Ariana
Lyra presses a cool, damp cloth to my forehead. Her touch is gentle, but I still flinch away from the memory of Joric’s bruising grip.
“Child, you are trembling like a leaf in a storm,” she murmurs, her brow furrowed with worry. “What did you say to him? He looked ready to kill.”
I shake my head, unable to form the words. I said he was boring. To the Alpha’s son. The words sound insane even in my own head.
“I… I don’t know,” I lie, my voice barely a whisper. It feels like someone else spoke through my mouth.
*Someone did.* The voice in my mind is back, calm and resonant. *I did.*
I squeeze my eyes shut. This can’t be happening.
Lyra sighs, a heavy, weary sound. “Whatever it was, you have painted a target on your back, Ariana. Joric’s pride is a fragile, vicious thing. He will not let this go.”
“I know,” I manage to say.
“Eat.” She pushes the bowl of broth into my hands. “You need your strength. The next few days will not be easy.”
She watches me take a few spoonfuls, her expression grim. When she seems satisfied that I won’t ignore the food, she picks up her basket of herbs.
“I must go and replenish my stock of willow bark. Rest. And Ariana,” she says, pausing at the door, “try not to find any more trouble.”
She leaves, and the heavy door thuds shut, sealing me in the quiet dimness with the voice.
I set the bowl aside, my appetite gone. “Who are you?” I whisper to the empty room.
*I am Selene. And before you ask, yes, the Moon Goddess. It is a rather dramatic title, I have always thought.* The voice has a thread of dry humor that is deeply unsettling.
I hug my knees to my chest. “I am going mad. That’s it. He hit me too hard and I have lost my mind.”
*Your mind is perfectly sound. More sound than it has ever been. You are simply waking up from a long, long sleep.*
“Waking up?” My voice is tight with hysteria. “I have a purple eye and a goddess in my head. This isn’t waking up. This is breaking.”
*Language is so limiting,* Selene muses. *What you call breaking, I call becoming. You are my daughter, Ariana.*
The statement is so absurd, so impossible, that a choked laugh escapes me.
“Your daughter. Right. And I suppose Alpha Valerius is a kind and gentle soul.”
*He is a gnat, buzzing around a power he cannot comprehend. But you… you are different. You are part me, part mortal. A demigod, in the old tongue.*
I shake my head, pressing my fingers into my temples. “No. No, I am an omega. A wolf without a wolf. My parents were pack members. They were nobodies.”
*Your mortal parents were chosen to raise you, to keep you safe. Your spirit was placed within this body as a test. To see if your heart could endure. To see if your spirit would shine even when smothered by darkness. You have endured, little one. And now, your power awakens alongside your wolf.*
It’s too much. The words are a flood, drowning me in their impossibility. I am Ariana. A clumsy, worthless omega. Nothing more.
“I don’t believe you,” I say, the denial a desperate anchor.
*Of course you do not. Words are wind. You need proof.*
The warmth in my violet eye begins to pulse again, a low, steady thrum. The edges of the infirmary begin to blur, the candlelight stretching into long, distorted streaks.
“What are you doing?” I gasp, my heart starting to pound.
*I am doing nothing. This is you. Your gifts are stirring. Let go. Just for a moment. See what you are capable of.*
I want to fight it. I want to hold on to the solid reality of the stone floor and the scratchy blanket. But a strange current is pulling me under. The world dissolves.
I am no longer in the infirmary.
I am standing in a forest of impossibly tall, ancient trees. Snow is falling, not in a blizzard, but in a slow, silent dance of perfect flakes. The air is so cold it feels like a blade against my skin, yet I am not cold. I smell pine, sharp and clean, and the electric scent of a coming winter storm.
And I am not alone.
A man stands before me. He is an Alpha. I know it in my bones, in the very marrow of my soul. The power rolling off him is a physical force, a pressure against my chest. He is tall, broader than even Valerius, with hair as black as a moonless night. He wears dark leathers, simple and practical. But it is his eyes that hold me captive.
They are silver. Not gray. Not pale blue. They are the color of molten silver, fierce and intelligent and blazing with an intensity that seems to peel back every layer of my being.
He stares at me. There is no surprise in his expression, only a raw, profound recognition. A fierce, terrifying possessiveness. It is not the cruel ownership of Joric or the cold dominance of Valerius. It is something deeper, more absolute. Like a mountain claiming its peak. Like the sky claiming its stars.
He does not speak. He does not have to.
His soul reaches for mine, a primal roar that echoes in the silent space where my own wolf should be. A single word imprints itself on my heart, a brand of burning silver.
*Mine.*
The vision shatters. I am back on the cot, gasping for air as if I have just surfaced from a deep dive. My body is drenched in a cold sweat. My hands are shaking uncontrollably.
“What was that?” I cry out, my voice raw with terror. “Who was that?”
