Rejected While Pregnant with the Alpha’s Secret Heir

Chapter 4: The Clearing

The dawn was unnaturally cold, the morning mist clinging to the damp grass of the pack’s main clearing. The entire Vargan pack had been roused from their beds and summoned, their hushed, confused whispers filling the chilly air.

Erin stood in the very front row, wearing a simple, pale linen dress. She hugged her arms around herself, shivering not from the cold, but from a gnawing, inexplicable anxiety. Corin hadn't come home last night. She had waited for him with a warm dinner and the life-changing plastic test hidden in her pocket, but the door had never opened. And now, this sudden gathering.

She scanned the crowd, her heart pounding against her ribs, until movement on the Alpha’s Rock caught her eye.

Corin stepped up to the massive stone ledge. He looked magnificent, powerful, and terrifyingly cold. His broad shoulders were tense, his jaw locked tight. Erin felt a wave of relief wash over her at the sight of him. She took a half-step forward, a soft, hopeful smile touching her lips. She tried to catch his gaze. Look at me, Corin. I’m right here.

But when his dark eyes swept over the crowd, they slid right past her. It was as if she were completely invisible. As if she were a ghost.

Erin’s smile faltered. A heavy knot formed in her stomach. And then, she saw her.

Serai Dalen stepped up onto the rock, taking her place right beside Corin. She looked radiant, clad in rich, dark fabrics, her chin held high with aristocratic pride. The harsh, icy scent of winter frost and silver drifted over the clearing, clashing violently with the warm, earthy smells of the Vargan pack.

The murmurs in the crowd instantly died. The silence that followed was absolute, suffocating.

Corin took a deep breath. His chest expanded, and when he spoke, his voice was unnervingly even, devoid of any warmth, any love, any hesitation. It boomed over the clearing, an ancient, devastating command.

"I, Corin, Alpha of the Vargan pack," his voice echoed off the surrounding trees, "invoke the ancient right of severance. Before the Moon and the Elders, I break the bond. I renounce Erin as my mate."

The words hit Erin with the force of a physical blow. All the air vanished from her lungs. The world tilted dangerously, the colors bleeding out of the morning sky. Renounce? Break the bond? It had to be a nightmare. It was a sick, twisted joke. Just yesterday morning he was kissing her neck, planning their house by the river, promising her a hundred years of happiness.

Corin didn’t look at her. He didn't even flinch. He slowly reached out and took Serai’s delicate hand in his massive one, raising their joined hands for the entire pack to see.

"I claim Serai of the Dalen bloodline," Corin declared, his voice ringing like a death sentence. "Accept her. She is your true Luna."

A shocked gasp rippled through the crowd. The silence shattered into a chaotic murmur of disbelief. Wolves exchanged wide-eyed, horrified glances, looking from their Alpha to the pale, trembling girl in the front row.

"Goddess..." an older female wolf, Ivara, breathed out in shock. She stepped closer to Erin, her eyes full of sudden, crushing pity, and grabbed Erin’s elbow to steady her. "Erin, child..."

The touch of pity was like a burning brand against her skin.

Erin blinked. The initial shockwave of agony began to solidify into something else. Something cold and hard. She looked at Corin’s hand, holding Serai’s. She looked at his face, carved from stone, completely detached from the girl he had called his whole world just twenty-four hours ago.

Slowly, deliberately, Erin pulled her arm out of Ivara’s grasp. She didn't fall to her knees. She didn't scream. She didn't beg.

She stood there for one agonizing second, feeling her heart shatter into a million irreparable pieces inside her chest. And then, the realization settled over her, cold and absolute: He found his real one. I was just a temporary toy. A stray he played with until a true, royal wolf came along.

Erin slowly raised her chin. Her face was pale, almost translucent, but her eyes were dry. She refused to give them her tears. She refused to let the pack see her break.

With her back perfectly straight and her head held high, Erin turned around. The crowd parted for her like the Red Sea, wolves lowering their heads in uncomfortable silence as she walked through them. She didn't look back. She didn't look at the Alpha's Rock. She just kept walking, step by agonizing step, away from the clearing, away from the pack, and away from the only man she had ever loved, carrying a secret he would now never know.