His Hidden Omega Walked Away

Salveth Bloodmoor had two front-row tickets to the Blood Moon revel tucked neatly into the breast pocket 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 number of gold moons, I managed to get a ticket last minute. And that's when I saw it.

On the open ground beneath the moonfire and the pounding drums, he was kissing another girl, deeply, passionately, like they were in the middle of their own love story. Their kiss was so emotional, so raw, that the watchers caught it on a crystal orb and threw the image up across the great screen for thousands of wolves to see.

After the revel, I stumbled across the girl'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 were full of blessings and crescent-moon glyphs.

A hundred moons of joy to you both, they said, wishing them a bond that would hold for a hundred years.

Meanwhile, I got hit by a car. His car. When I woke up, I was in a bed in a private Healing Hall on the Pack's payroll, the kind of den where no one asks questions and the corridors smell of crushed wolfsbane and silence. Salveth was sitting beside me, thumbing through a crystal communicator, a soft smile playing on his lips. A smile I had never seen him wear when he was with me. His scent filled the room, obsidian and cold ash, dried clove, old leather gone faintly bitter. It was the same as always. He was not.

I asked, "Who is she?"

Without even lifting his eyes, he replied coldly, "I'm your Alpha. Now that you're awake, just focus on healing."

Then he walked away. No hesitation, no guilt. I turned my head away from the door and called my uncle through the sending-stone.

"Harkon, about that arranged mating bond you mentioned I'll do it. I'll take him as my mate."

There was a long pause on the other end, so long that I almost thought the link had broken. Then came a quiet exhale, followed by an unmistakable sigh of relief.

"Selene, finally," the voice said, concern and satisfaction threading through the words. I could picture him in his den, the ember of his pipe glowing as he tapped the ash with his thumbnail. Three precise strokes, never two, never four. The old oak and pipe-smoke of him almost reached me through the stone. "That wolf kept you hidden in the dark for five whole years. Five years. A male like that doesn't even deserve to run under the open moon."

I didn't respond right away.

"When can you come back?" he continued, his tone shifting, becoming more urgent, more hopeful. "I just reached out to them. They're already asking to set the date for the mating ceremony."

Five years.

Five years with Salveth, 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 territory that anyone else could see. I was convenient when he wanted me, invisible when he didn't. In the Bloodmoor Pack, I had been kept off every gathering, absent from every feast night and full-moon run, an Omega who existed only behind closed doors in an Alpha's private rooms, my scent suppressed down to nothing so no one would ever catch the trace of me on him.

Now that he had made it so clear that I meant nothing to him, I didn't see a reason to hold on anymore. If I severed ties with the Pack, I doubted he would even try to stop me.

"The sooner the better," I said quietly, my voice steady despite everything. "I can handle it quickly."

I had barely finished speaking when the door of the Healing Hall opened again.

Salveth walked back in.

Apparently, he had forgotten something.

"Severing ties?" he echoed casually, as if the words had simply caught his attention in passing. His eyes moved around the room as he searched for something, completely unconcerned. A silver lighter turned over his knuckles in that idle, precise rhythm he carried everywhere. "Who's leaving the Pack?"

His tone was light, almost amused, like it was nothing important.

He would have to sign off on it anyway, so there was no point hiding it. I gave a small nod, but he didn't even notice. He didn't lift his head long enough to register my response.

After a moment, he found what he was looking for.

His car keys.

Picking them up, he let out a short, half-laugh. "The healer said you hit your head pretty hard. Might even have some memory loss." He paused briefly, glancing at me with a faint smirk. "Honestly, for a second there, I almost believed it."

My fingers tightened slightly under the blanket. Somewhere deep beneath my ribs, the part of me that had no name yet shrank back, low and silent, refusing even to growl.

"The car" he added, almost as an afterthought, like it wasn't worth much attention. "It was mine. The lights along the run were dim, and you were staring at your communicator"

I froze.

So that was it.

That was the explanation. The reason he had said nothing, offered nothing, and treated me like I was nothing more than an ordinary pack-wolf he barely knew.

Ten minutes ago, when he introduced himself as "just my Alpha," his expression had been flawless. Composed. Distant in exactly the right way. There had been just enough concern in his voice to make it believable.

But not even a trace of guilt.

Right before I lost consciousness, I had seen everything clearly.

The car.

Salveth in the passenger seat.

And the she-wolf he had just kissed. She was the one behind the wheel.

He hadn't given me a chance to question him. Not even a single second. He had simply brushed it off, thrown out an excuse about the pack being too busy, and left as if I had imagined the entire thing.

At the time, I thought he was avoiding me because he didn't know how to face me after striking me with the car.

But the truth was even more pathetic than that.

I didn't matter enough to him.

Not even enough for him to feel guilty.

Still a little dizzy, the scent of antiseptic and stone thick in the air of the Healing Hall, I forced a polite smile onto my face, as if everything was perfectly normal.

