Chapter 1 Before the Moon Chooses

The night before my coronation as Luna, I couldn’t sleep.

The Moon hung full and unblinking above the Crescent Woods, its light spilling through my window like a silent witness. Everyone in the pack house was asleep, except me. My heart wouldn’t quiet. It beat too loudly, echoing the truth I’d tried to bury for weeks — I wasn’t ready. Not for the crown. Not for the bond. Not for him.

I rose from my bed and moved to the balcony. From here, the entire packland spread out before me — the valley where our wolves trained, the silver river that marked our borders, the torches flickering along the patrol lines. My father used to say this view was my inheritance. My mother said it was my cage. Tonight, it felt like both.

Below, the scent of pines and burning cedar drifted through the cold air. Somewhere far off, a wolf howled — low, mournful, alone. My chest tightened at the sound.

Tomorrow, I would be Luna.

Tomorrow, I would be mated to Alpha Darius Thorn.

The thought sent a tremor through me. Darius — strong, silent, and unyielding. His every word felt like a command from the Moon Goddess herself. Every girl in the pack dreamt of being chosen by him, and yet… when he looked at me, I sometimes felt less like a lover and more like a duty.

Still, I told myself I was lucky.

I told myself I was honored.

I told myself love could grow from obedience.

A knock sounded at my door.

“Lyra?” It was Mira, my best friend — and tomorrow, my beta. Her voice was soft but sharp with worry. “You’re awake again?”

I opened the door, forcing a smile. “Couldn’t sleep.”

She eyed me knowingly. “You’re thinking too much again.”

“When am I not?” I sighed, sinking onto the edge of my bed.

She joined me. “You’re nervous. Everyone would be. But Darius—”

“—is everything a pack could want,” I finished for her. “I know.”

She smiled faintly. “Then why do you sound like someone walking to her own execution?”

I didn’t answer. I didn’t have to. Mira had known me since we were pups. She knew my silences better than my words.

“I heard there’s been movement at the eastern border,” she said after a pause. “Rogues, maybe. Darius sent patrols.”

My gaze flicked toward the window. The moonlight looked colder now. “So close to the ceremony?”

She nodded. “He didn’t want to tell you. He said you have enough on your mind.”

Of course he did. Darius always decided what I could or couldn’t handle — as if I were a fragile thing wrapped in silk instead of the alpha’s daughter born with claws of her own.

Mira stood and squeezed my hand. “Try to sleep. You’ll need your strength. Tomorrow, you’ll belong to him — and to the pack.”

Her words settled like a stone in my stomach.

Belong.

When she left, I leaned against the balcony rail again. The moon had climbed higher, watching me like a judge. My pulse drummed louder. I needed air — real air, the kind that didn’t taste like incense and destiny.

So I slipped on my cloak, ignored the rules about leaving the house before ceremony day, and slipped into the woods.

The forest greeted me with silence and frost. My wolf stirred beneath my skin — restless, curious, alive. The moment my feet touched the soil, I felt something ancient hum through me. Maybe the Moon was listening. Maybe she was warning me.

I wandered deeper until the torches of the pack faded behind me. The air thickened with mist. I should’ve turned back. But then I heard it — a sound that didn’t belong here.

A growl.

Low. Deep. Close.

I froze.

Another growl followed, then a crash — claws against bark, a sharp snarl, and the scent of blood in the air. I shifted slightly, my fingers glowing faintly with the pull of my wolf, ready to fight if needed.

Then he appeared.

A massive black wolf burst through the trees, fur matted, eyes glowing silver-blue. He staggered, bleeding from a wound along his side. Our eyes met, and for a moment, the world stopped breathing.

It wasn’t fear I felt. It was recognition.

Something in me — something buried, wild, and ancient — answered his gaze with a pulse of heat so fierce I almost dropped to my knees.

The wolf snarled weakly, then collapsed.

Without thinking, I ran to him. “Hey! Don’t move—”

He shifted.

Bones cracked, fur vanished, and where the beast had fallen now lay a man — bloodied, half-naked, and impossibly beautiful. His skin was bronzed, his jaw sharp, his hair dark and damp with sweat. But it was his eyes that stopped me — that same silver-blue, bright with pain… and something else.

“Don’t touch me,” he rasped, but his hand trembled as if reaching for mine.

“You’re hurt,” I whispered. “You’ll bleed out.”

“Not your concern, Luna.”

The way he said it — like he knew who I was — sent a chill through me. “Who are you?”

He didn’t answer. He just looked at me as if he’d known me long before this night, long before the Moon ever chose my fate.

Then his eyes rolled back, and he went still.

The forest held its breath.

And beneath the full Moon, I realized something I couldn’t take back — that I had just crossed a line no Luna was ever meant to cross.

Because the stranger bleeding in my arms wasn’t just a rogue.

He was the beginning of my ruin.