The Forsaken
Lana's POV —
The torches lining the courtyard hissed against the midnight air, their flames bowing low as if afraid of what dawn would bring. Shadows stretched across the stone, sharpening the jagged edges of the palace walls. From her chamber window, Lana watched the crowd gather below, the people murmuring with the kind of fever that only came with blood and prophecy.
Tomorrow was her mate ceremony. Tomorrow, the moon would decide her fate.
She should have felt honored—chosen as the daughter of a respected warrior family, about to be bound to the Alpha himself. But her chest carried a weight that no silken gown or ceremonial crown could hide.
They whispered about her in the streets.
Cursed. Forsaken. The bride who would bring ruin.
"Stop brooding." Her younger cousin's voice snapped Lana out of her thoughts. Maris stood by the mirror, fussing with the silver pins that would hold Lana's hair in place for the ceremony. "You'll wrinkle your brow, and then even the Moon Goddess will frown upon you."
Lana forced a smirk. "If the Moon Goddess cares about wrinkles, then our kingdom is more doomed than the prophecies say."
Maris laughed, but it was brittle, like glass ready to shatter. Even she couldn't disguise the fear.
When the door shut behind her cousin, silence bled back into the room. And in that silence, Lana heard it; the scrape of voices in the corridor. Male, deep, and meant to be hidden. She moved closer, pressing her ear to the crack of the door.
"…the Alpha will reject her tomorrow. Publicly. Before the dominion."
Her heart stuttered. Dominic? Rejecting her?
Another voice, lower and sharp. Cyril. She recognized it instantly. "Good. Let him humiliate her. The prophecy will unravel itself. And when it does, she'll crawl to me. She always does."
Her nails dug into the wood of the door, leaving shallow crescents. Cyril. Her former lover. The man who had once sworn the moon itself burned less brightly than she did. He sounded different now; darker, hungrier.
"You think Dominic's rejection will drive her to you?" the first voice scoffed.
"It doesn't matter where she runs," Cyril replied, amusement curling like smoke. "So long as she runs. Once the pack sees her as worthless, I'll make her mine again. And when she bears the heir, the dominion will bow to me."
Lana staggered back, bile burning the back of her throat. The prophecy. The cursed heir. They weren't only afraid of her, they were planning her downfall.
Tomorrow, everything would change.
The moon hung swollen and red the next evening as the entire dominion gathered in the ceremonial grounds. Wolf banners rippled against the night sky, embroidered in black and gold. The air reeked of incense, of musk and fur, of too many bodies pressed together in anticipation.
Lana stood barefoot on the stone dais, the cold cutting through her thin gown. Her silver eyes caught the glow of the fire pits, and whispers rippled through the crowd like a rising tide. She held her chin high, refusing to flinch, even as the mark on her wrist pulsed with unbearable heat the mate bond calling, binding, demanding recognition.
And there he was. Dominic.
The Alpha approached from the opposite side of the dais, golden eyes gleaming, shoulders squared like the weight of the entire world rested on them. He was every inch the warrior-king they adored scarred, ruthless, unyielding.
But when his gaze found hers, there was something else. A flicker of regret. A shadow.
The priest raised his hands. "Under the watch of the Goddess, the bond shall be named. Step forward, Alpha Dominic, and claim your mate."
The crowd roared approval. Lana's pulse thundered. Every instinct screamed that this was the moment she had dreamed of, fought for, bled for.
Dominic stepped closer. His scent-pine, smoke, steel-wrapped around her. His hand hovered over hers. The bond burned hotter, a brand begging to be sealed.
Then he spoke.
"I, Dominic, Alpha of the Crescent Dominion…reject you."
Gasps shattered the night.
Pain like molten iron ripped through Lana's wrist, searing deep into her bones. She bit back a scream, her body bowing under the invisible lash of the rejection. The mark on her wrist split, bleeding red across her skin.
And as she fell to her knees, the torches around the courtyard flared violently, their flames surging higher, brighter, before one by one, they died.
Darkness swallowed the ceremony.
For a heartbeat, there was only silence. Then came the sound.
A child's cry. Thin, sharp, echoing across the courtyard though no child stood there.
The people shrieked, clutching one another. The priest dropped to his knees. "The prophecy!" he wailed. "The forsaken bride shall birth the heir of ruin!"
The darkness broke with a rush of light Lana's own eyes, silver and burning like twin moons.
She didn't know what was happening. Her body shook, her blood screamed, her power surged outward like a storm breaking its cage. The ground beneath the dais cracked, spiderwebbing into the crowd.
And in the shadows, Cyril smiled.