"Guess I was still a bit foggy when I woke up," I said lightly. "Didn't recognize you, Alpha."

The word slipped out naturally, but it carried none of the warmth it used to.

He barely reacted. The silver lighter kept moving over his knuckles, steady as a heartbeat.

And I kept going along with it, as if this distance between us had always existed. As if there had never been anything more.

He finally looked at me again, his brows drawing together slightly, confusion flickering in his eyes.

The girl who used to cling to him over the smallest things, who would demand to be nuzzled over something as trivial as a scraped palm, was gone.

In her place was someone quiet.

Still.

Unreachable.

Salveth glanced around the room, making sure no one else was there. Even in a Healing Hall that answered only to his pack, old habits held. Only then did his expression soften a fraction, his voice dropping lower.

"Selene," he said, almost gently, "these places are full of wolves. And whispers travel faster than scent on the wind." He paused, choosing his words carefully. "We can't risk anyone catching us like this."

Like this.

What we were had to stay hidden. Even now. The pack's code of silence didn't just govern secrets about blood and territory. It governed me.

"Just rest," he continued. "Focus on healing. Once you're back at the den, I'll make it up to you."

I looked at him, then gave a small, composed smile.

"Thank you Alpha."

I used to call him that as a joke, a teasing name when we were alone, our scents tangled in the dark of his study. Back then, it had been playful, intimate, filled with something unspoken between us.

Now, it felt completely different.

Cold.

Distant.

Like a wall had been built between us, brick by brick, until there was nothing left to cross.

He frowned slightly. He noticed it.

Of course he did.

Just as he was about to say something else, the door opened again and the moon-healer walked in for a routine check.

In an instant, Salveth changed.

The softness disappeared as if it had never existed. His posture straightened, his expression cooled, and the distance returned. His Alpha aura settled back over the room like a dropping temperature, untouchable and controlled. The silver lighter went still in his hand for one beat, then slipped into his jacket pocket.

After exchanging a few brief words with the healer, he turned to leave.

At the door, he paused.

Then he looked back at me one last time.

"Get some rest," he said.

There was a slight pause before he added, his tone firm, almost like a warning.

"And don't think your special arrangement gives you any privileges inside my pack."

His eyes held mine, steady and unreadable. Beneath my skin, my wolf paced once, low and uneasy, catching something in his scent of obsidian and cold ash that didn't sit right.

"Everyone is treated equally. Everything follows the code."

With that, he walked out, the door closing softly behind him, leaving the room colder than before.

The moon-healer glanced at the smile I was forcing onto my face and let out a light, teasing chuckle, like he could see straight through it.

"Your Alpha already left," he said casually. "No need to push yourself to keep smiling like that anymore."

I didn't respond.

"But I'll give him this," he added with a grin, flipping through my chart. "Stubborn mouth, soft heart. He already settled every last moon-credit of your healing fees."

My smile didn't disappear, but it shifted, subtly, almost imperceptibly, into something bitter.

Salveth really did deserve an award for his performance.

To everyone else, he was just a responsible Alpha who ran the outer trading-post, a wolf who took care of his own out of basic decency. A male with principles. No one knew the truth. No one knew that behind the locked door of his private study at the ancestral den, I had been with him for five years. Five entire years of secrecy, of compromise, of waiting.

No one except a handful of his closest wolves. His inner circle. The ones bound by the same silence that bound me.

I had asked him more times than I could count, always carefully, always hoping for a different answer.

"When can we stop hiding?"

Every single time, he brushed it off with the same vague excuse.

"The timing's not right."

I used to believe him.

I used to tell myself that there was a reason, that the pack's politics demanded patience, that one day things would be different.

But today, I finally understood.

When he thought I had lost my memory, the first thing he did was draw a line between us.

I'm your Alpha.

That was the truth.

That was all I had ever been to him.

A wolf who kept the ledgers of his outer trading-post.

A secret.

My wounds weren't deep, so the pack healer kept me under watch for three days before letting me go. Everything was routine. Quiet. Uneventful. The private Healing Hall smelled of crushed herbs and old bloodline money, and the attendants moved with the careful hush of those who knew better than to ask whose name truly sat on the bill.

The cost passed through the Pack's holdings, and whatever remained was returned straight to Salveth's account.

Three days.

Not a single visit.

Not even a sending through the stone.

And then, on the day they released me, my crystal communicator rang.

"You're out already?" Salveth's voice came through, casual, almost mildly annoyed. "You could've at least given me word."

I held the communicator in silence.

"I've a council to sit today," he went on. "Can't come for you."

"All right."

That was all I said.

I swallowed everything else. The questions that rose to my throat. The ones that used to matter.

I didn't ask where he was.

I didn't ask who he was with.

Instead, I opened the communicator and traced his location.

A den on the edge of Bloodmoor hunting grounds. One of those with discreet attendants and no eyes in the corridors.

I didn't need him to explain anything. I didn't need it confirmed.

Then, faintly, through the receiver, I caught a woman's voice.

