MARKED TO BURN, BORN TO RULE

NADIA’S POV "Please! I still have time, no, please, NO!" Smoke and screaming everywhere, and under all of it there's this smell I'm not even going to try to name, because if I actually think about what it is I'm going to lose it completely. Nobody around me looks away either. Nobody ever does, which honestly says more about this pack than anything else could. I don't stick around to watch this one burn. I've seen enough of them by now to know exactly how it goes, every single time, and I've got two days left before I'm the one they drag up there. Two days. Wolfless, that's the whole crime. You don't choose it, you definitely don't cause it, but Mooncrest still calls it a capital crime like that makes any sense at all. I run the whole way home like running is somehow going to buy me more time. It won't. I run anyway because what else am I supposed to do? "Naddy? Back so soon?" Mum's voice comes from the kitchen and I head in, and Dad's right there with her too. "They're burning more people today." The room goes quiet and cold, the kind of quiet where you can hear it happening, and Dad crosses the room in like two steps and pulls me into a hug. Mum's hand goes to her mouth. She doesn't say anything. She doesn't have to, honestly, because I've seen that look on her face enough times to know what it means. Not yet. Not my girl. Not like this. "Nothing is going to happen to you," Dad says. Like he hasn't said that literally every single day this week. "You're my daughter. You're Reid's mate." Reid. My mate. Interim alpha, running things because his dad's too sick, and also the reason "mate" doesn't mean whatever my dad thinks it means. Three weeks ago Reid had me against a wall by my throat after punching me several times in my stomach, telling me to remember my place, and I still haven't shown anyone the bruises from that. Everyone believes the bond keeps me safe and Reid's never bothered to correct them, because why would he? It keeps my dad's guard down and it keeps me quiet. I could tell my Dad the truth but I don't. There's no version of that conversation where my dad hears it and stays alive. "I want to go talk to the families that left," I say instead, because it's easier than the truth. "The ones near the border. Maybe they'd-" "Go wash up." Dad's already turned back to the sink. "Dinner will be ready soon." And that's the end of that. I lie awake that whole night trying to make numbers that just don't work. Two days to somehow convince two extremely stubborn parents to leave everything they've ever built behind, in a pack they still genuinely believe is going to protect their only kid. I don't get two days though. Something wakes me before I even understand why. It's too quiet, like actually quiet, the kind where your body just knows something's wrong before your brain's even caught up. I get up and check my parents' room first. Bed's untouched. Nobody slept in it. "Mum? Dad?" Nothing. I'm outside the house now, still calling their names, when I catch movement at the treeline. I know that move. Pack warriors move exactly like that, trained not to waste a single sound doing it. I turn to run back inside but a hand's already over my mouth from behind. I bite down as hard as I can, taste blood, and manage to yank one elbow free, just enough to catch the mark stitched into the arm holding me. The sigil of the alpha family guards. My own mate sent them. That's the last thought I get before something cracks against my skull and everything just disappears. ****** I wake up on stone. Cold, wet, disgusting stone, and a headache splitting my head in half as I look around. The dungeon. "I told them not to kill you," a voice says out of the dark, and I already know exactly who it is before the torchlight even reaches his face. "I wanted this to actually be memorable." Reid crouches in front of me and whatever tiny part of me was still hoping this was some huge misunderstanding just dies right there. "Get up." When I don't move fast enough for him he grabs my jaw hard enough to leave a mark. "I want you standing up, looking at me." "Reid, please, whatever you think I-" "That's Alpha to you." The slap comes before I even finish talking, my head snapping sideways so hard my vision goes blurry for a second. I taste blood, sharp and metallic in my mouth. "We had three years." I say it anyway, because some i***t part of me still thinks that's supposed to mean something. "Three years, Reid." "Three years of pretending the goddess didn't screw up." He says it like he's said this exact line to himself a hundred times before tonight. "Your birthday's tomorrow anyway. Let's just get this over with now." He straightens his jacket, like he's about to make a toast at dinner instead of end my life. "I, Reid Mercer, reject you, Nadia Laurent, as my mate and Luna. Let the goddess witness it, if she's even still watching at this point." The bond doesn't just break. It rips straight through me. Every single nerve in my wolfless body lights up like it finally found something worth feeling, and all it wants to feel, apparently, is this. I'm on the ground before I even realize I fell. Reid doesn't touch me again. He doesn't need to, I'm already doing all the damage to myself, gasping like someone reached in and pulled all the air straight out of me. "The stake's already built," he says, already turning for the door. "Custom job, actually. Shame to waste it on just anyone." "My parents." My voice barely works. "Where are my parents, Reid? What did you do?" He stops at the door. Doesn't turn around. "Traitors don't get visitors." He waits a second, just long enough to enjoy it. "Turns out your father's been feeding information to the border packs for years. Your mother knew the whole time too. Careless of them honestly, leaving something lying around where their own daughter could stumble onto it." I go still. "That's a lie and you know it." "Doesn't matter if it's true or not." He glances back at me, finally, and there's nothing behind his eyes I recognize. "It just has to be believable. And it is." He's already walking off when he adds it, almost like an afterthought. "Don't worry though. They'll be right there with you tomorrow. Front row seats to the family bonfire." The door slams behind him and the sound swallows everything else in the room. I'm alone with my own heartbeat and one thought I honestly cannot put down no matter how hard I try. He's not lying about the fire. Somewhere above me, faint through all the stone, I can hear hammering. They're already building it.