Screams tore through the courtyard as the earth split beneath the dais. The stone cracked open like bone under a blade, shards flying outward. Wolves shifted instinctively, fur rippling, claws slashing air, but even their snarls faltered under the raw surge of power radiating from Lana.
Her breath came ragged, her body shuddering with a force she did not command. The scar on her wrist bled freely, the rejection wound glowing like molten silver.
"Contain her!" one of Dominic's advisors shouted. "She carries the ruin!"
Dominic's golden eyes locked on Lana's trembling form. His jaw tightened, but his feet… his feet would not move. He had done this. He had branded her cursed, and now the dominion itself bore witness to the consequence.
"Do something, Alpha!" voices shouted from the crowd.
And then came Cyril.
He moved through the panic with a predator's ease, every step unhurried, every inch of him painted in dark amusement. Where Dominic stood frozen, Cyril kneeled beside Lana, his lips curling into a smile meant for her alone.
"My forsaken dove," he murmured, just loud enough for her to hear. His fingers brushed the blood seeping down her wrist, caressing the scar as though it were a lover's mark. "Look at what he's done to you. Look at what he's wasted."
She tried to recoil, but her strength was bleeding out of her as quickly as her lifeblood.
Cyril bent lower, his lips brushing her ear. "The prophecy may scare them, but to me? You are power itself. And I will show you how to use it."
The crowd gasped as he lifted her hand and pressed a mocking kiss to it, the same hand Dominic had refused.
Whispers flared. Cyril wants her. Cyril claims her.
Dominic finally moved, a snarl tearing from his throat. "Get away from her." His voice carried the Alpha's command, a low thunder that made lesser wolves drop to their knees.
But Cyril only laughed. His cold steel eyes gleamed in the torchlight. "Too late, brother. You cast her aside. I don't pick up scraps, Dominic; I claim treasures discarded by fools."
Dominic lunged, but before claws could meet flesh, the ground shook again. The phantom child's cry pierced the air once more, louder, shriller, echoing from nowhere and everywhere at once. Wolves howled in agony, clutching their ears, their bodies bowing under the sound.
Lana's vision blurred, silver light spilling from her eyes. The last thing she saw was Cyril's wicked smile and Dominic's furious face before darkness claimed her.
When consciousness returned, it was not to the comfort of her chamber but to the stench of iron and smoke.
Chains bit into her wrists. She was in the dungeons.
The torches here flickered dimly, their flames barely keeping the shadows at bay. Her body ached from rejection, her throat raw from screams she could not remember making.
And then came the footsteps. Slow, deliberate, echoing against stone.
Dominic appeared, looming like a phantom in the half-light. His golden eyes burned not with triumph, but with something dangerously close to regret.
"You should not be awake," he said, voice rough.
Lana pushed herself upright, the chains rattling. "Why?" Her words cracked, but she forced them through clenched teeth. "Because you hoped I'd die quietly, like the cursed thing you've painted me?"
His jaw flexed. He didn't answer immediately. Instead, he moved closer, crouching just beyond the reach of her chains.
"What happened tonight was…" He stopped, searching for words as though they might soften the blow. "…necessary."
Her laugh was hollow, sharp. "Necessary? To tear me apart before the entire dominion? To brand me worthless?"
"You don't understand," he snapped, and for the first time, she heard it; the fracture in his voice. "If I had claimed you, the prophecy would have destroyed everything. I…"
"Do not," she cut him off, silver eyes flashing. "Do not dare tell me this was to protect me. You didn't protect me. You humiliated me. You chained me like an animal."
For a heartbeat, silence stretched between them, broken only by her ragged breathing.
Dominic's gaze dropped to the scar on her wrist, the place where their bond should have sealed but now lay split and bleeding. His hand twitched, as though he might reach for her then tightened into a fist instead.
"You are stronger than you know," he said finally. "And that terrifies them. It terrifies me."
Before she could reply, the dungeon door screeched open. Cyril strolled in, uninvited, carrying a goblet of wine like he was stepping into a feast hall rather than a prison.
"Well," he drawled, eyeing the two of them. "Isn't this cozy? The Alpha visiting the cursed bride in her chains. What will the dominion say if they knew?"
Dominic rose, his posture snapping into steel. "Leave."
But Cyril ignored him. He set the goblet on the ground, just within Lana's reach. "Drink. It will ease the ache." His eyes locked on hers, gleaming with promise and poison. "I don't want your fire extinguished before you've burned them all."
Lana's throat burned with thirst. She hated herself for wanting it. She hated Cyril for knowing she wanted it.
Dominic's voice was a growl. "She will not take anything from you."
Cyril smirked. "Funny. You've taken everything from her. And yet here she is alive. Mine to shape."
Lana's heart thundered. Between them stood her destruction and her salvation and she no longer knew which man was which.