Chapter 5 Moonshade Herb
[Kaelan's POV]
Theron brought me to the most remote cabin on the territory's edge—far from Blackthorn's center, far from the eyes that watched me. I had expected Draven to kill me. Or at least return me to a dungeon. Instead he had put me here.
The cabin was bare: a bed, a table, a washbasin. No chains. No cage. No cold, damp stone.
For anyone else, it would barely qualify as shelter. For me, it felt like an indulgence. Clean water. A soft bed. Food delivered each day. Things so ordinary they should not have needed naming—and yet I had gone without them for so long that having them felt like something I had not earned.
I closed my eyes, and memory came without permission.
Before my mother was exiled, I had lived in Wolfsbane's stronghold. I had a warm room. Carefully prepared food. I had my mother, Elara, and my younger sister, Lina. They were the only light I had.
My mother most of all. Whenever Alaric's coldness left a bruise on me, she would hold me close. The smell of sage and cedar resin on her was the one thing that could always bring me back to stillness.
I had believed then that as long as she and Lina were there, I would not truly lose anything. I had believed home would always be waiting.
Until Alaric took it apart with his own hands.
He declared my mother a traitor to the Pack and drove her out. I searched everywhere she might have gone. There was nothing—no word, no trace. She had simply vanished.
That same day, I stormed the council chamber to confront him. Alaric did not raise his voice. He only looked at me.
"Lower your eyes," he said.
In that moment I understood. He could not stand to see my eyes. Because my eyes were the same green as hers.
But I could not lower them. I did not believe that a Luan—a woman who had taught me the Pack came before everything—could betray the very thing she had lived by. To lower my eyes would have been to confess her guilt. I would never do that.
Alaric did not press further. He simply stripped away everything I still had: the feasts, the education, the guards, the title.
"You want to protect Omegas?" he said. "Then go be one."
Lina and I were expelled from the stronghold and deposited in a crumbling stone building in the Omega quarters.
From that point on, I saw Wolfsbane clearly for the first time.
Those people were not warriors. They were not the proud wolves the stories described. They were simply surviving. Rising before dawn, working until deep into the night, never quite enough to eat, always afraid of making a mistake, always afraid of the ones with power over them. Warriors could punish them for any reason, or no reason at all. Could decide what happened to their lives.
I had always believed that becoming Alpha meant strength. I understood something different that day.
A true Alpha is not someone who makes others afraid. A true Alpha is someone others can lean on when they have nothing left.
Alaric had held that seat his entire life and had never once carried what came with it.
Later, in Ironfang's dungeon, I learned the situation was worse than I had imagined. I had thought only I was sold. But there were Omegas from Wolfsbane in those cages—traded away like cargo.
My hands slowly tightened.
Alaric.
He had not only destroyed my mother.
He would destroy Lina too. My sister was still young—still without obvious value to him. But not yet valuable was not the same as safe. Alaric simply had not found the right price.
My chest went cold.
I had to go back.
For my mother. For Lina. For the people still living in fear.
Laughter drifted through the window. I turned.
Young wolves were running across the grass outside—chasing each other, playing, falling over and scrambling upright. No fear on any of their faces. No hunger. No shadow hanging over them.
I watched them for a long moment.
Wolfsbane's people should have this.
They needed an Alpha who would actually protect them—not someone who ruled over them like Alaric, but someone willing to stand in front of them when it mattered.
But what could I do alone?
I looked down at my hands. These hands had once held a sword. They had been locked in chains. Now they held nothing.
Then I thought of Draven. Those amber eyes. The man who had stood between Ironfang and everyone in that dungeon.
Powerful. Merciless. And yet his people followed him not because they feared him, but because they chose to. He had not become Alpha through terror. He had earned it.
That was what strength looked like.
My heartbeat slowed.
Draven Blackthorn. My Fate Mate.
The thought brought an instinctive recoil. He was Blackthorn. I was Wolfsbane. Our Packs had been tearing at each other for years. There were more than enough reasons for us to hate each other.
