Rejected

The search

Matteo POV

The forest blurred past in shades of gray and green, my paws barely touching the damp earth before springing forward again. The pack fanned out around me. Twenty warriors, maybe more, their collective howls tearing through the morning mist like blades. But I was faster. I had to be.

Her scent hit me two miles from the border, faint but unmistakable. Jasmine, rain, and beneath it, the copper tang of fresh blood.

My chest seized, lungs burning as I pushed harder. The trail wove through thornbushes and across a shallow creek, deliberately erratic. She knew they’d come for her. She’d always known. But she was hurt,worse than usual, maybe. The smell of blood was too strong, too recent. My wolf whined, the sound muffled by the wind rushing past my ears.

A massive black wolf cut across my path. Kaiden. His eyes were still that terrible, burning gold, and when he snarled, the command in it rippled through my bones like a physical blow. Stay behind me.

I bared my teeth but dropped back half a pace, my hackles raised. I wasn’t challenging him. Not yet. But I wouldn’t let him hurt her either.

Elias ran to my left, his brown wolf tense, his gaze flicking between Kaiden and the trail. He hadn’t said a word since we left the house, but I could smell the conflict on him.Sweat and fear and something bitter that might have been shame.

Her scent grew stronger near the ridge. I caught the flash of something pale caught on a branch and surged ahead, ignoring Kaiden’s warning growl. It was fabric. Her nightgown, torn and bloody, snagged on a thorn bush. Beside footprints.Small, limping, human. She’d shifted back. She was running on two feet, barefoot, bleeding.

I shifted without breaking stride, my bones snapping and reforming in a fluid wave of agony that I barely registered. I grabbed the scrap of fabric, pressing it to my face, and my knees nearly buckled. She’d been crying when she passed this spot. I could smell the salt, could almost taste her despair.

"Matteo," Elias’s voice came from behind me. He’d shifted too, his chest heaving, his eyes wide and uncertain. "The trail splits here. Half the pack went north toward the highway."

"She didn’t go north," I said, my voice rough. I pointed to a disturbed patch of moss, barely visible beneath a fallen log. "She doubled back. She’s heading for the old den. Our den where we used to play." I almost ran towards that direction but Elias grabbed me.

Elias POV

She's not, Matteo." I tightened my grip on my brother's arm, feeling his muscles coil and tremble beneath my fingers. He was half-shifted, unstable, his wolf riding him too hard. I knew the feeling. Mine was doing the same. Scratching at my ribs, howling for me to move , to find her . But I was Beta. I was supposed to be the clear head when everyone else lost theirs. "Her scent is everywhere. She spread it everywhere. She's scared of being found."

Matteo snarled, snapping his teeth inches from my face. "Let go, Elias. I know her. I know where she'll go—"

"You knew her fourteen years ago!" I shoved him back, hard enough that he stumbled. The words came out harsher than I meant them, tasting like ash and old lies. "Before you decided she was nothing. Before you stopped looking at her. You don't get to claim you know her now."

The silence between us was poisoned.

Kaiden shifted back, his naked form cutting through the mist like a blade. His eyes were still gold, still feral, but there was something else there now. Panic. The kind of panic that made an Alpha dangerous. "What do you mean, her scent is everywhere?"

I forced my wolf down, forced my breath to steady, and crouched low to the earth. I pressed my palm into the damp soil and inhaled. Deeply. Properly. Not like a hunter chasing prey—like a tracker. Like the Beta I was supposed to be.

Jasmine. Rain. Blood.

But I was right. It was too much. Too deliberate. I found a smear of it on a rock two feet left. A soaked patch of moss ten feet right. A torn strip of fabric dangling from a low branch like a flag. She'd bled on purpose, rubbed her scent on bark and stone, split her trail into a dozen directions.

"She's not running blind," I said, my voice dropping. I stood slowly, turning in a circle. The forest was a web of her. "She's leading us in circles. She's... she's smarter than we gave her credit for."

"She's a feral," Kaiden said automatically, the word falling from his lips like a reflex. But it lacked conviction. It sounded hollow, even to him.

I looked at him. Really looked at him. The Alpha who had rejected his mate. The man who had stood beside Sebastian and nodded while Sophia was collared. And I saw something that made my stomach twist.

He didn't believe it anymore either.

"She's not feral," Matteo whispered, and his voice cracked. "She never was. We just needed her to be."

I turned away from them both, my chest tight, my wolf whining low in my throat. I didn't want to hear this. I couldn't afford to doubt. Doubt meant I'd spent fourteen years as a monster. Doubt meant every whip I'd watched land, every meal I'd denied her, every night I'd slept in a warm bed while she bled on a mattress in a closet—it all meant something I couldn't survive knowing.

But the scent didn't lie.

I followed the true trail. Not the strongest scent, not the bloodiest. The weakest. The one that smelled like fear and exhaustion and a girl who was running out of time. It led away from the old den. Away from the highway. It led west, toward the ravine.

Toward the border.

"She's going for the silverpines," I said, the realization hitting me like a physical blow. "She's crossed into rogue territory."

Kaiden went rigid. "The silverpines are toxic this time of year. The sap burns. No wolf can survive a crossing without..."

"Without what?" Matteo demanded. "Without pack protection? Without her brothers? She's already survived worse, Kaiden. She's survived us ."

I started moving before I could stop myself. Not because Kaiden commanded it. Not because I wanted to drag her back for punishment.

Because the trail smelled wrong.

Her scent was fading.

I shifted without thought, my brown wolf bursting free, and I ran. I ran faster than I'd ever run in my life, the wind screaming past my ears, my heart hammering a single rhythm against my ribs.

Not dead. Not dead. Please, not dead.

I reached the edge and skidded to a stop, my claws digging furrows into the earth. My breath came in ragged pants, steam rising from my muzzle.

Then suddenly, I lost her scent

Had she masked her scent?

She was gone

Kaiden,Matteo and the rest of the warriors stopped as we sniffed. She really was gone.

"She couldn't have gone that far right?

It's only been a few hours. She might be in a neighboring pack. Let's return and write letters to the neighboring packs" I tried to reason with Kaiden who glared at me but eventually nodded.

"Everyone back!" He ordered