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"No one knows I'm the Alpha's mate. Or, to be precise—he's made damn sure no one ever will. A gutter girl from the Grey Zone. A wolf that never stirred. A nobody. How could someone like me ever be Luna of the Thornwood Pack? For three years, Casbian stashed me in the cracks and shadows. I took the edge off his ruts with my body. I fed him my blood to quiet the beast. I told myself—be good enough, useful enough, obedient enough—and one day he'd stand me before the pack and say the words. But three days from now, he's going to stand before the pack and call Lydia Ashford his Luna. I've stopped wanting a crown. I'm leaving. I'm going somewhere no Alpha will ever find me. Chapter 1 ""No wolf. No bloodline."" ""You can't even hold a full shift."" ""And you think you're worthy of the Luna title?"" ""The Moon Goddess played a sick joke on me."" Casbian climbed off me and wiped his hands on the sheets. ""You actually believe you deserve the word 'mate'?"" My hands were shaking. Shaking so hard I couldn't grip the sheets. Three years. Three years. I pricked my fingers on sewing needles to feed him my blood. A remedy. A sedative. Anything to calm the rage. I told myself—be good enough, be useful enough—and eventually he'd claim me in front of the pack. I believed I was his future Luna. Turns out I was just a tool he was too ashamed to name. ""In three days—"" ""Lydia will officially take her place as the pack's Luna."" ""Ashford blood. Pure line. A true wolf form."" ""The entire pack already believes she's my mate."" The Alpha rose and adjusted his cuffs. A stranger was about to take the crown that was mine. Casbian paused at the door and glanced back. ""You will attend the ceremony."" His gaze dragged over my bruised and marked body. No guilt in his eyes. No disgust. Nothing. ""You'll stand in the back row of the gallery. Kneeling. With the servants."" ""You will bow to the new Luna."" ""If you make a scene—if Lydia, or anyone else, discovers what you really are—"" He didn't finish. He bent low and patted my sweat-slicked face. ""I'll tear your tongue out with my own hands, you worthless little thing."" The door clicked shut. The room swallowed into black. I curled up on the crumpled sheets. Every inch of me felt crushed. The tears wouldn't come. Not because it didn't hurt. It hurt too much. Too much for tears to mean anything. I was his fated mate. I should have been this pack's Luna. I don't know how long I lay there. My thighs still sticky. The air thick with two Alphas' pheromones—sweat and dominance—so heavy it turned my stomach. My phone buzzed. A message from a neighbor in the Grey Zone. Five words. ""Your sister Maya is dying."" Barefoot, I scrambled off the bed and ran, bolting through the mess on the floor. The shack smelled of blood. Thick, spoiled blood. Maya was curled on her worn mat, dark liquid seeping from the corners of her mouth, her nostrils. Her body convulsed in violent, wrenching spasms. ""Maya!"" I dropped to my knees beside her, hands frantic, trying to wipe the blood away, but it wouldn't stop. It just kept coming. The pack doctor was already packing his kit, ready to leave. ""The wolf bite's gone to the bone."" He barely glanced her way. ""Unless you can get Alpha's blood as an antidote, she's finished."" Alpha's blood. Casbian. His blood could save her. But he wouldn't even admit I existed. I shut my eyes and reached for the thread. The mate bond. The thin, fraying line that still tied me to him. Three years of pulling one way, and it had worn down to almost nothing. But it was still there. No matter how much he loathed me, the mate bond was the Moon Goddess's mark. It couldn't be severed while we both drew breath. ""Casbian. Please. Just one drop."" ""Maya's dying."" Chapter 2 Silence. Two seconds. Then Lydia's voice trickled through the mind link, sweet as poison. ""Casbian, look."" ""That lace neckline—don't you think it's prettier than the last one?"" And Casbian's voice, so soft I barely knew it. ""They're all beautiful."" ""You could wear a sackcloth and still be beautiful, my Luna."" My Luna. He never called me that. I was his mate. But those two words—that title—he handed it to a woman who had no bond with him at all. I screamed through the link. ""Casbian! I'm begging you!"" ""Shut your mouth."" ""Still using your sister for sympathy?"" ""Is there no end to your shamelessness?"" ""An Alpha's mate squatting in the Grey Zone, weeping and begging. How do you think it makes us look?"" I pleaded. ""Casbian, Maya is bleeding. It's real."" ""Enough, Ivy."" His voice came back colder than a