After My Alpha Chose Another, I Cut the Bond

The ghost-mark on my neck started burning the moment I stepped into the banquet hall.

I told myself it was nothing. Just nerves. Just cold air on three years of pale, raised skin where Cassian's mark should have been and never was.

My name is Delilah Wilson. Daughter of a disgraced former Beta. Fated mate of Alpha Cassian Carter of Shadowridge Pack. Unmarked. Unacknowledged. Twenty-one years old, and tonight, under the full Moon Banquet, I had let myself believe, for one stupid hour while I zipped up my pale dress, that this might be the night he finally saw me.

The hall glowed. Candles, white roses, long stone tables draped in silver. Every ranked wolf in Shadowridge stood beneath the open skylight where the moon poured down like a blessing. I could smell pine smoke and wine. I could smell Aleyna's perfume from across the room. Heavy florals layered over something colder.

I found my place near the back. I always stood near the back.

Cassian stepped onto the ceremonial platform.

He looked beautiful the way a winter does. Sharp jaw, sharp shoulders, firelight caught in the dark of his hair. He did not look at me. He had not looked at me in months.

"I, Cassian Carter," he said, "Alpha of Shadowridge."

The hall hushed.

"Reject you, Delilah Wilson, as my fated mate."

The world cracked.

It was not pain like a wound. It was pain like being scooped hollow with a spoon. The bond, that thin suffocating tether I had carried for three years, went taut, then ripped. My knees folded under me before I knew they had. I hit the banquet floor hard. The ghost-mark on my neck flared so hot I thought my skin would split.

Through the white noise in my ears, I heard him keep speaking.

"I claim Aleyna Rose, of Crimsonpine Pack, as my chosen Luna."

The crowd cheered.

I stayed on the floor.

No one bent down. No one reached for me. A circle of skirts and polished shoes stood around me like a fence, and through it I could see Aleyna in her golden gown, her hand resting easy on Cassian's arm, her smile soft and pleased and serene.

She glanced down at me. Then, slowly, she descended the platform and crossed the floor. She crouched in front of me and extended one slim, manicured hand.

She did not want to help me up. She wanted the pack to see her offering.

I stared at her hand. I did not take it.

She withdrew it with a small, sad smile. "Poor thing," she murmured, just loud enough. "She really thought he'd choose her."

Behind her, Petra Voss laughed under her breath. The whole circle of ranked she-wolves laughed with her, soft and pretty, like wind chimes.

I put one hand flat on the cold stone. Then the other. I pushed myself up. My legs shook so hard I thought I'd fall again. I didn't. I walked out of that hall with