Nun to call mine

The Vow

The Lunaria Temple was nothing like the world Lisa left behind.

There were no golden halls here. No roaring fires or rich tapestries. No music or laughter or the smell of feasting. There was only stone — gray and cold and ancient. The walls rose high on every side, blocking out the sun so that the temple existed in a permanent state of twilight. The air smelled of candle wax, old books, and something else — something sharp and clean, like the air after a storm.

The Mother of Nuns led Lisa through a narrow corridor without speaking. Their footsteps echoed in the silence. Other nuns passed them — women in gray robes with their heads bowed and their eyes fixed on the ground. None of them looked at Lisa. None of them spoke.

Lisa's feet left bloody prints on the stone floor. She was still barefoot. Still in her ruined white gown. Still shaking.

The Mother of Nuns stopped before a heavy wooden door and pushed it open. Inside was a small room — smaller even than Lisa's room at the Alpha house. A narrow bed with a thin blanket. A single candle on a stone shelf. A basin of water. Nothing else.

"You will stay here tonight," the Mother said. "Tomorrow, at moonrise, you will take the vow. After that, this is your life. Do you understand?"

Lisa nodded. She did not trust her voice.

The Mother of Nuns studied her with those gray eyes — eyes that seemed to see more than they should. "You are the Alpha's daughter. The one they call cursed."

It was not a question. Lisa nodded again.

"Your reputation precedes you," the Mother said flatly. "I will be honest with you, child. Many here will not welcome you. They have heard the stories. They believe you bring misfortune wherever you go."

Lisa's throat tightened. Even here. Even in a place of peace and prayer, the curse followed her.

"I will not cause trouble," Lisa said quietly. "I only want to be left alone."

The Mother of Nuns regarded her for another long moment. Then she nodded once and left, closing the door behind her.

Lisa stood in the center of the tiny room. Alone. Truly alone.

She walked to the basin of water and looked down at her reflection. In the dim candlelight, she saw what she always saw — a young woman with curly brown hair and green eyes and a face that looked, to her own eyes, perfectly ordinary. Not beautiful, perhaps. But not monstrous. Not ugly.

And yet everyone else saw something terrible when they looked at her.

What was wrong with her?

The tears came then. Not the quiet, controlled tears of the great hall. These were ugly, gasping sobs that shook her entire body. She sank to the floor and curled into herself, pressing her face against her knees, and she cried until her chest ached and her throat was raw and there was nothing left inside her but emptiness.

She cried for the father who never protected her. She cried for the mother who never held her. She cried for the sister who smiled while stealing her future. She cried for Thrain — not because she loved him, but because being rejected by your fated mate was a wound that went deeper than love. It was the universe itself saying: you are not enough.

When the tears finally stopped, Lisa felt hollow. Clean, almost. Like a fire had burned through her and left only ash.

She stood up. Washed her face. Changed into the gray robes that had been left folded on the bed. She pulled the rough fabric over her head and looked down at herself.

Gray. Plain. Invisible.

Good.

She slept that night without dreams.

The next evening, as the moon rose fat and silver over the temple walls, Lisa was brought to the central courtyard. It was an open space surrounded by stone pillars, with a great fountain in the center. The fountain was carved in the shape of the Moon Goddess — a tall woman with her arms raised to the sky, water pouring from her open palms into a wide silver basin below.

The nuns stood in a circle around the fountain. Thirty women in gray robes, their faces hidden by hoods. They chanted in the old language — words Lisa did not understand but could feel in her bones. The sound was low and haunting, like the earth itself was humming.

The Mother of Nuns stood beside the fountain, holding a silver knife.

"Step forward, child," she said.

Lisa walked to the center of the circle. The chanting grew louder. The moon above was so bright it hurt to look at.

"Speak your name," the Mother commanded.

"Lisa. Daughter of Lykon."

"Lisa, daughter of Lykon. You come before the Moon Goddess seeking shelter. You come seeking silence. You come seeking an end to the life you knew." The Mother's gray eyes bore into her. "Do you give your body to this temple?"

"I do."

"Do you give your heart to the Moon Goddess alone?"

Lisa thought of Thrain's disgusted face. She thought of the golden thread snapping in her chest. She thought of every person who had ever looked at her and turned away.

"I do," she said. And she meant it.

"Do you give your future — your freedom, your choice of mate, your right to love and be loved by any wolf — to the service of this sacred place?"

This was the weight of it. The true cost. No mate. No love. No bond. Forever.

Lisa closed her eyes. "I do."

"Then let it be sealed."

The Mother of Nuns took Lisa's hand and drew the silver knife across her palm. Lisa gasped at the sharp bite of pain. Blood welled up — red and bright against her pale skin. The Mother guided her hand over the fountain's basin, and Lisa watched her blood drip into the silver water.

The moment the blood touched the water, the liquid glowed. White, brilliant, blinding. The chanting reached a peak — a single, powerful note that vibrated through the courtyard like a bell being struck.

Then silence.

The glow faded. The water returned to normal. Lisa's palm throbbed.

"It is done," the Mother of Nuns said. "You are bound. From this moment, you belong to the temple. If you break this vow — if you take a mate, if you give your heart to another — the consequence is death. The Moon Goddess does not forgive betrayal."

Lisa nodded. She felt the vow settle over her like a chain — invisible but heavy. She could feel it around her wrists, her ankles, her throat. A binding.

But also a protection. No one could hurt her here. No one could reject her if she had already rejected the world first.

The nuns dispersed without a word to her. No one congratulated her. No one welcomed her. They simply returned to their rooms, leaving Lisa standing alone by the fountain with blood still dripping from her hand.

She wrapped her palm with a strip of cloth and returned to her small room.

This was her life now.

She told herself she was at peace.

She almost believed it.

In the days that followed, Lisa learned the temple's rhythms. Wake before dawn. Pray. Clean. Cook. Pray again. Study the sacred texts. Pray once more. Sleep. Repeat.

She was given tasks no one else wanted — scrubbing the floors of the deepest chambers, washing linens in freezing water, carrying heavy stones for wall repairs. She did not complain. Complaint required energy, and she had none left.

The other nuns avoided her. They whispered when she passed. They moved their food to a different table when she sat down. One morning, she found a dead crow on her doorstep — a message. Death follows you.

Lisa picked up the crow, buried it in the garden, and went to her morning prayers without a word.

She lived in a separate room, far from the other nuns. She ate alone. She prayed alone. She existed in a bubble of silence that no one wanted to enter.

Weeks passed. Then months. The outside world became a distant memory. The pain of Thrain's rejection faded from a scream to a whisper. Lisa's broken bond scarred over, leaving a dull ache that only hurt when she breathed too deeply.

She was surviving. Not living, but surviving. And for now, that was enough.

But at night — always at night — something stirred inside her. A restlessness. A heat in her blood that had no explanation. It was worse during the full moon. On those nights, she paced her room like a caged animal, her skin burning, her vision going strange. Gold flickers at the edges. A growl building in her throat that did not sound like her.

The nuns heard her on those nights. The snarling. The scratching at the door. In the morning, her room would be destroyed — furniture overturned, claw marks in the stone walls, her blankets shredded.

Lisa remembered none of it.

The Mother of Nuns made a decision. From now on, Lisa would be locked in her room during every full moon. For the safety of the temple.

For the safety of everyone.

Lisa did not argue. She was used to being locked away.

But each full moon, the thing inside her grew stronger. Each full moon, the gold in her eyes burned brighter. Each full moon, the cracks in her cage grew wider.

Something was waking up inside Lisa.

And far away, in a pack across the mountains, a young man with blood on his hands was about to be sent straight to her door.