*That was a time-glimpse,* Selene’s voice explains, softer now, tinged with something that might be sympathy. *A whisper of what is to come. A look at your other half.*
“My other half?”
*Your mate.*
The word hits me like a physical blow. A mate. For me? The Fates would not be so cruel. No Alpha, especially not one with that much power, would ever accept a worthless omega. He would reject me. He would kill me.
“No,” I whisper, shaking my head violently. “No. I don’t want that. I don’t want him.”
*You fear him because you have only known power used as a weapon to harm you. You will learn, Ariana. You will learn.*
Before I can argue, before I can scream, the heavy door of the infirmary is thrown open. It is not Lyra. It is one of the Alpha’s guards, a hulking brute named Fenris.
His eyes, small and dull, sweep over me. “The Alpha summons you,” he grunts. His gaze lingers on my face for a moment too long, and a flicker of confusion crosses his features before he straightens up.
Ice floods my veins. A summons from Valerius himself. Not Joric. Valerius. This is not about a minor punishment. This is something else.
Joric must have told him what I said. About my eye. He knows something is wrong with me.
*He knows nothing,* Selene states, her voice firm, a steel rod against my spine. *He feels a shift in the currents of his pack, and it frightens him. Stand up, child.*
My legs feel like water, but I obey the command in my head. I push myself off the cot, my bare feet cold against the stone.
*Walk.*
I follow Fenris out of the healer’s wing. The main hall is mostly empty, the evening meal having concluded. Every step echoes, a countdown to my own doom. The guard says nothing, just leads me towards the Alpha’s den at the heart of the compound.
The terror is still there, a cold, familiar companion. But underneath it, something new resides. The memory of the silver-eyed Alpha. The feel of his power. The quiet certainty of Selene’s voice in my head.
Fenris stops before the heavy, iron-banded door of the Alpha’s den and knocks once. A deep voice from within calls, “Enter.”
The guard opens the door and shoves me inside before pulling it closed, leaving me alone with my Alpha.
The room is large, dominated by a massive oak desk and the scent of old leather and woodsmoke from a low fire in the hearth. Furs are thrown over the floor and chairs. Maps of pack territories cover one wall.
Alpha Valerius sits behind the desk. He is not looking at me. He is sharpening a long, wicked looking hunting knife with a whetstone. The rhythmic scrape of stone on steel is the only sound in the room.
I stand before him, my hands clenched into fists at my sides, my heart a trapped bird beating against my ribs.
*Breathe,* Selene whispers. *Do not look at the floor. Look at him. Let him see you are not afraid.*
I am afraid. I am terrified. But I lift my chin and meet his gaze as he finally looks up. His eyes are chips of gray ice, cold and merciless.
“Joric tells me you have found your tongue,” he says, his voice a low rumble. He sets the knife down, the sound unnervingly loud.
I remain silent.
“He also tells me you have recovered… remarkably quickly from your lesson this morning.” He leans forward, his massive forearms resting on the desk. He steeples his fingers. “Lyra’s skills are good, but they are not miraculous. So tell me, omega. What magic is this?”
“There is no magic, Alpha,” I say. My voice is steady. It does not tremble. I do not know where this steadiness comes from.
He smiles, but it is a predator’s smile. It holds no warmth, only threat. “No? Then perhaps it is defiance. A sickness of the spirit that needs to be burned out.”
He stands up. The full force of his Alpha presence crashes down on me, an invisible weight designed to make me bend, to make me grovel. It has always worked before. It has always dropped me to my knees.
But tonight, it is different.
It is like standing in a gale, but I am no longer a leaf to be torn from the branch. I am a stone. Anchored. Unmoving. Selene’s presence within me is a shield I did not know I had.
Valerius walks around the desk, his steps slow and deliberate. He circles me, just as Joric did, his eyes missing nothing. “You think you are strong now? Because you mouthed off to my son? Because you healed a day sooner than expected? You are nothing. A speck of dust. I can crush you and no one in this pack would shed a single tear.”
He stops directly in front of me, so close I can feel the heat radiating from his body. He is trying to intimidate me with his size, his power.
“You have forgotten your place,” he snarls, his face inches from mine. “You have forgotten what pain feels like. I think it is time for a reminder.”
He raises a hand, large enough to encircle my entire throat.
*Do not flinch,* Selene commands. *Do not look away.*
I hold his gaze. My heart hammers against my ribs, but my body does not move. I do not cower. I do not plead. I simply stand there, and I meet the eyes of my tormentor without fear.
I watch as his eyes, the cold gray eyes of a tyrant, widen just a fraction. His nostrils flare. His head tilts, a subtle, confused gesture.
And then he does something I have never seen him do. Something I did not think was possible.
Alpha Valerius, the brutal ruler of the Blackwood pack, unconsciously takes a small, almost imperceptible step back.