"Come dry my hair, won't you?"

The line went dead almost instantly.

He cut it.

I stared at the stone for a moment, unmoving. Somewhere beneath my ribs, my wolf went very still, the way an animal goes still when it senses a thing it cannot name.

Not long after, two transfer marks surfaced.

1,314 moon-credits.

1,520 moon-credits.

The numbers hit me harder than anything else.

They weren't random.

They meant something. They always had.

1314 meant forever.

1520 meant I love you.

For years, I had wished for this. For him to send me those numbers, for something so simple and bound with meaning. I had imagined catching it on a screen, sharing it on the spirit network, just once, like everyone else. Just once, to show that I had something real.

But every time I raised it, he refused.

He didn't like attention.

He didn't want anyone asking questions.

He didn't want it known. An Alpha's private life was a liability, he said. Something rival packs could use.

And now now that I had already decided to let him go, he sent them?

I didn't know if it was guilt. Or habit. Or something else entirely.

I opened his profile without thinking.

The moment it loaded, I froze.

His image had changed.

It was a couple portrait.

But not with me.

I didn't hesitate.

I returned both transfers at once.

A few seconds later, the stone buzzed again.

A string of question marks.

I didn't answer.

When I returned to the den-rooms, nothing had changed.

Everything was exactly as it had been the night of the gathering. The same boots by the door. The same coat thrown over the chair. The same faint trace lingering in the air, obsidian and cold ash, dried clove, old leather gone faintly bitter, the ghost of a world where rulings were made in back chambers and sealed with oaths that could never be unspoken.

Which meant one thing.

He hadn't been back.

Not once.

I stood there a moment, letting the silence settle around me. Then I drew a deep breath, pushed down the tight ache rising in my chest, and began to pack.

It didn't take long.

Piece by piece, the space began to empty.

Five years.

Five years of a life I had carefully built around him, taken apart in a few short hours.

Most of what I packed were things I had chosen myself.

Couple things.

Matching mugs. Clothes that paired. Small ornaments that hinted at something shared.

Salveth had never cared for any of it.

He never wore anything that might mark him as taken. Never used anything too plain to read. He said a wolf in his place couldn't afford to look soft. Couldn't give anyone a grip to hold.

I used to tease him about it.

Saying he carried himself like some deep-buried tracker, hiding his scent from the whole world.

Now I understood.

It was never a jest.

He simply never saw me as someone he needed to claim. No mark at the curve of my neck. No glow under the moon. Nothing.

I was halfway through packing when I heard the door open.

He came back.

"Selene, what's this about?" he snapped the moment he saw me. "I've been calling you. I told you to come out and eat. You didn't pick up, didn't reply."

I didn't look up at once.

The scent reached me first.

A woman's perfume.

Not mine.

Not even close. My wolf flattened low inside me, a quiet, wounded thing that did not howl, only turned its face away.

Without thinking, I lifted my hand slightly, holding him from coming any closer.

When I finally raised my eyes, they drifted to his neck.

Faint red marks.

Bite-bruises.

"Sorry," I said calmly, my voice steady. I smoothed a blouse flat against the lining of the case, pressing the crease until it was sharp enough to cut. "I've been busy. Didn't check the stone."

He frowned, his gaze sweeping the room.

Only then did he notice the cases. The bare shelves. The missing pieces.

"Don't tell me you've spent it tearing the rooms apart," he said, irritation creeping into his tone. "You just left the Healing Hall. You should be resting."

His eyes settled on a few unopened boxes I hadn't reached yet.

Inside were the couple things I'd bought not long ago. Still new. Still untouched.

"You don't want any of this?" he asked.

I bent down to pick one up.

Before I could even straighten, he reached out and took it from my hands.

"Fine, I'll throw them out for you," he said, almost impatiently. "But stop wasting moon-credits on useless things. What, do you think they grow on the trees?"

His tone was casual.

Indifferent.

Like none of this mattered.

Then, as if nothing had happened at all, he added, "Go change. I'll take you out to eat."

Like this was just another normal day.

Like nothing was ending.

Instead, I walked out to the balcony.

From there, I watched him.

He carried the boxes down and walked straight to the refuse pit behind the den, past the black obsidian carriage idling at the edge of the grounds where one of his sentinels sat waiting, engine low and growling.

No hesitation.

No second glance.

He tossed them in.

Just like that.

The same way he had thrown away our five years.

Effortlessly.

Like they meant nothing at all.

At the trading-post, a quiet place on neutral ground where the pack sometimes kept private tables, he ordered several dishes without asking.

Most of them were our usual favorites.

The kind we always shared.

The kind tied to memories. Late-night laughter, long runs under a low moon, lazy days where time seemed to slow and the world outside, with all its blood and obligation, couldn't reach us.

For a moment, it almost felt familiar.

Almost.

But then I saw it.

One more dish.

Bitter melon with scrambled eggs.

The one I hated the most.

He knew that.

He had always remembered.

