The Cursed Alpha & His Rejected Luna.

The forest was bleeding.

Not just the forest- but her. Seraphina was bleeding, but so were the trees, the sky, the gods themselves. Everything around her felt like it was tearing at the seams, unraveling beneath the weight of something ancient and cruel.

Rain lashed against her back like a whip, soaking through what remained of her torn clothes. Every step felt like dragging shattered bones across jagged stone.

Her paws had given out miles ago, now she stumbled on bare, trembling legs, slipping in the mud as snarls echoed behind her.

They were close, she could hear them, feel them. She tripped over a root and hit the ground hard, a sharp, ugly sob ripping from her chest.

“Why me?” she whispered into the storm, but no answer came.

Her brother, Joren, was dead. She had buried his scent with the ash. So what more did they want from her?

Gritting her teeth, she forced herself upright, her palm scraping against rock, igniting a flare of pain. Blood trailed behind her—evidence of her weakness, her body’s betrayal. She hated it. Hated it with every breath.

She was rogue.

She hadn’t asked to be one. She hadn’t chosen to be one.

The world had made that decision for her— and then discarded her like garbage. And now it wanted to finish the job?

Another howl ripped through the trees, closer now- and much crueler. Her legs gave one final push, carrying her toward a distant ridge, toward trees that curved in strange, unnatural shapes. Something ancient tugged at her from that place. Something sacred.

Then she saw it.

A faint shimmer in the air like sunlight reflecting off water, but untouched by rain. It was magical, old and potent.

A border, but not just any pack's.

Blood Moon territory.

Crossing into it felt like stepping into the jaws of a sleeping god.

The air shifted into something thick, charged and alive. Her knees struck the dirt. Her hands followed. Her head bowed low, dripping rain, blood, and body heat into the soaked earth.

“Please,” she whispered to no one.

“Let me live.”

The last thing she felt was the pulse of the ground beneath her before the world faded to black.

~~~

Am I dead?

The thought slithered through her mind before her eyes even opened. There was no rain now, no snapping branches, no snarling teeth at her heels. Only stillness. Cold stone.

Then the ache hit deep in her limbs, thick and suffocating like poison running through her blood.

Her wrists were bound and so were her ankles.

Chains.

Real ones. Heavy, tight, etched with a faint, glowing rune-fire. Her fingers twitched, they were stiff and raw. She tried to lift her head, but her body protested. Even breathing felt too loud in the silence.

Where was she?

The scent came first, wolves. It screamed of Power and Authority. It clung to the walls like smoke. The kind of scent that made the hairs on her arms rise in warning.

She turned her head slowly, blinking against the dim light filtering through the iron bars of the cell. Shadows moved beyond them—guards. Lots of them. Some clad in armor, others half-shifted with glowing eyes and twitching claws. All of them watching her like she was a live weapon primed to detonate.

Dragging herself toward the bars, the chains clinking and scraping, she wrapped trembling fingers around the cold metal and pressed her face to the narrow space between.

Her voice cracked.

“Let me go. Please.”

One of the guards glanced her way, unmoved and suddenly, there came footsteps....slow, sure, each one striking the stone louder than the last. The guards shifted. Straightened and parted a way.

Through the bars, she saw him. A tall figure cutting through the line of warriors, his presence commanding even before he spoke. The guards bowed their heads slightly as he passed.

He didn’t look like a king but they treated him like one.

“Beta Damon,” one of the guards said, voice clipped.

So this was the Beta. Of course it was. He didn’t even spare her a glance. He sure made her feel like a discarded piece of shit.

“What’s the situation? How was she caught?”

“She was found unconscious at the southern border,” the guard reported. “Patrol intercepted her before she could cross deeper into the territory. She was alone.”

Damon said nothing, but his silence echoed louder than words. Then, a command.

“Take her to the Assembly Grounds.”

And just like that, her fate moved again. The lock snapped open, loud as thunder.

Two guards stepped in. One seized her arm while the other jerked the chain from her ankles, dragging her upright like a lifeless thing. Her knees buckled and her spine screamed. But pain had no place here.

She could barely stand. Every step was a knife dragged along her legs.

The hallway was long and carved from ancient stone, lit by flickering torches casting claw-shaped shadows on the ground. She tried not to stumble, but the chains were too tight, and the guards too impatient.

Then it began. A ripple beneath her skin.

Lulu.

Her wolf stirred, twitching like fire in her bones, pacing, vibrating with something urgent and feral.

“We’re close,” Lulu whispered in her mind, her voice trembling with emotion. “We’re meeting him. I’m going to explode.”

Seraphina clenched her jaw. Not now. Not when I can barely breathe. But Lulu didn’t stop. She pressed against bone and rib like she was being drawn toward a gravitational pull too ancient to resist.

Her wolf had never behaved like this- never so frantic, so desperate, like she was aching for something she didn’t know she needed.

Lulu, stop, she whispered in her head. We don’t even know what we’re walking into.

Lulu whimpered. “You’ll see. You’ll see. It’s him.”

She didn’t have the strength to argue. The hallway widened into a vast chamber. Guards lined the edges in a tight crescent, more than she’d ever seen in one place. Every single one fixed their gaze on her. Their combined energy pressed down like a thundercloud ready to break.

She was led forward, heart pounding, vision dimming. The pressure in this space was unbearable, powerful, ancient, charged. It slid beneath her skin like fire and ice in the same breath.

This was a place where wolves bowed to no one except him.

And she felt him before she saw him. The presence was magnetic, violent and timeless.

She stumbled. One of the guards shoved her forward and she hit the ground hard, her knees cracking against stone. Her hands gripped the chain around her wrists, trying to catch herself, but it was no use.

She landed against something solid. Blood filled her mouth, iron and heat and shame.

She raised her head slowly, her gaze traveling up over dark pants, then a tall, unmoving figure. And finally

....eyes, those eyes of his as cold as death. Darker than night and sharp enough to cut bone.

He stared at her like a predator ready to feast on its prey. His gaze alone tore throughout her skin, piercing invisible knives into her soul.

Alpha Rael Fang.

And in that moment, Seraphina felt more seen and more doomed than she had in her entire life.