The unfamiliar scent of cedar wood and mountain air clung to the silk sheets beneath Lia. Her body was heavy with exhaustion, limbs aching from the long journey and the year of pain she'd carried. But it wasn't just her body that was thorn – it was her spirit.

Sleep had come in waves, shallow and broken, until she eventually sank into a stillness that passed for rest. At least, that's why they thought.

She remained curled beneath the thick duvet, her breathing slow and even.

The perfect image of a sleeping girl. But behind her closed lids, her mind was awake. Alert. Listening.

The room was dimly lit by firelight from a hearth across the chamber somewhere to her right, the tall double doors creaked open.

“Let her sleep,” came Alpha Kieran’s low commanding voice. “Don't disturb her. She's been through enough.”

Lia's chest tightened slightly, but she didn't move. His voice was deeper up close, smooth and sharp like velvet - dropped steel. There was a stranger softness in it when he spoke about her - but only for a moment.

Another voice entered the room.

“Alpha,” the newcomer greeted respectfully. “I heard you returned.”

“Beta Real, “ Kieran acknowledge without turning. “Close the door.”

A faint click followed.

Then silence.

Until Rael spoke again, his voice quieter now, but laced with disbelief. “Why you bring her, Kieran? That's the girl they cal cursed. The wolfless one. Her family are desolate, they abandoned her - left her to rot all by herself.”

There was no response at first.

Then Alpha Kieran's boots echoed softly as he walked toward the windows.

“I don't bring her here for pity,” he said flatly. “I brought her because she's an assets.

“Am asset?” Real sounded skeptical. “She has no wolf. No bloodline. No strength.”

“That's why they think,” Kieran murmured. “But her beings wolfless makes her more valuable than any warriors in our ranks.”

Rael hesitated “....you mean the Luca ritual.”

Kieran turned them, and though Lai couldn't see his face, she could feel the change in the air– the power humming from him, the barely restrained force behind his words.

“To rise beyond am Alpha, I mean the blood of a wolfless werewolf. That's the price. That's the path to become what this pack needs– a Lycan . And the goddess doesn't make many of her kind.”

Rael was quiet now.

Lia's breath caught quietly in her throat.

Her blood?

She felt the weight of his words pressing into her chest like a boulder.

She had always wondered why fate had made her different. Why she was born broken.

Abandoned. Humiliated. Had it all been for this?

“She's not like the others,” Kieran continued.

“Her suffering carved something rare inside her. That strength – tha void makes her the key.”

“She doesn't know yet?” Rael asked cautiously.

“No,” Kieran said, “And she doesn't need to. But yet.”

Lia's heart pounded against the mattress.

Tears blurred stung the corner of her eyes.

So that's why he saved me.

Not because he saw me.

Not because I mattered.

Because I'm useful.

She fought the urge to sit up, to scream, to ask why.

But she stayed still.

Because now she knew something she wasn't meant to.

Because now she had.

The heavier oak doors clicked shut behind her.

Silence fell over the chamber once more – but it was a different silence. Not the kind that brought rest. The one pressed against Lia's chest, stiffing, choking, unbearable.

As soon as their footsteps faded, Lia trembling finger clutched the blanket. She sat up slowly, the pain in her chest bursting out in a raw, guttural sob.

She had heard everything.

Every word that proved she had simply been moved from one prison to another.

“An asset.”

“The blood of a wolfless werewolf.”

“She doesn't need to know.”

The word echoed like daggers in her head.

Tear streamed down her face as she stumbled out of the bed. Her legs barely holding her weight. The room spun, but she didn't care. Her heart fell shattered beyond repair.

Her hands fumbled with the door until it opened –and then she ran.

Through the hallway. Past startled warriors who barely had time to question her.

Into the cold night , where the moon hung high and full above the forest.

She didn't stop.

Didn't think.

Her bare feet pounded the forest floor, snapping twigs and stirring leaves, branches slapped her arms and face as she pushed deeper into the unknown woods – intibaother territory she didn't recognize.

But she didn't care.

Sue only stopped when her knees gave no way again.

Collapsing near a cluster of rocks , she buried her face in her hands, shoulder shaking with each sob that tore through her chest.

“Why?” Sue whispered to no one. “Why do I always have to be the pawn? What did I do wrong just to be born this way?”

Her voice cracked.

Her body trembled.

And still, no answer came – only the rustle of leaves and the soft song of cricket.

Until.

A new sound.

A voice.

Smooth. Calm. Masculine. Deep enough to carry authority, but lace with something softer.

“Why are you sobbing so hard, little wolf?”

Lia's breath caught in her throat.

She froze.