Every little thing.

Until now.

My appetite disappeared completely, like something inside me had quietly snapped. The scent of the food, the low murmur from nearby tables, even the old hunting-song drifting from the den's far corner all felt distant. Somewhere beneath my ribs my wolf went still, the way she did when she could no longer make sense of him. I didn't feel like forcing myself anymore, didn't feel like pretending everything was normal.

"Excuse me," I called gently to the omega aide standing nearby, keeping my tone polite and controlled. "Could you take this dish off the table? I'll pay for it separately."

The aide hesitated for a second, clearly unsure, but before he could even reach for the plate, Salveth moved first. He dragged the dish back toward himself with a faint scoff, the obsidian-and-cold-ash of his scent sharpening with annoyance.

"Oh, come on," he said. "I miss a few days while you're in the Healing Hall and suddenly you're acting like a drama queen?" He let out a short, humorless laugh. "Maybe if you were actually paying attention to where you were going, you wouldn't have gotten run down in the first place."

The words landed harder than they should have.

Because I knew what it looked like when he cared.

I had seen it before.

There had been a time when fever took me in the dead of winter. He had panicked, lifted me onto his back, and carried me through freezing wind all the way to a moon-healer he trusted, his hands trembling, his voice breaking as he kept asking if I was still with him. I still remembered the way he cried that night, like losing me would destroy him. Back then he wasn't the Alpha yet. Back then his hands still shook for reasons that had nothing to do with blood.

And now?

Now he had been part of the thing that hurt me and didn't even bother to come.

He knew I hated bitter melon. For five years, he had never once ordered it, never once brought anything remotely bitter to our table. He used to say even the smell made me frown too much.

And yet now, like we had gone back in time to when we had just met, like none of those years had ever existed, he casually ordered it again without a second thought.

I curled my lips into a faint, tired smile, the kind that didn't quite reach my eyes.

"I really hate bitter melon," I said softly. "I can't even stand the smell."

"Then don't eat it," he replied immediately, his tone sharp and impatient. "Simple."

The irritation in his voice wasn't even hidden. The silver lighter appeared in his hand, turning slow across his knuckles, each rotation catching the low light like a small, indifferent blade.

But I kept my expression calm, polite, like I had trained myself to be over the years.

"I think we should"

I didn't get to finish.

A woman's voice cut in smoothly from the side.

"Salveth, after all these years, you still remember I love bitter melon!"

I lifted my gaze.

She stood right beside our table, perfectly put together from head to toe. Flawless. Impeccable. Her posture straight, chin slightly lifted as she looked down at me with a faint, unmistakable trace of disdain. Jasmine and cold copper rolled off her in a wave, one finger resting on the pearl at her throat, light as a breath, as if confirming something only she needed to know.

Without waiting for any invitation, she stepped closer.

With an easy familiarity, she nudged Salveth slightly inward along the booth, then slipped into the seat right next to him, close enough that their shoulders brushed. The two sentinels at the bar didn't turn, but I could feel the room's attention tighten, the way it always did when the Alpha's table changed shape.

"Let me introduce myself," she said sweetly, her voice smooth like syrup. "I'm Salveth's girlfriend. Aurelia Caldris."

I didn't respond.

She leaned in even closer to him, her arm grazing his as if it were the most natural thing in the world, then slid a glance sideways at me, subtle, almost playful.

"Salveth," she said lightly, "aren't you going to introduce her? She's"

Salveth's expression stiffened instantly.

It was clear he hadn't expected this.

His eyes flickered toward me, a brief flash of unease, almost panic, before he forced himself back into stillness. Beneath the surface I caught the faint hitch in his scent, obsidian and cold ash gone sharp for half a breath. The lighter went still in his hand.

For a second, I almost laughed.

"Selene Ashford," I said before he could speak, my tone calm and even. "I serve in Alpha Bloodmoor's outer den. The trading-post was full, so we're only sharing a table."

His head snapped toward me.

That flicker of panic vanished as quickly as it had come, replaced by visible relief. He let out a breath, then nodded fast. The lighter resumed its slow rotation.

"Yeah, that's right," he said. "This is Selene. One of my pack's own."

Aurelia smiled slowly.

The kind of smile a wolf gives when it already has its quarry pinned beneath its paw.

"Then Selene must be very capable," she said, tilting her head slightly. "I've never seen Salveth sit at the same table with any she-wolf besides me."

Her tone was light, but every word carried weight.

Then she set her crystal communicator casually beside her wine glass, nudging it forward just enough to be seen. It looked accidental.

It wasn't.

I caught a glimpse of the surface.

Her image-glyph.

It matched Salveth's.

A bonded-pair portrait.

Even their colors today were coordinated. The same tones, the same palette, down to the smallest detail, the matching bands at their wrists. Everything deliberate, curated, costly. The kind of paired presentation that in this world meant more than affection. It meant claim. It meant territory.

Under the warm light of the trading-post, they looked perfect.

