From His Luna to His Rival's Mate

Chapter 28

SELENE

FEW DAYS LATER

The Bond Trial ceremony was the kind of event the academy took very seriously, every student was required to attend in formal wear. The great hall had been transformed overnight into something that looked like it belonged in a different century entirely.

Long silver banners hung from the ceiling beams, rows of white chairs faced a raised stone platform at the far end of the room. Candles burned in tall iron holders along both walls, throwing warm, flickering light across everything, the whole room smelled like cedar and something older underneath it, something that felt deliberately ceremonial.

I stood near the entrance in a dark green dress that hit just below my knee and looked at all of it with the specific feeling of someone who already knows a storm is coming and is watching the sky anyway.

Mara appeared beside me, she was wearing deep blue and her hair was pinned up neatly. She looked at the room and then at me. "You ready for this?"

"Define ready," I said.

She laughed once. "Fair enough."

We found seats in the fourth row, center. The hall filled up quickly around us, students moving in dressed and formal and buzzing with the particular energy of an event that everyone understood was significant.

The Bond Trials were not small, they determined academic pairings, combat partnerships, and in some cases, pack alliances that lasted long after graduation. Being claimed here, in this room, in front of every student and faculty member in the academy, meant something.

That was exactly what made it dangerous. Professor Harlan took the platform and the room settled.

"The Bond Trials," he said, his voice carrying cleanly through the hall, "are among the oldest traditions at Silverwood. They are not about romance, they are about compatibility, strength, and trust under pressure. The partnerships formed here will be tested across three events over the coming weeks. Tonight, students may declare their intended partner openly. The named partner has the right to accept or decline."

He paused and let that land. "Declarations are binding in intent but not in outcome. The trials themselves will determine whether a pairing holds."

A student near the front raised his hand and declared first, naming a girl two rows behind him who stood and accepted with a nod. The room applauded politely, two more declarations followed in quick succession, both accepted, both unremarkable.

Then Calder stood up and the room changed immediately. Calder walked to the end of his row and stepped into the aisle with the unhurried, deliberate movement of someone who had been planning this for a long time and had decided tonight was the night.

He turned to face the room, his eyes found me immediately but my stomach didn't drop like I had expected. I just looked back at him and felt something go very quiet inside me.

He walked to the base of the platform and turned to address the room rather than the professor, which was exactly the kind of move Calder Vance would make. His voice came out strong and carrying.

"I declare my intended partner." He looked directly at me. "Selene Vale."

The silence lasted about two seconds, then the room erupted in low noise, not quite gasps, not quite whispers, but the specific sound of two hundred people all reacting at the same moment and trying to do it quietly.

I felt every set of eyes in the room swing to me. Mara's hand found my arm under the armrest. She didn't say anything, she just held on.

I stood up and I heard the noise shift again as I moved into the aisle. I walked toward the platform with steady steps and kept my eyes forward.

Calder watched me with something in his expression that looked like certainty, like he had run this moment forward in his head enough times that he already knew how it ended.

I stopped a few feet from him, close enough that the whole room could see both of our faces clearly.

"Calder." I kept my voice even and loud enough to carry. "I appreciate the declaration, but my answer is no."

The silence that followed was the loudest thing I had ever heard.

Calder's expression didn't collapse. It fractured, something behind his eyes cracked open and then shut fast, replaced by a stillness that was worse than anger. His jaw worked once. "Selene..."

"I have the right to decline," I said simply.

He stared at me, the whole room stared at me. I could feel it like physical pressure from every direction. I turned to face the hall.

Kael was sitting six rows back on the right side, arms resting loose on his knees, watching me with an expression I couldn't fully read. Calm on the surface, something underneath it that was paying very close attention.

I held his gaze. "Kael Voss," I said clearly. "I declare you as my intended partner."