winter wind. ""Today is Lydia's dress fitting. As future Luna, every moment of her time matters more than whatever drama you're inventing. Get a hold of yourself."" The link severed from his side. The backlash slammed into me. A white-hot detonation inside my skull. I clutched my head and crumpled. My ears rang so loud the world went mute. By the time I dragged myself upright, Maya had stopped seizing. Her hands were cold. She was looking at me. With trembling, failing fingers, she reached inside her shirt and pulled out a whistle—old, carved from bone. She pressed it into my palm. Her lips moved. No sound. Just a shape. ""Run."" Her hand dropped. I held her stiffening body. I couldn't cry. Not because I didn't want to. The moment the bond snapped shut, something inside me snapped with it. My tears went with it. Outside, the pack loudspeakers were looping Lydia's voice, recorded and polished: ""Join us next week as I take my place beside Alpha Casbian—as your Luna."" That was supposed to be mine. But I didn't even have the right to fight for it. To fight, you had to be acknowledged first. And I wasn't even allowed to exist. I don't know how long I sat there. The door scraped open. A blade of cold air sliced in. I squinted into the wind. A figure stood in the doorway, tall, draped in a tattered cloak. Every nerve in my body pulled taut. I lurched to my feet, shielding Maya's body. ""Who are you?"" He didn't answer. He looked at her body, then at me. Then he stepped to the corner, picked up the shovel leaning against the wall, and lifted Maya onto his shoulder. He carried her outside. I think I understood. Behind the mountain, in ground frozen hard as iron, he dug. He filled the hole with earth and set a wooden plank as a marker. ""Why are you helping me?"" ""Six months ago. The alley behind the market. You saved my life."" He turned and dissolved into the dark. I stood alone by the fresh grave, gripping the bone whistle Maya had left me. Its edge, carved sharp, had already cut into my palm. That's when I felt it. A flutter. Tiny. Deep beneath my belly. Something stirred in my blood, faint and secret, pressing gently against the inside of my skin. I pressed my dirt-crusted hand to my stomach. Two heartbeats. Faint. Steady. I was pregnant. With his pups. My Alpha's children. Chapter 3 Ridiculous, wasn't it? He wouldn't claim me as his mate—but he'd planted his bloodline in my belly. Casbian would never let me carry these pups to term. If he found out I was carrying his young, it wouldn't just be a scandal. It would make the entire pack question Lydia's legitimacy. They'd snuff out these two lives as casually as they'd stomped out the last embers of my dignity. I'd already lost Maya. I would not lose them too. I looked down at the bloodstained whistle, and I thought of the cloaked wolf—the one who had just helped me put Maya in the ground. I lifted the whistle to my lips and blew. Every last shred of strength I had. The sound barely carried. Swallowed whole by the winter wind. Three days later, on the eve of the Luna coronation, two guards hauled me from my shack in the Grey Zone and shoved me into the servants' dressing room of the pack house. ""Put this on."" One of them tossed a gray linen shift at me. ""Tomorrow you stand with the servants. Back row of the gallery. You kneel. You bow to the new Luna."" ""Head down. No talking."" ""Don't even look at the Alpha."" I took the rough cloth and said nothing. What a farce. I was this pack's true mate. That crown should be sitting on my head. Instead, I'd be dressed in slave's rags, kneeling on cold stone, watching a woman with no bond take my place. The door bolted behind me. I crouched on the floor, one hand pressed to my stomach without thinking. Three days. The two heartbeats had grown a little stronger. Tiny. Stubborn. Pushing back. The door flew open. Not a guard. Lydia. She stood there in an ivory velvet gown, hair loose, satin slippers on her feet. Two attendants flanked her. ""So. You're Ivy."" She cocked her head, studying me top to bottom. ""The little wolfless stray from the Grey Zone."" She sniffed and wrinkled her nose. ""You reek."" ""I can't fathom why Casbian even lets you stay in the territory."" She narrowed her eyes, taking my measure. I kept my chin down. I didn't dare speak. One whisper that I was his real mate, and neither I nor my babies would live to see sunrise. Lydia didn't press. Her gaze snagged on my neck, where Maya's bone whistle hung from its cord. Without warning, her hand shot out and ripped it away. ""Give it back!"" I lunged. A slap cracked across my face and dropped me to the floor."