Like a portrait of an Alpha and his Luna.

I lowered my gaze, set my chopsticks down carefully, and stood.

I didn't want to stay.

Before I could take a step, Aurelia reached out and seized my wrist.

Her fingers were slender, her nails long and perfectly tended.

They dug into my skin just enough to hurt, just enough to leave a mark, but hidden from Salveth's line of sight. Jasmine and cold copper drifted off her, sweet on the surface, wrong underneath.

"Selene," she said softly, her voice laced with feigned concern, "leaving already? Did I say something wrong?"

Her eyes shimmered, almost as if she were genuinely sorry.

"Let me apologize, all right?"

I didn't have the patience for this.

Didn't have the energy to play along with someone wearing sweetness like a borrowed pelt.

I pulled my hand back sharply, breaking free of her grip. Low in my chest, my wolf bristled, a growl held just behind my teeth.

As I lowered my eyes to check my wrist, I saw it: thin red marks where her nails had dug in, one of them already beading with blood.

Before I could even process it, everything happened in an instant.

Aurelia suddenly lifted her own hand and swung it outward.

A loud smack rang through the trading-post.

A little pup standing nearby was struck across the face.

His cry broke out at once, sharp and piercing as he clutched his cheek, tears spilling as he sobbed without control. Two fingers hooked into the hem of his tunic, twisting the cloth tight, and he couldn't look up.

The whole room went still for a split second. The low music between songs. The clink of silver stopping at three separate tables. The kind of hush that in any pack-held den meant someone of standing was watching.

Aurelia's expression changed just as fast.

Her face turned pale, her eyes widening in exaggerated shock.

"Oh no!" she gasped, covering her mouth. "I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to! Sweetheart, are you all right?"

Salveth was already on his feet.

He crossed the room, apologizing again and again to the pup's parents, his voice urgent and sincere. Without hesitation he drew his communicator and sent a transfer of moon-credits, smoothing it over as quickly as he could. The Alpha tending to the lesser-ranked. Keeping the peace in a public den where the Bloodmoor name hung over every dealing like smoke that wouldn't clear.

Then the little pup suddenly pointed straight at me.

"It was her!" he cried between sobs. "She grabbed that lady's hand and made her hit me! She should say sorry!"

Every gaze in the trading-post shifted.

All at once.

Aurelia turned to me slowly, her eyes filling with hurt, her face trembling just enough to look real. Her fingers drifted to the pale stone at her throat again, holding it like a she-wolf afraid she'd be struck next.

"Selene" she said softly, her voice fragile, "I don't know what I did to upset you."

She lowered her gaze slightly, as if holding back tears.

"If you have a quarrel with me, please take it out on me. Don't drag innocent ones into it"

Whispers began to spread.

Low voices. Judging. Speculating.

I could feel it.

The weight of every stare pressing against my back. In a place like this, where half the room owed something to the Bloodmoor name, the pack's opinion wasn't just opinion. It was verdict.

Salveth turned toward me, his expression darkening instantly. The air around him thickened, his Alpha aura pressing down cold across the table, and somewhere beneath my skin my own wolf flattened low under the force of it.

"What are you standing there for?" he snapped, his voice sharp and cold. "Apologize. Now."

His tone left no room for argument.

"Stop making a scene."

Like I was the problem.

Like I was the one who had shamed him.

Like I was the one who didn't belong.

Backed by the murmured encouragement of the grown wolves crowded around him, the little pup broke free from his parents' hold and rushed toward me. Before I could react, he grabbed my hand and sank his teeth into it. Hard. The pain shot through me instantly, sharp and raw, and he didn't let go. Even his small jaw carried the early strength of a born wolf, and somewhere beneath my skin my own wolf flinched, going low and quiet, refusing to answer a pup.

"Hey" someone gasped, but no one stepped in.

The more gently Aurelia crouched beside him, coaxing him in a soft, soothing voice, the deeper his teeth seemed to press into my skin, as if her words only fueled his stubbornness. Her scent of jasmine and cold copper drifted sweet over the table, and her tone was all concern, all patience, the picture of kindness.

"Sweetheart, let go okay? You're scaring me," she murmured, reaching out but never quite pulling him away.

I stood there, frozen.

I couldn't exactly push a pup off me. Couldn't raise my voice. Couldn't bare my teeth without looking like the villain they already believed I was.

So I swallowed everything.

Swallowed the pain. Swallowed the humiliation.

"I'm sorry," I said quietly, forcing the words out as evenly as I could. "I'm sorry, okay?"

The pup finally loosened his grip, stepping back, still sniffling. My hand throbbed where his teeth had broken the skin, a dull, pulsing ache that quickly turned wet. The scent of my own blood rose between us, and I forced my wolf still.

But Salveth wasn't satisfied.

He didn't notice the blood slowly seeping from the bite mark. Didn't notice the way my fingers trembled slightly from the pain. Didn't even glance at me properly.

All he cared about was salvaging someone else's dignity.

