care. Those rogues had tried to kill her. Had bitten through her arm with the intention of taking her as leverage.

"What did he mean?" she asked. "The scarred man. He said someone sent them. Said incomplete bonds are a weakness that needs to be eliminated."

"We're investigating." Matthias's hands were fists again. "Elder Roslyn thinks there might be a larger conspiracy. Other packs with similar philosophies about mate bonds."

"Philosophies?"

"That fated bonds make packs weak. That choosing political matches is stronger than accepting fate's choice." He looked at her. "That Alphas like me who reject their Lunas are proving the old ways are obsolete."

The words settled between them like stones.

"So I'm not just a personal failure," Sera said. "I'm a political symbol."

"You're not a failure," Matthias leaned forward, his intensity suddenly focused entirely on her. "Sera, you kept this pack together. You built loyalty with the omegas, trained the healers, protected the vulnerable. You did everything Luna should do, and you did it without any support from me. Without the bond giving you power. You did it alone."

"Because I had to."

"Because you're stronger than I ever gave you credit for." His hand moved like he wanted to touch her again, then stopped. "Stronger than my mother. Stronger than me."

Sera's throat tightened. She'd wanted to hear something like this for seven years. Wanted acknowledgment, recognition, some sign that he saw her as more than an unwanted burden. But hearing it now, with her arm wrapped in bandages and her wolf still too weak to surface, felt hollow.

"Words are easy," she said. "You've made your choices. I've lived with the consequences."

"I want to make different choices," Matthias's voice was urgent now. "I want to claim you properly. Complete the bond. Give you everything I should have given you seven years ago."

The mate bond flared at his words, eager and hungry. Seven years of incomplete connection surging toward the possibility of finally being whole. Sera felt the pull of it, the way her body wanted to say yes without thinking, without considering anything except the promise of that aching emptiness finally being filled.

She forced herself to breathe. To think past the bond's demands.

"No," she said.

Matthias went very still. "No?"

"You had seven years to choose me." Sera's voice was steady despite the way her chest ached. "You chose fear instead. I'm not going to let you claim me now just because guilt feels uncomfortable."

"It's not guilt,"

"Then what is it?" She cut him off. "Love? Matthias, we don't even know each other. We've barely spoken in seven years. You've told me about your mother, about your fears, but I don't know your favorite color or what you do when you can't sleep or if you even like the sound of rain."

"I do," he said. "Like rain."

"That's not the point." Sera looked away from him, focusing on the bundles of dried lavender hanging from the ceiling beam. "The bond says we're supposed to be together. Fate says we're mates. But neither of those things mean we actually love each other."

"I do love you."

The words should have made her happy. Should have filled the hollow place in her chest. Instead, they just made her tired.

"You love the idea of me," she corrected. "The Luna you're supposed to have. The mate bond you're supposed to complete. But me? Sera Ashwood, the woman who reorganized the healing ward and talks to the omega pups and has nightmares about being invisible?" She shook her head. "You don't know me well enough to love me."

Matthias opened his mouth, closed it again. She could see him processing, trying to find an argument that would work. But she was right, and they both knew it.

"So what do you want?" he asked finally. "Tell me what to do, and I'll do it."

"I don't know." Sera's hand drifted to her bandaged arm. "I don't know if there's anything you can do. You rejected me, Matthias. You rejected the bond. Maybe some things can't be fixed."

"I don't accept that."

"You don't have a choice." She finally looked at him again. "This isn't about what you'll allow or won't allow. I'm not some problem you can solve with Alpha commands."

The door to the ward opened. Jorah stepped through, carrying a tray of medical supplies. He stopped when he saw them, his gaze moving between Sera and Matthias with obvious understanding.

"The pack council is requesting your presence, Alpha," Jorah said carefully. "Elder Roslyn says it's urgent. Something about the captured rogues."

Matthias didn't move. "Tell them I'll be there when I'm ready."

"With respect, they said immediately."

The muscle in Matthias's jaw ticked. For a moment, Sera thought he might actually refuse, might actually tell the pack council to wait so he could keep sitting here having this conversation that was going nowhere.

Then he stood. "Fine."

He looked down at Sera, and something in his expression made her chest tight. "This isn't over."

"It's been over seven years," she said. "You just didn't notice."

Matthias flinched. Then he turned and walked out, Jorah trailing behind him with an apologetic glance at Sera.

She was alone again.

Sera lay back against the pillows and stared at the ceiling. Her arm throbbed. Her wolf was a weak, distant presence in the back of her mind. The mate bond pulled at her chest, confused and hurt and still desperately wanting the connection that had been denied.

And somewhere in the holding cells, captured rogues were refusing to talk about a conspiracy that had marked her as a target.

She nearly died two days ago. Matthias had confessed he'd been suffering too, that he'd made a mistake, that he wanted to fix things. The bond was pulling them together with the force of seven years of denied connection.

But lying here in the healing ward, Sera realized something that should have been obvious from the start:

She didn't know if she could forgive him. Didn't know if she even wanted to try.

The bond might say they were meant for each other. But seven years of rejection had taught her that sometimes fate got it wrong.