Salvar Nightbane had two front-row tickets to the Blood Moon revel tucked neatly into the breast of his tailored coat. I thought he had planned a surprise for me. I was giddy with anticipation, counting down the nights until the revel. But when the night finally came, I found out he had taken those tickets and gone off on pack business instead.
With the help of a few connections and a ridiculous amount of gold moons, I managed to get a token of entry at the last moment. And that's when I saw it.
On the high platform, beneath the silver glow and the pounding of the drums, he was kissing another she-wolf. Deeply, passionately, like they were in the middle of their own love story. Their kiss was so emotional, so raw, that the crystal-orb handlers caught it and threw it up onto the great screen for thousands of wolves to see.
After the revel ended, I stumbled across the she-wolf's post on the spirit network.
Sharing a kiss with the love of my life under the Blood Moon… Best Moon Blessing Day gift ever.
The comments beneath it were full of blessings and bright little moon-sigils.
May the Goddess give you ninety-nine moons together, they said, wishing them a bond that would hold for a hundred years.
Meanwhile, I got hit by a carriage. His carriage. When I woke, I was lying in a healing bed in a private den on the pack's payroll, the kind of place where no one asks questions and the halls smell of crushed herbs and silence. Salvar sat beside me, thumbing through his crystal communicator, a soft smile playing on his lips. A smile I had never once seen him wear when he was with me.
I asked, "Who is she?"
Without even lifting his eyes, he answered coldly, "I'm your Alpha. Now that you're awake, just focus on recovering."
Then he walked away. No hesitation, no guilt. I turned my head from the door and called my uncle through the communicator.
"Harrow, about that alliance mating you spoke of… I'll do it. I'll take him as my mate."
——
There was a long pause on the other end, so long I almost thought the line had gone dead. Then came a quiet exhale, followed by an unmistakable breath of relief.
"Selene, finally," the voice said, concern and satisfaction threading through the words together. I could picture him in his study, oak bark and gun-oil iron heavy in that room, his thumbnail flicking ash from the smoldering thing between his fingers. Three precise strokes, never two, never four. "That Alpha kept you hidden in the dark for five whole years. Five years. A male like that doesn't deserve to walk under the moon."
I didn't answer right away.
"When can you come home?" he went on, his tone shifting, growing more urgent, more hopeful. "I only just reached out to them. The Abernathys are already asking to set the date of the Mating Ceremony."
Five years.
Five years with Salvar, and I was always the one tucked away, the one who couldn't exist in the open. No introductions, no acknowledgment, no place in his world that any other wolf could see. I was convenient when he needed me, invisible when he didn't. In the Nightbane Pack I had been kept off every guest list, absent from every feast night and full-moon run, an unmarked Omega who existed only behind the closed doors of an Alpha's private rooms. No mark at the curve of my neck. No scent of his laid over mine for the pack to know. Nothing.
Now that he had made it so plain I meant nothing to him, I saw no reason to hold on anymore. If I cut myself loose from the pack's front den, I doubted he would even try to stop me.
"The sooner the better," I said quietly, my voice steady despite everything. "I can move through it quickly."
I had barely finished speaking when the door of the healing room opened again.
Salvar walked back in.
Apparently he had forgotten something.
"Cutting yourself loose?" he echoed, casual, as if the words had only caught his ear in passing. His gaze moved around the room as he searched for something, entirely unconcerned. The silver lighter turned over his knuckles in that idle, precise rhythm he carried everywhere. "Who's leaving our operation?"
His tone was light, almost amused, as though it were nothing of consequence.
He would have to sign off on it anyway, so there was no point hiding it. I gave a small nod. He didn't notice. He didn't lift his head from the communicator long enough to register it.
After a moment he found what he'd come back for.
His carriage keys.
He scooped them up and let out a short, half-laugh. "The healer said you struck your head fairly hard. Might even have some memory loss." He paused, glancing at me with a faint smirk. "Honestly, for a second there, I almost believed it."
My fingers tightened beneath the blanket. Something low in my chest stirred, a sound my wolf wanted to make and I swallowed before it could rise.
"The carriage…" he added, almost as an afterthought, as if it weren't worth much attention. "It was mine. The lantern-lights were dim, and you were staring down at your communicator…"
I went still.
So that was it.
That was the explanation. The reason he had said nothing, offered nothing, and treated me like nothing more than some ordinary pack-wolf he barely knew.
Ten minutes ago, when he had named himself "just my Alpha," his expression had been flawless. Composed. Distant in exactly the right measure. Just enough concern in his voice to make it believable. The black cedar and cold iron of his scent had not so much as flickered.
But not even a trace of guilt.