He reached out and grabbed my arm just as I turned to leave. His grip carried the weight of an Alpha's aura, and the air around us thickened, pressing down until even the wolves at the next table dropped their gazes.

"Selene," he said sharply, his grip tightening. "Apologize. To Aurelia."

Aurelia immediately put on that same gentle, self-effacing expression, tugging lightly at his sleeve as if trying to stop him. One finger drifted to the moonstone at her throat and touched it, barely, the way someone checks a pin before walking into a room full of watching eyes.

"Salveth, it's fine," she said softly. "Really, it's not a big deal. I'm okay." She paused, lowering her gaze with perfect timing. "It's just the little one he got hurt, and he's probably scared."

Her words were modest.

Her tone was forgiving.

And yet, they only made everything worse.

Salveth's attention shifted instantly.

His eyes dropped to the back of her hand, where a faint red mark had formed, barely noticeable, nothing compared to the blood on mine.

But to him, it was everything.

Something in his expression softened, almost pained.

Then, just as quickly, it hardened again as he turned back to me.

Before I could react, he grabbed my injured hand and shoved it straight into the bowl of scalding broth that had just been set on the table.

The heat hit me instantly.

The broth wasn't quite boiling, but it was scalding enough. The liquid soaked into the fresh bite wound, salt and heat combining into a sharp, searing pain that shot up my arm like an electric current.

My entire body jerked.

A gasp tore out of me before I could stop it. Deep inside, my wolf threw herself against the cage of my ribs with a sound I had never heard her make, a high, broken keening that had no name.

The pain was unbearable.

It spread, burned, throbbed, every nerve screaming at once. My fingers curled involuntarily, trembling as I tried to pull back, but his grip held me in place for a second longer. An Alpha's grip. The kind that didn't negotiate.

"Selene, what is wrong with you?" Salveth hissed, his voice low but cutting. "You need to be taught a lesson."

My vision blurred slightly from the pain.

Still, I looked up at him.

"Is that who I am to you?" I asked quietly, my teeth clenched so tightly they ached.

I already knew the answer.

But I still asked.

Maybe some part of me hadn't fully given up yet.

Around us, the whispers grew louder. The other wolves at the pack trading-post weren't even pretending to look away anymore.

"Wait so which one is his actual mate?"

"Are you blind? Obviously the one he's protecting."

"Yeah, look at them. Matching scents, paired marks on their crystals it's obvious."

Their voices weren't even hushed anymore.

Their gazes shifted toward me, heavy with something worse than judgment.

Pity.

"Hey, enough is enough," a wolf at a nearby table muttered. "Another few seconds and you're going to boil her hand off."

Only then did Salveth hesitate.

I stood there, my lips pale, my body still trembling slightly from the pain, and yet, somehow, I was smiling.

A faint, fragile smile.

I looked straight at him.

And for the first time, something flickered in his eyes.

Unease.

Just for a moment.

Then he let go.

He released my hand as if nothing had happened, reached for Aurelia instead, and took her by the arm.

"Let's go," he said quietly.

And just like that, he walked away with her, her jasmine scent trailing after them while the bitter clove of his own faded toward the door.

Didn't look back.

Didn't say another word.

When I got home, the den felt colder than usual. The hall was dark, the inner latch still drawn the way he always left it, as though guarding the threshold mattered more than the wolf locked within. His obsidian-and-ash scent clung faintly to the walls, stale now, like something already gone.

A notification glowed on my crystal communicator.

He had sent a vial of burn salve to me through a courier-wolf.

I stared at it for a long moment before opening the message that came with it.

[Selene, please stop being so sensitive and antagonizing Aurelia. The two of you are going to be sharing the same den for a long while. I expect you to get along from now on.]

I let out a quiet breath.

So that was it.

That was his solution.

A jar of burn salve in exchange for silence.

For obedience.

For pretending nothing had happened.

For accepting that he would keep both of us in his life, as if we were things an Alpha could arrange however he pleased.

I didn't reply.

I worked the salve into the burn in silence, the cool sting biting at the raw skin, then lay down on the bed. Through the wall I could hear the faint hum of the den-wards cycling through their nightly watch, the low pulse that warded Bloodmoor against intruders. The whole place had been built for the Alpha's safety. Not mine. My wolf lay flat somewhere beneath my ribs, too quiet, the way a beaten thing goes quiet.

He didn't come home that night.

The next morning, the moment I stepped into the front of the Bloodmoor trading-post, I could feel it.

The change.

Eyes followed me everywhere I went. Conversations cut off the second I drew near, only to resume in hushed whispers the moment I passed. The serving-Omegas. The floor runners. Even the old wolf behind the bar who always rumbled a low good-morning wouldn't lift his gaze to mine. Their scents had soured with something close to contempt, and I caught it on every breath.

It felt like walking into a den that had been violently overturned.

As I sat down at my station, Giselle leaned over almost at once, her ledger-scroll curling between her fingers as she twisted it tight. Chamomile and warm cedar shavings, threaded with something anxious.

