ARIA'S POV
The blood won't come out.
I scrub harder, my burned hands screaming as the brush tears across the white marble floor. The blood is mine—from yesterday when Beta Marcus hit me for looking at him wrong. But pack law says omegas clean up their own messes, even when someone else makes them bleed.
"Faster, Aria." Luna Claire's sharp voice cuts through the empty hall. "Guests arrive in two hours. This floor better shine."
I don't look up. Looking up gets you hurt.
"Yes, Luna," I whisper.
Her expensive shoes click away, and I'm alone again with the blood and the scrub brush and the pain that never really stops anymore.
Tonight is the Mate Celebration. Four years ago, on my eighteenth birthday, the mate bond snapped into place between me and Damien Silvercrest, the pack's Alpha. I felt it like lightning in my chest, warm and perfect and *right*. I thought the Moon Goddess had finally answered my prayers. I thought being an omega—the lowest rank—didn't matter because fate chose us for each other.
I was so stupid.
"You're my mate," I'd told him that night, my voice shaking with hope.
Damien had looked at me like I was dirt on his shoe. "You're an omega. Did you really think I'd claim *you*?"
But he didn't reject me completely. That would've broken the bond and set me free. Instead, he kept me tied to him, using the bond to make me heal his warriors when they got hurt, to feel his emotions while giving him nothing back, to exist in this horrible in-between place where I'm his mate but also his slave.
For four years, I've scrubbed his floors and healed his wolves and served his food while he pretended I didn't exist. While he gave his heart to Celeste, the Beta's daughter. Beautiful, cruel Celeste who makes my life even worse just because she can.
And tonight, he's announcing her as his Luna. His chosen mate. The mother of his heir.
The bond in my chest throbs—Damien's excitement bleeding through. He's happy about tonight. About claiming her in front of everyone.
I scrub harder, trying to scrub away the feeling, but it doesn't work. It never works.
"Still cleaning?" Lila's soft voice makes me look up. My only friend in this pack, another omega, hovers near the stairs. Her eyes are red like she's been crying. "Aria, please. You have to run. Tonight, after the announcement—they're going to hurt you bad."
"How do you know?"
"I heard Celeste talking to her friends. She wants you gone. Really gone." Lila's hands shake. "They're planning something terrible."
My stomach drops, but I keep scrubbing. "Where would I go? Omegas don't survive as rogues. We're not strong enough."
"You're stronger than you think," Lila insists.
I'm not, though. I'm weak and broken and so, so tired.
"I'll be okay," I lie. "Go get ready. You have to serve drinks tonight too."
Lila leaves, and I finish the floor. My reflection stares back at me from the shiny marble—silver-blonde hair in a messy bun, violet eyes I hide with brown contact lenses because unusual colors get you noticed, a face too thin from never having enough food. I look like a ghost.
Maybe I am one. Maybe I died four years ago when Damien rejected me, and I just haven't realized it yet.
---
Two hours later, I'm in the kitchen with the other omegas, arranging food on silver trays. The celebration happens in the grand hall above us—music and laughter from wolves who matter, who have worth, who aren't me.
"Take these appetizers up," the head cook snaps, shoving a tray into my hands. "And don't embarrass us."
I climb the stairs on shaking legs. The grand hall is packed with pack members dressed in their finest clothes. Alpha Damien stands at the front, tall and handsome in a black suit, Celeste beside him in a dress that probably cost more than I'll see in my lifetime. She's glowing, her hand on her stomach.
The bond in my chest twists as Damien's love for her floods through it. He never loved me like this. Not even a little.
I weave through the crowd, offering appetizers, being invisible like omegas should be. Until Damien's voice rings out.
"Everyone, I have an announcement!"
The room goes quiet. My feet stop moving.
"Four years ago, I became Alpha of Silvercrest Pack. Tonight, I take the next step." He pulls Celeste close. "Celeste carries my heir. She will be my Luna, my mate, my queen. Some wolves are born to lead. Others are born to serve. The Moon Goddess knows the difference."
His eyes find mine in the crowd. He's looking right at me when he says it.
The tray slips from my hands. It crashes to the floor, food and glass everywhere.
Everyone stares.
"Clumsy omega," someone mutters.
Celeste's smile is pure poison. "Some wolves can't even hold a tray. How could they ever hold a title?"
Laughter ripples through the room. I drop to my knees, picking up broken glass with shaking hands. A piece slices my palm, and blood drips onto the white floor again. Always more blood to clean.
When I finally escape to the kitchen, Celeste follows.
"Did you really think an omega could be Luna?" She corners me by the ovens, pulling something from the fire. A branding iron. The metal glows red-hot. "You're a stain. A mistake. After tonight, Damien's severing the bond completely. But first, let's make sure you remember your place."
She presses the iron to my arm.
The pain is white-hot and blinding. I scream, and she laughs, and through the agony I realize—this is how I die. Slowly, painfully, in this kitchen that smells like my own burning skin.
"Next time, it's your face," Celeste whispers. "Now clean this mess and get out of my sight."
She drops the iron and leaves.
I'm shaking so hard I can barely stand. Blood and burns and broken glass and four years of pain crash over me all at once. Lila bursts in, sees my arm, and goes pale.
"Run," she begs. "Please, Aria. Run right now."
And I do.
I run out the back door, into the night, into the Forbidden Forest where rogues hunt and monsters live and omegas go to die. The cold air hits my face, and I keep running, the mate bond in my chest stretching and stretching until—
It snaps.
Not breaks. *Snaps*. Like something that was never real suddenly became very, very real.
And in the distance, a howl rises—deep and ancient and nothing like a werewolf.
Something worse just noticed me enter its forest.