And yet he had saved me. He had found out I was Alaric's daughter—and he had not killed me.
Why? Because of the Fate Mate bond? Perhaps. But that alone did not explain it.
If I could show him, someday—that I am not Alaric. If I could make him see who Kaelan actually is, not what name she carries.
Maybe then he could become something other than an obstacle. Not a weapon I used, not a shelter I hid behind. Someone willing to stand beside me.
But not yet. Right now, all he saw was Alaric's bloodline. An enemy's daughter.
If I told him my intentions now, he would read them as a trap.
I needed time. Time for him to know me, to see me, to stop hearing only my surname.
For the first time, I thought that perhaps the Moon Goddess had not been entirely cruel. She had placed me in front of this man—and maybe that was meant to be a door, not a punishment.
The corner of my mouth lifted slightly at the thought of facing him again.
Dangerous. This man was far too dangerous. He was the first person who had ever made me want to trust someone—and the first who had made me genuinely wonder what it would mean to be his Mate.
Amaris would mock me for that, I was sure of it. Because even now, even knowing all of it, I could not pretend he did not draw me.
I lay back on the bed. For the first time in a long while, the tension across my shoulders eased the smallest degree.
Outside, the young wolves' laughter carried on in the dark.
I let my eyes close and stayed there for a little while.
The next morning, I was pulled out of sleep by the sound of someone eating an apple.
The smell of it made me smile before I was fully awake.
That was Finn—my assigned patrol guard, a broad-shouldered young man with an easy grin and an apparent inability to let silence stand. He had kept me talking until well past midnight the night before.
I opened the door. Finn turned, already grinning, and held out an apple.
"Brought one for you. They're good today—try it."
I took it and bit in without hesitation. His grin widened.
"Alpha's still in the main house," he announced, the way people announce things they find personally fascinating. "He never sleeps in. He's always in the council hall before anyone else. Today he's—well. Sleeping in."
Draven is in the main house?
I looked out past the training ground toward the far end of the territory. A black fortress rose there—sitting at the outer edge of Blackthorn's land, its back to where the Pack lived, its face toward open wilderness and forest. Black stone walls, solid and unadorned, their clean severe lines suggesting a man who considered ornamentation a waste. It stood the way a silent sentinel stands. Like something that had decided to hold that ground and simply never left.
When Finn moved off to swap out with the next guard and the watch briefly lapsed, I slipped out the back of the cabin and moved through the shadows toward the main house.
Passing the medical tent, I heard sounds from inside—low, suppressed. Muffled pain. I slowed.
Werewolves healed fast—that was part of why they were formidable fighters. This many casualties in one place was unusual.
I pressed close to the canvas and looked through the gap.
I recognized the wounds immediately.
Silver-alloy weapons—Ironfang's specialized equipment. Injuries made by silver resisted even a wolf's natural healing. The wolf soul could not fully repair them.
But Moonshade Herb could.
I looked at the injured inside. These were the fighters hurt during the raid on Ironfang.
That raid had pulled me out of that place. If I could help them recover, then I should.
I turned toward the dense forest beside the territory's edge, closed my eyes, and let my perception spread outward.
Moonshade Herb was not something easily found. Its presence was subtle—most people searched for years and found nothing. But I could feel it. Something in my blood answered to it like a call.
There.
I opened my eyes and walked into the forest.
By the time I returned to Blackthorn, the light had gone grey with approaching dusk.
I stopped the moment I crossed the boundary.
Draven and Theron were riding out at the head of a large party—full armor, torches lit, the kind of formation that meant a search, not a patrol. The firelight bounced off the metal around them, and the air they moved through had a particular edge to it.
I stood where I was.
The torches halted. Dozens of eyes landed on me. Every one of them alert.
I tightened my grip on the sack in my hands. I understood. They had thought I was gone.
Draven and Theron rode forward.
