I was already lying upon the healer’s stone bed when the scent of crushed herbs and burning moonleaf grew too heavy for my senses, the chamber dimly lit by pale moonstones set into the walls. The decision had been spoken of in hushed tones by the healer and the attending nurses of the pack, as though my will no longer held weight within my own body.
An abortion, they called it gently, as if gentleness could soften the meaning of what was to be done.
Twin lives. Two small sparks of existence beneath my womb. And yet my thoughts had become a storm of confusion and fear, whispering that perhaps ending it would be easier than surviving what came after. Lucan, Ellie, the lies tangled around my fate like poisoned vines—I told myself I could not bring children into such ruin.
But even in that moment of trembling surrender, something within me resisted. I had not spoken of the pregnancy to anyone. Not to the pack elders, not to Jace, not even to Lucan. These lives were still mine alone, untouched by the cruelty of the world outside my skin.
When the healer prepared the silver instruments blessed beneath the moon, I felt something inside me snap awake, sharp and instinctive like a wolf recognizing danger to its young. My breath stilled as I looked up at the carved stone ceiling, and suddenly I could not bear it.
I was not a murderer. Not of my own blood.
Before the ritual could begin, I tore the binding threads from my arm where the sleeping draught had been set, pain flaring through me like lightning. I rose so abruptly that the healer called after me in alarm, but I did not hear her properly over the pounding of my own heart. I ran barefoot through the corridors of the healer’s hall, the cold stone biting at my feet, the echoes of pursuit fading behind me as instinct overtook reason.
I did not stop until I burst beyond the archway into the open grounds of the pack, where the air was colder and heavier beneath the watch of the moon.
That was where I saw her.
Ellie stood near the waiting carriage of polished dark wood, her cloak wrapped neatly around her frame, the faint curve of her abdomen visible even beneath fine woven fabric. Her presence alone was enough to make the air feel sharp, as though the land itself recognized the fracture between us.
Her eyes lifted to me, and whatever calm she had worn shattered instantly into something venomous.
“So even the healer’s hall cannot hold you,” she said, her voice edged with scorn as she stepped closer. “Tell me, Elowen, are you so desperate now that you follow me into every place I go?”
I froze, breath uneven. “What are you doing here?”
Her lips curled faintly. “The Moon Healer summoned me for my lunar blessing. Eight weeks now,” she added, one hand brushing lightly over her stomach as though claiming something sacred. “The child of my mate.”
My chest tightened so violently it felt as though the bond itself had been struck. “You are carrying Lucan’s child?”
Her smile deepened, slow and deliberate. “Did you truly believe you were the only one the Moon Goddess favored?”
Something in her tone shifted, sharpened by old resentment that had never truly healed. She stepped closer until there was barely space between us, her voice lowering into something far more dangerous.
“You took my place once already,” she whispered. “Do not pretend you do not understand what comes after that.”
I tried to move past her, but she shifted with me, her hand already reaching for the carved latch of her waiting carriage. “Go on then,” she murmured coldly. “Run as you always do. It seems to be your only talent.”
I had taken no more than a step forward when the sound of hooves striking stone shattered the silence.
The carriage moved without warning, sudden and violent, as though guided by something far more deliberate than chance. The world tilted in a blur of motion and light, and before I could call upon instinct or mindlink, impact struck me with a force that stole breath and thought alike.
I fell beneath the weight of it, the earth rushing up to meet me as pain bloomed through bone and flesh in waves too overwhelming to comprehend. The taste of iron filled my mouth, and beneath me the ground warmed with spreading blood.
My hands moved on their own, instinctively seeking the life within me.
My pups.
Ellie stepped down from her carriage as though nothing of consequence had occurred, her movements calm, almost elegant, the sound of her footsteps measured against the stone path. She crouched beside me, studying me with a gaze devoid of mercy, then slowly removed her veil before spitting upon the ground near my face.
“Look at you,” she said softly, almost amused. “Even now, you cannot carry yourself with dignity. How easily you break.”
I tried to speak, but my voice faltered beneath the weight of pain and disbelief.
She leaned closer, her scent overwhelming in its closeness, her words sliding into me like poison beneath the skin. “Did you truly think you were chosen? That your blood made you untouchable? You were never anything more than a replacement placed where I should have stood.”
Tears blurred my vision as the world began to fade at its edges.
“And do not weep as though you are wronged,” she added with quiet cruelty. “You should have thought of that before you laid claim to what was never yours. Lucan only ever returned to me. He told me himself that you were dull, lifeless… something he endured rather than desired.”
My breath broke at the edges, shallow and fading.
She laughed, low and unrestrained. “He said you were like still water left too long beneath the sun. And I—” she paused, smiling faintly, “—I am the storm he always comes back to.”
My lips parted in a broken plea, but she only watched as though I were already gone.
Her hand lifted then, as if to silence whatever remained of me, but before she could speak again, another presence cut through the air like a blade drawn in the dark.
“Elowen.”
The voice was distant at first, then closer, urgent, carrying through the bond like something long forgotten but never truly lost. Strong arms lifted me from the ground, cradling me with desperate care as the world threatened to slip entirely from my grasp.
“Stay with me,” he said, his voice breaking through the haze. “Do not close your eyes. I will not let you fall.”
And as my vision dimmed beneath the weight of blood and loss, I saw him clearly for the first time in what felt like a lifetime.
The boy who had once stood beneath the silver moon with me when we were younger, the only one who had ever looked at me as though I mattered.
But even as I clung to that fading recognition, I understood the truth settling over me like winter.
It was already too late.
