The Luna's Forgotten Vow

Chapter 5: The Three Promises

The moment I got to my room, I noticed a piece of paper partially slipped underneath the door. Only the tip was visible, as though someone had carefully pushed it inside.

I crouched down immediately, grabbed the edge, and pulled it out. My heart skipped when I saw the symbol. It was the same one Aerion had shown me earlier.

I quickly looked around. If I acted suspicious or showed that I recognized it, whoever had left the paper might realize that I knew something. So I tossed it aside as though it meant nothing and opened my door.

As soon as I stepped into my room, my legs gave out beneath me, and I collapsed onto the floor.

I had no trusted friend in the pack to talk to or share my despair with. My only true female friend, Mia, had left the Golden Lake Pack three years ago to continue her training as a master herbalist and potion maker. We had studied together at the Werewolf Medical Academy.

While I specialized in werewolf medicine and surgery, Mia chose alchemy, medicinal herbs, antidotes, and potion brewing. After graduation, our paths separated. I served as the pack's doctor, while she traveled to a remote settlement deep in the wolf region to apprentice under a renowned herbal master.

Like me, Mia was an outcast. Perhaps that was why we understood each other so well. We knew what it felt like to belong nowhere.

The entire day passed in silence. I didn't go to the dining hall. I didn't answer the knocks on my door. I simply lay there, staring at the ceiling. My tears refused to stop.

By evening, it became painfully clear that Alpha Ryker had meant every word he said to me. I climbed out of bed, wiped the last of my tears away, and began packing my belongings. If he wanted me gone, then I would leave the Golden Lake Pack and head for the small, isolated town of Delta Junction, where my mother had settled among humans.

The door to my room opened. I lifted my swollen eyes.

Aerion stood quietly at the entrance. As the Chief Engineer and Head of Wolf Telecommunications and Starlight Technology, he was usually seen in practical but well-fitted clothes. Today, he wore a dark shirt with the sleeves rolled to his elbows, black trousers, and sturdy boots. His clothes were slightly damp from the rain, and his dark hair was disheveled as though he had been running his hands through it repeatedly.

He had just returned from the Northern Starlight Communication Station, where he had been inspecting a damaged transmission tower that had disrupted communication between several packs.

His eyes locked with mine. He looked unhappy, as though he had been crying for hours. This was someone who currently held the rank of the most powerful wolf in the region, so I found that quite strange.

I couldn't ask him what had happened because my eyes were swollen from crying too.

Aerion walked over to the bed, reached for the clothes scattered across it, and quietly began folding them one after another. We packed in silence.

For several minutes, neither of us spoke.

The only sounds in the room was the rain beating steadily against the roof.

Finally, Aerion broke the silence.

"I can separate Ryker and Malia and make Ryker come for you," he said calmly. "But you have to promise me three things."

I stopped folding my clothes and looked at him.

"What three things?"

"You won't cry over him again."

His words caught me off guard.

"The second is that once you get to the human territory, you'll move on with your life. You'll continue practicing medicine and stop waiting for him."

He paused before adding, "If you do as I say, count exactly five months from today. He'll come looking for you."

My brows furrowed because five months from today was my birthday.

"How do you intend to do that?" I asked, because despite what Ryker had done, I shamelessly still wanted to be with him.

"It's simple. Ryker rejected you because he believes becoming Alpha left him with no choice. If that's the reason, then I'll take the title away from him."

"What?"

"I'll turn the council against him," Aerion continued. "I'll expose the things they've overlooked and force them to remove him as Alpha. Once that burden is gone, he'll have no reason to stay away from you. The agreement he made the day he became Alpha will become invalid."

I stared at him.

The idea sounded cruel, yet a part of me wanted it.

Ryker had smiled more when he was merely the head warrior than he ever had since becoming Alpha. The crown hadn't brought him happiness. It had only built walls between us.

After a long silence, I finally asked, "And the third promise?"

"I'll write all three conditions down and bring them to you in the human territory for you to sign."

I frowned immediately.

"I'm not signing anything."

He nodded as though he had expected my response.

"I'll come to see you after you've settled in. I want to see with my own eyes that you've truly begun living again instead of waiting for Ryker. Then I will show you the third condition, and you must sign it for me."

"And if I don't like the third condition?"

"Then don't sign."

His voice remained gentle.

"I won't force you. The choice will be yours."

I let out a long breath.

"Fine," I whispered.

I zipped my travel bag shut and stood.

Aerion rose with me. Without asking, he pulled me into a warm embrace. One of his hands gently brushed away the tears clinging stubbornly to my cheeks.

In the corridor, Aerion bent down and picked up the paper I had tossed aside earlier. I pretended I hadn't seen it.

"Are you saying you don't recognize this symbol at all?" Aerion asked.

I shook my head, forcing my expression to remain perfectly blank. In reality, a cold shiver was running down my spine.

"What does that symbol stand for?"

"If you tell me the truth, I'll tell you what it means," he said.

I didn't know what would happen to me if I admitted that I had that symbol. What if it was something that could get me killed?

Honestly, if Ryker were the one asking me, I wouldn't have hesitated to tell him. But Aerion was different.

He was Ryker's mysterious brother who hardly spoke to anyone. He didn't have a mate, and he never showed interest in any she-wolf. He was always working on the packs’ telecommunications, starlight technology, or going to war.

He currently held the title of the most powerful, handsome, and intelligent wolf in the region, yet he always looked troubled, as though he was fighting a battle no one knew about.

The only time he ever came close to me was during our birthdays. Afterward, he would return to his usual distance and stare at me from afar with that strange, unreadable look.

How was I supposed to tell him about a symbol on such a private part of my body? There was no way I could bring myself to have that conversation with him.

As we continued down the corridor, I made up my mind. Since I was going to meet my mother, I would ask her about the symbol first. Only after I understood what it meant would I decide whether I could trust Aerion with the truth.