Even from several feet away, Draven's presence arrived before he did—pressing through the night air like a weather change. He was holding his anger in. I could feel it anyway.
Theron noticed the sack first. His expression shifted. He dismounted and came toward me.
"Is that Moonshade Herb?"
I turned to face him and held the sack out. "Yes. The injuries in the medical tent—Ironfang weapon wounds. Moonshade Herb treats them. So I went to find some."
Draven dismounted.
I turned to look at him directly.
"I was not running."
I said it slowly and clearly, one word at a time. I needed him to understand that.
He went still for a moment.
Theron opened the sack and checked the contents. Then he looked at Draven and gave a single nod. It's real.
"How did she find this much?" Nyx's voice came from behind the group. She moved forward, her gaze settling on me with measured attention. "Moonshade Herb doesn't grow just anywhere. She must have prepared this in advance. Wolfsbane would have known we hit Ironfang and that we'd need medicine."
Draven looked at me.
I did not respond to Nyx. She was not the one whose decision mattered here.
I kept my eyes on Draven. "The forest beside the territory. Swamp interior, twenty kilometers east, under the pine canopy. A large patch. If you want to verify it, send someone."
"Could be a trap," Nyx said immediately. "She wants to draw our people out there."
Theron glanced at Draven. "I'll go check."
A brief silence. "Take enough people with you," Draven said.
Theron nodded and left.
Every remaining eye in the group came back to me.
Draven's voice was low. "How did you find it? We've been looking for a long time."
I met his gaze.
This was the secret I had kept hidden my entire life. The kind of ability that would make any Pack want to possess you. In Wolfsbane, I had never dared let anyone know—because if Alaric had discovered it, I would not have survived long enough to be sold.
But here, I could let Draven know. Because it was the most honest thing I had to offer.
"I can sense it," I said. "Moonshade Herb. I can feel where it grows."
The group went quiet.
The way the fighters looked at me changed. They understood what that meant—that silver wounds were no longer an unsolvable problem, that their injured companions could suffer less, could survive things that would otherwise claim them.
Draven watched me for a moment. "Do you understand what you just told me?"
"Yes," I said. "That's why I told you."
He held my gaze for a long time. Then he turned his head slightly. "Take her to the medical tent. Wait for Theron."
I was about to follow the guards assigned to escort me.
"She should be punished first." Nyx's voice was tight. "She left the cabin. She violated a direct order."
The air stilled again.
Draven said nothing.
Nyx stepped forward. Her eyes were on him. "You've always said it yourself—no one defies your orders."
I waited.
Draven looked at Nyx in silence. He did not speak.
Nyx held the look for a long moment. Then her jaw tightened, and she lowered her gaze.
Silence settled over the group. Only the torches moved, shifted by wind.
When Draven finally spoke, his voice was measured.
"She did defy the order. But she came back with Moonshade Herb." He paused. "Her contribution cancels the violation."
No one argued.
Because everyone there knew what she had brought back, and whose lives it would serve.
Draven moved his hand—a small gesture, directing the guards to take me.
They stepped forward and moved to restrain me as instructed. My injuries were still raw. One guard's hand came down directly on a wound. I went rigid—blood soaked slowly through the cloth.
The next second, Draven moved.
His hand closed around the guard's wrist.
I looked at his hand. The same hand that had driven an axe through iron. Now it was between me and the pain.
Everyone stopped. Including him.
The guard looked at Draven, uncertain.
Draven released his wrist. His voice dropped low. "She's injured. Don't touch her. Walk beside her and make sure she doesn't leave. That's all."
Everyone had seen it.
Low voices moved through the group—not about me. About Draven. About something they had not seen from him before.
As I was led away, I looked back once.
Nyx stood in the middle of the crowd. Her face had gone pale.
She was watching Draven with the expression of someone who has just understood that something is shifting—something they cannot stop, and did not cause.
And she was right.
The change was not coming from me.