"Selene they're saying you tried to take the Alpha for yourself," she whispered. "That his woman caught you at it. It's spreading through every sending-stone thread in the pack."

She slid her communicator-crystal toward me.

An image was moving across its surface.

The feast-hall scene from the night before.

Someone had caught all of it in a crystal orb.

At some point during the chaos, a new mind-link channel had been opened for nothing but this. Message after message scrolled past, speculation, accusation, mockery. The whispers off the floor made permanent, captured and passed wolf to wolf.

They painted me as a concealed Omega who'd tried to scent her way into the bloodline's favor and been dragged into the light for it.

I stared at the crystal, my expression calm, even as something inside me went completely still.

Before I could turn it over further, the front doors swung open.

Salveth walked in.

With Aurelia right at his side.

His scent reached me first, obsidian and cold ash, dried clove, old leather gone bitter, and beneath it the jasmine-and-copper note of her, the two woven so close they were nearly one. The silver lighter rolled across his knuckles in that slow, idle rhythm, catching the high lamps once, twice.

"Pack," he said, his voice clear and carrying the weight of an Alpha's command, "this is your new overseer of the front den. Aurelia."

So that was what he had meant.

When he said we would be sharing the same den for a long while.

He hadn't been exaggerating.

He had brought her straight into the heart of the pack's front operation.

As my superior.

The room fell silent.

Every pair of eyes turned toward me. The air thickened, the faint press of an Alpha's aura settling over the floor, and on instinct half the wolves there dropped their gazes.

For the past several moons, ever since the old overseer broke ties and vanished into the northern ranges, I had carried most of the work alone. Everyone had assumed the rank would pass to me.

It had seemed obvious.

Until now.

Salveth added Aurelia to the inner mind-link thread right there in front of everyone. Almost at once, the two of them sent into it.

Their marks appeared side by side in the thread.

Matching.

A bonded-pair image.

Smiling.

Perfect.

The meaning couldn't have been plainer.

The rest of the morning passed in a haze of whispers and sidelong glances. No one was truly working. Everyone was watching.

Talking.

Judging.

But I no longer cared.

I was leaving.

Before midday, I drafted my letter severing ties from the pack and sent it through the proper channels.

With nothing left holding me to this place, I rose and walked to the back room.

I needed something warm. Something simple.

I steeped myself a cup of honeyed grapefruit tea and watched the steam climb slow off the surface, the scent soft and quieting. Sweet. Light. Nothing like the bitterness I had just walked out of.

I had barely taken two sips when the door opened again.

Aurelia walked in like she held the deed to every stone of it.

Confident. Unhurried. Her jasmine and cold copper filled the small room until it crowded out my own scent entirely.

She fixed herself a cup, then crossed to me and settled into the seat at my side, folding one leg over the other with the ease of a wolf taking a throne that had always been hers.

Her presence pressed against the walls.

When she spoke, her voice was smooth and sweet, but underneath it ran something with an edge.

"Selene," she said, her lips curving faintly, "I know you've been Salveth's little secret for five years. His unclaimed Omega, hidden away where no one could scent you."

She tilted her head, studying me.

"But I'm his Luna now. In the open, before the whole pack."

A pause.

"I'm back," she went on softly, "and it's time the concealed one learned when to slip away."

Her smile didn't waver.

"As long as you keep your mouth shut, the way you always have," she added lightly, "I won't make this any harder for you."

The threat was gentle.

Courteous.

And unmistakable.

As she spoke, Aurelia drew out her communicator-crystal and tapped a stored voice-message, holding it just close enough for my ears to catch.

The recording played.

It was the little pup from the day before.

His voice came through bright, sweet in that practiced, childish way, but there was something smug beneath it, something that had no business living inside innocence at all.

"Auntie Aurelia, wasn't I clever? Don't forget the carved storm-hawk you promised me!"

The message ended on a soft click.

And just like that, everything fell into place.

Every detail. Every movement. Every perfectly timed cry from the night before.

It hadn't been an accident.

None of it had.

Every instinct beneath my skin screamed at me to leave. To get out of that den immediately, before things escalated further. But before I could even take a step back, Aurelia moved.

Fast.

She snatched the cup of moon-tea straight out of my hands.

Before I could react, she tilted it and poured it over her own head.

The liquid splashed down her hair, soaking through the strands and dripping over her face, her neck, her blouse. It wasn't hot anymore, the tea long gone cold, but that didn't matter. The effect was exactly what she wanted.

Then, without hesitation, she slammed the ceramic cup onto the ground.

Right at my feet.

It shattered instantly.

The sharp crack echoed through the room as fragments of porcelain exploded outward. Several pieces skidded across the floor, a few slicing lightly into my ankles.

A sharp sting followed, but I barely registered it.

