THE ALPHA'S REGRET, MY REVENGE

Ronan’s Awakening

The Shadow Fang Pack rose with the dawn.

It was tradition, discipline, and ritual woven into bone and blood. The first light of the sun spilt across the stone barracks and timber huts, and already the warriors were awake, stretching their limbs, cracking joints, sharpening blades. Their movements carried the precision of soldiers, a rhythm drilled into them since they were pups.

From the highest balcony of the Alpha’s Hall, Ronan Ashbourne watched them. His sharp, cold eyes scanned the grounds, measuring every strike, every fall, every howl of exertion. His presence alone carried weight. The wolves moved harder, faster, with a desperation to impress. To displease their Alpha was to invite wrath, and no one dared.

He stood tall, a dark figure wrapped in authority, his broad shoulders framed against the pale morning sky. His aura pressed outward, heavy, commanding. No one could mistake him for anything but what he was—Alpha.

And yet… beneath the steel mask, something fractured.

Something he could not name.

Something that clawed at the edges of his control.

It had been weeks since he had rejected Brielle. Weeks since he had stood in that clearing, her wide eyes staring at him as though he had ripped her heart straight from her chest, and declared her unworthy.

He had expected release.

That was the way of the mate bond. Break it, and the chain dissolved. Freedom restored.

That was what he told himself when he turned away from her tears, her shaking frame, her desperate whispers of his name. He had told himself it was mercy, that she was too weak, too fragile, too ill-fitting for an Alpha of Shadow Fang. He had told himself he had no choice.

But since then…

The silence had grown.

At first, it was subtle. His wolf pacing inside him, restless, unsettled. He thought it would pass.

But then the quiet deepened. The bond he thought he had severed still hummed faintly, a ghostly ache that pulsed every time he crossed the clearing where he had left her behind. His wolf would growl low, deep in his chest, refusing to move forward, refusing to obey.

And then, one morning, it stopped answering him at all.

Now, when he reached inward, there was nothing. A void. A howl was swallowed before it could escape. His wolf crouched low, sulking, punishing him with silence.

The absence was unbearable.

An Alpha without a wolf was like a blade without a sharpened edge. Still dangerous, still lethal, but dulled. Hollow.

Ronan clenched his fists behind his back as he watched the warriors below. His jaw tightened, teeth grinding. No one could know. No one could sense weakness in him. He would not allow it.

He was Alpha. He was unbroken.

And yet… something in his chest whispered otherwise.

He avoided the clearing at first. The one where he had cast Brielle aside.

The memory was a thorn, lodged deep, festering. He had hoped distance would dull the sting.

But Shadow Fang’s territory was vast and wild, crisscrossed with patrol paths carved into his very bones. And no matter how he tried, fate pulled him back. His boots crunched on the same soil, his eyes caught the same trees, and his chest constricted as though invisible hands wrapped tight around his ribs.

Every time, he remembered her face.

Tear-streaked. Disbelieving. Fragile in a way that cut him deeper than her strength ever could.

Every time, his wolf snarled. Not in triumph. Not in agreement. But in protest.

And Ronan’s composure cracked a little more.

The whispers began soon after.

The warriors murmured when they thought he wasn’t listening. Omegas traded glances in the kitchens. Elders narrowed their eyes when he strode into the council.

Their Alpha was distracted, they said. Quicker to anger, sharper with his words. His patience, always thin, was now nonexistent.

Some said his eyes carried shadows that hadn’t been there before.

Some wondered if the rejection had cost him more than he admitted.

And though none dared voice it openly, the question lingered in the air like smoke:

Was their Alpha faltering?

It was Ciaran, his Beta, who finally confronted him.

The two of them stood on the training grounds at dusk, the warriors dismissed, the air thick with the scent of sweat and churned earth. The sky burned orange, shadows long across the dirt.

“You’re slipping,” Ciaran said, his voice blunt, unflinching.

Ronan’s head snapped toward him, his gaze sharp as a blade. “Watch yourself.”

But Ciaran did not cower. He had been by Ronan’s side since they were boys, had bled with him, fought with him, and built this pack with him. If anyone had earned the right to speak truth, it was he.

“I mean it,” Ciaran pressed, his green eyes steady. “You’re distracted. You’ve been lashing out at the warriors, missing details in the council. The pack feels it. I feel it. Something’s off.”

Ronan’s fists curled at his sides. Rage prickled his skin. “You forget yourself.”

“No,” Ciaran countered, stepping closer. “You forget yourself. You think I don’t see it? This started after her.”

Ronan froze. His chest went tight.

Ciaran’s voice dropped lower. “I don’t know what she meant to you. I don’t care. But whatever you think you buried in that clearing… It’s not gone. And it’s tearing you apart.”

“Enough,” Ronan snarled, his aura flaring, shadows rippling like heat across the air.

But Ciaran didn’t back down. He never did. His jaw clenched, his voice firm.

“Keep lying to yourself, Ronan. But don’t lie to me. I’ve known you too long.”

For a moment, the silence between them was a blade.

Ronan turned away first, his shoulders rigid, his breath shallow.

“Get out of my sight,” he muttered.

Ciaran lingered, studying him with eyes that carried too much pity. And then he left, his footsteps fading into the dusk.

Ronan stood alone, the weight of his Beta’s words pressing like iron against his chest.

The nights were worse.

The Alpha’s Hall was vast and cold, stone walls echoing with silence. Torches burned low, their light flickering against the dark. Servants moved quietly, afraid of their Alpha’s temper, afraid of the storm simmering beneath his skin.

Ronan paced his chambers, stripped bare to the waist, his breath ragged. Sweat dripped down his temples, his muscles straining as he tried again and again to summon his wolf.

“Come,” he growled, clawing at the floorboards, the sound of wood splintering beneath his nails. His body trembled, the shift hovering, taunting him.

But nothing came.

The beast inside him crouched low, silent, refusing.

Every attempt ended the same: blood dripping from his hands, claw marks gouged into stone, his chest heaving with frustration and failure.

And always, the memories seeped in.

Her face.

Brielle.

Tears streaming, lips trembling, voice breaking as she whispered his name.

His rejection replayed like a curse, over and over, each time cutting deeper.

Until one night, the silence broke.

Not with his wolf. Not with the shift.

But with a word.

A name.

Her name.

It slipped past his lips, unbidden, raw.

“Brielle.”

The sound shattered him.

He sank to his knees, claws retracting, breath ragged. His chest burned, his throat tight, and for the first time in years, Alpha Ronan Ashbourne felt the weight of guilt like fire in his veins.

Hours passed. He sat in the shadows, back against the cold stone, staring at the claw marks gouged into his floor.

His wolf did not speak, but it mourned.

The grief was suffocating, pressing into every bone, every breath, every thought.

He had thought rejecting her would free him. That he could sever the bond cleanly, return to himself whole and unbroken.

But now he knew.

He hadn’t just lost a mate.

He had lost the only thing that made him whole.

And he had thrown it away with his own hand.

The moon rose high above the Shadow Fang lands that night, its silver glow spilling through the window of his chamber.

Ronan lifted his eyes to it, his chest hollow, his soul torn.

He whispered her name again.

“Brielle.”

And for the first time in his life, the Alpha of Shadow Fang felt… empty.

Not powerful. Not commanding.

Empty.

And nothing terrified him more.