BROKEN HOWL

Chapter 2: Exile’s Edge

The forest swallowed Matilda whole.

Branches whipped across her arms and face as the warriors shoved her deeper into the wild borderlands. Their grips loosened once the torches of the sacred clearing disappeared behind the thick canopy. One of them a scarred gamma named Ronan finally let go and spat at her feet.

“Keep walking, half-blood. Alpha’s orders. Don’t come back.”

The other warrior, younger and quieter, hesitated for half a second. His eyes flicked to her stomach before he looked away. “Dawn’s in four hours. If you’re still on Nightshade land after that…”

He didn’t finish. Didn’t need to.

Matilda stood there, bare feet sinking into cold mud, the white gown now torn and streaked with dirt. She watched them turn and melt back into the trees. Their footsteps faded. Then nothing but the rustle of leaves and the distant howl of some lone wolf that wasn’t pack.

Her legs gave out.

She dropped to her knees, palms slamming into the wet earth. A sob tore from her throat—ugly, jagged, nothing like the controlled silence she’d held in the clearing. Her fingers dug into the soil until her nails cracked. The bond’s absence pulsed like an open wound in her chest, raw and bleeding.

“Williams,” she choked out, the name tasting like ash. “You bastard.”

Another wave hit her. She curled forward, forehead pressing against the ground, shoulders shaking. Six weeks. Six weeks of hiding the tiny life inside her while he’d been pulling away, growing colder, listening to Liora’s whispers and the elders’ demands for a “stronger” match.

She hadn’t told him. Had wanted to surprise him after the ceremony. Had imagined his rare smile cracking through that stone face when she placed his hand on her belly.

Now?

Now she wanted to rip his throat out.

Matilda stayed like that until her breathing evened. Until the tears dried into stiff tracks on her cheeks. Slowly, she pushed herself up. Her hands trembled as she brushed dirt from the ruined gown. The scar above her eyebrow throbbed in time with her heartbeat.

She wasn’t safe here. Not tonight. Not ever again.

With a deep, shuddering breath, she started walking. Not back toward the pack. Forward. Into the unclaimed territories where rogues and outcasts scraped by. Her steps were unsteady at first, then steadier. Each one carved something harder inside her.

By the time the sky lightened to a bruised gray, she had crossed the invisible border. The air smelled different sharper, wilder, laced with the metallic tang of old blood and forgotten magic.

A small cave mouth appeared between two jagged rocks. She crawled inside, curling into the darkest corner. Exhaustion dragged her under, but sleep brought no peace. Dreams twisted with Williams’ voice rejecting her, Liora’s mocking laugh, and the faint flutter of movement low in her belly.

When she woke, the sun had climbed high. Hunger gnawed at her. Thirst burned her throat. But something else burned hotter.

Revenge.

She pressed both hands to her stomach. “I won’t let him take you from me,” she whispered, voice rough from crying. “We’re getting stronger. Both of us.”

Days blurred.

Matilda learned quickly how unforgiving the outside world was. She traded the torn ceremonial gown for rough trousers and a hooded tunic from a traveling merchant who asked too many questions. She worked odd jobs skinning rabbits for a rogue camp, carrying messages between shady traders, even cleaning blood off floors in a dingy tavern that served both wolves and humans who knew better than to ask.

Her body changed slowly. The slight swell remained hidden under loose clothes. Morning sickness she blamed on bad meat. The pack bond was gone, but a new strength flickered in its place. She practiced shifting alone at night, pushing her wolf harder, faster, until her muscles screamed and her lungs burned.

She made one friend. Only one.

A sharp-tongued rogue named Selene who ran a hidden forge on the edge of the neutral lands. Selene had silver streaks in her dark hair and a burn scar that ran down her neck. She didn’t ask why Matilda was alone. She just handed her a knife one evening and said, “If you’re staying, learn to use this properly. Pretty scars won’t save you.”

Matilda took the blade. Practiced until her palms bled.

Months passed. Five of them.

Her belly had grown enough that loose tunics barely hid it anymore. She moved with careful grace now, never letting anyone too close. The anger inside her had settled into something colder. Sharper. A weapon she sharpened every single day.

She heard rumors, of course. Whispers carried on the wind between travelers.

Nightshade Pack was expanding. Williams had taken Liora as his chosen mate in a rushed ceremony. The pack grew stronger, richer. But there were cracks discontent among some elders, strange attacks on the borders that no one could explain.

Matilda smiled thinly when she heard that last part. She had started leaving small marks. Nothing obvious. Just enough to remind Williams that the forest remembered.

One rainy evening, Selene found her in the back of the forge, sharpening a set of throwing knives by lantern light.

“You’re planning something stupid, aren’t you?” Selene asked, leaning against the doorframe. Her arms crossed tight over her chest.

Matilda didn’t look up. The blade scraped rhythmically against the whetstone. “Not stupid. Necessary.”

Selene snorted. “Necessary got my sister killed. You got a pup in there, girl. Think about that before you go charging back like some avenging goddess.”

The knife stilled in Matilda’s hand. She finally lifted her gaze. “I am thinking about the pup. That’s why I can’t stay hiding forever.”

Selene studied her for a long moment. Then she sighed and tossed something onto the workbench. A small leather pouch.

“Contacts in Blackthorn City. They owe me favors. If you’re serious about coming back stronger, you’ll need more than knives and rage. You’ll need allies. Money. Information.”

Matilda picked up the pouch. Heavy. Coins clinked inside.

“Why help me?” she asked quietly.

Selene’s smile was bitter. “Because I see what he did to you in your eyes every damn day. And because someone needs to make bastards like Williams Draven bleed for what they break.”

Matilda nodded once. No thanks. No tears. Just the cold promise settling deeper in her bones.

She left the forge two nights later under a clouded moon. The road to Blackthorn stretched ahead—dangerous, uncertain. But for the first time since that night in the clearing, she didn’t feel broken.

She felt dangerous.

What she didn’t know was that back in Nightshade territory, Williams stood on the balcony of his private quarters, staring out into the dark forest. Liora slept in his bed behind him, her scent heavy on the sheets. But he couldn’t sleep.

His wolf paced restlessly inside him. The rejected bond still tugged sometimes, faint and irritating, like a splinter he couldn’t dig out.

He told himself it was nothing. That Matilda was gone. Weak. Forgotten.

Yet every full moon, he caught himself scanning the tree line, searching for a ghost with a scar above her eyebrow.

A scout burst into the courtyard below, out of breath.

“Alpha! Border patrol found something. Old scent. Female. Mixed with… something else.”

Williams’ hands tightened on the stone railing. “What kind of something else?”

The scout hesitated. “Bloodline scent. Ancient. Not pure Nightshade.”

Williams’ jaw clenched. A flicker of unease stirred in his gut something he hadn’t felt in months.

He turned and strode back inside, ignoring Liora’s sleepy murmur. His mind raced with possibilities he refused to name.

Matilda was supposed to be gone.

But the forest had a way of spitting back what it swallowed.

And somewhere out there, a woman he had cast aside was no longer the girl who once loved him.

She was becoming the nightmare he might not survive.