Aurelia stood there, drenched, her hair clinging to her face in messy strands, her blouse soaked and sticking to her skin. Beneath the spilled tea I could still catch her scent, jasmine over cold copper, sharp with the citrus edge of a wolf playing a long game. She looked utterly disheveled.

Pitiful.

Humiliated.

Perfect.

This female wasn't just ruthless. She was terrifying.

Before I could move past her, she stepped forward, blocking my path completely.

And then she screamed.

"Selene! What are you doing?! Why would you hurt me like this?!"

Her voice was high, shrill, and filled with raw, trembling emotion.

It carried. Through the front of the den, past the half-open doors where Bloodmoor wolves nursed their morning brews, into the back rooms where guard-wolves and runners kept their heads down and their ears pricked. Within seconds, the whole outer den began to stir. Doors opened. Chairs scraped. Wolves rushed in from every direction, drawn by the commotion, noses lifting to read the air.

But Aurelia wasn't done.

Not even close.

She picked up her coffee, her hand trembling just enough to make it look real, and splashed it across her own chest.

The dark liquid spread quickly across the fabric, staining it unevenly.

Then, just like the night before, she lifted her hand to her neck and began scratching. Hard.

Red marks bloomed instantly across her skin, raw and irritated, as if someone had grabbed her violently.

I stood there, watching.

Something inside me finally snapped. Deep beneath my ribs, my wolf surged up snarling, hackles rising at the lie laid out in plain sight.

Enough.

Before I could think it through, before I could stop myself, I stepped forward and slapped her.

Hard.

The sound rang out, sharp and clear.

Everything went silent. The kind of silence that only falls in a place run by wolves who understand violence. The kind where nobody breathes until they know whose side to take.

And that was the exact moment Salveth walked in.

He saw everything.

Or at least, what it looked like.

Me, standing there, upright, composed.

And Aurelia, soaked, disheveled, trembling, like a fragile creature that had just been attacked.

There wasn't even a second of hesitation.

His hand came down across my face.

The force sent my head jerking to the side, a sharp sting blooming across my cheek. His Alpha aura crashed down with it, thick and cold, pressing every wolf in the room toward the floor.

"Selene!" he snapped, his voice cold with anger, the obsidian and cold ash of his scent sharpening to a blade. "If you don't want to be here anymore, then get the hell out."

He didn't wait for a response.

Still visibly furious, he shoved me aside, his shoulder hitting mine hard enough to make me lose my balance. Then, without another glance in my direction, he bent down, scooped Aurelia up into his arms.

A perfect bridal carry.

Like an Alpha rescuing someone who needed saving.

And carried her straight into his inner den. The heavy door slammed shut behind them, and the silver lighter he'd left on the edge of his desk didn't so much as rattle. It just sat there, still.

I staggered back from the force of his shove, my body colliding with the edge of a nearby desk. Pain shot up my spine instantly, sharp and blinding. My vision blurred for a second as tears welled up in my eyes.

But I didn't cry.

I just stood there. Inside me, my wolf had gone quiet, a low keening folding in on itself until there was nothing left but silence.

The overseer of the front operation, who had been hesitating over my severance papers just minutes ago, now stepped forward without a word. His expression had changed completely.

He picked up the document.

Signed it.

Stamped it.

Approved.

No questions asked. No delay.

Salveth didn't even come out. He didn't look at the form. Didn't ask anything. Someone brought it into his inner den, and while he was busy comforting Aurelia, he scribbled his signature across the page without even glancing at it.

Then tossed it aside like it meant nothing.

Like I meant nothing.

The treasury wolves moved quickly after that.

Too quickly.

Always eager to stay on the good side of whoever held power in the pack's front operation, they rushed to process my final pay in moon-credits, efficiency driven not by duty but by their desire to please the Alpha's favorite.

I still had work to finish. A stack of client materials from the den-trade accounts that needed to be handed over properly. So I sat down, sorted everything, organized the files carefully, and prepared to send them to Salveth.

But the moment I tried to open my access, denied.

I tried again.

Nothing.

My credentials had already been struck from the pack's records. Completely wiped.

There was only one wolf who had the authority to do that.

Salveth.

I paused for a second, staring at the crystal screen.

Then I pulled out my communicator.

I sent him a message.

No response.

I called.

The call didn't even go through.

Blocked.

The mind-link channel.

Severed.

Everything. Every possible way of reaching him, gone.

I stood there for a moment, completely still.

Stunned.

But only for a moment.

Then I exhaled slowly.

I smoothed the edge of my skirt until the crease was sharper than anything I could bring myself to say.

Picked up my bag. Packed the last of my things. Cleared every trace of myself from what I could still touch in the system.

And walked out.

No hesitation.

No looking back.

Past the wolves who wouldn't meet my eyes. Past the corridor where a guard-wolf held the door open for me with the careful neutrality of one who had already chosen whose name to forget. Past the front entrance of the Bloodmoor trading-post, where the awning cast its shadow over the path like a territory line drawn in the dirt.

I didn't go home.

I went straight to the airfield.