Chapter 4
The mating ceremony preparations had come to a grinding halt.
I wasn't there to witness it, but Mikael's network of rogue allies kept us informed of what was happening back at Silver Moon. According to his sources, Marina's condition had rapidly deteriorated in my absence.
"She's become increasingly unstable," Mikael told me as we sat by the fire in our northern cabin. "Without you nearby, the binding spell is fraying at the edges."
I stared into the flames, trying to process what he was telling me. "What does that mean?"
"It means," he said carefully, "that Marina has been using your suppressed power to fuel her own strength. Now that you're gone, she's experiencing withdrawal."
The thought made me shiver. All those years, I'd been nothing but a battery for Marina's ambition.
---
Back at Silver Moon, chaos reigned.
Marina thrashed in her bed, her golden hair plastered to her forehead with sweat. "It hurts," she whimpered, clutching at her chest. "I need Damien. Now!"
Damien stood at the foot of her bed, his face a mask of concern and frustration. "The healers say your condition has worsened."
"Of course it has!" Marina snapped, then immediately softened her tone. "I'm sorry, my love. The pain makes me... irritable."
She reached for his hand, pressing it against her racing heart. "You need to mark me immediately. Your Alpha aura is the only thing that can stabilize me."
Damien hesitated, something flickering in his eyes. "Are you certain? The ceremony isn't for another week."
"I can't wait that long!" Marina's voice rose hysterically before she caught herself. "Please, Damien. I need you."
He nodded grimly and leaned down, his teeth elongating as he prepared to bite into the tender skin where her neck met her shoulder.
But as his teeth touched her skin, something went terribly wrong.
Damien jerked back as if burned, his eyes wide with shock and pain. "What's happening to me?"
Marina sat up, her expression changing from vulnerability to calculation in an instant. "What do you mean?"
"My wolf," he gasped, clutching his chest. "He's... he's rejecting you."
---
The bridge where I'd nearly ended my life stood empty in the moonlight. Damien paced along its length, his senses heightened by his growing desperation.
Something was wrong. His wolf had never disobeyed him before, but now the creature inside him howled in agony whenever he tried to get close to Marina.
"There has to be an explanation," he muttered, scanning the area.
That's when he spotted it—a small crystal glinting in the mud beside the bridge. Edith's communication crystal.
He picked it up, turning it over in his hands. "She was here."
But something else caught his attention—a scent. Not just Edith's faint trace of pine and starlight, but something else. Something powerful and ancient.
Damien followed the scent trail, moving swiftly through the forest until he reached the charred remains of the orphanage library.
"Who would burn such a place?" he wondered, kneeling to examine the ashes.
His fingers brushed against something metal beneath the floorboards. A hidden box.
Inside were letters—dozens of them—written in a bold, slashing hand. The first one was dated nearly twenty-five years ago.
"My dearest Marina," it began. "The plan is proceeding perfectly..."
Damien's blood ran cold as he read further. The letters were signed by someone named Joshua Martin—the Rogue King.
---
"These letters prove it," Damien said, slamming them down on Alpha Nelson's desk. "Marina has been working with her real father all along."
My parents—no, not my parents anymore—stared at the evidence in disbelief.
"This can't be true," my mother whispered, her hands trembling as she touched the papers.
"Bring the witch," Alpha Nelson commanded, his voice hollow.
The woman who entered looked harmless enough—a small, gray-haired figure with kind eyes. But when Damien's Alpha aura pressed down on her, those eyes darted nervously around the room.
"Tell us the truth," he demanded. "What did you do to Edith?"
The witch—or rather, the rogue witch in disguise—crumpled under the pressure of his command.
"I bound her wolf," she confessed, her voice barely audible. "Joshua paid me to place a suppression spell on the Alpha's true daughter."
"True daughter?" My father's voice cracked.
"Edith is a Lycan," the witch continued, tears streaming down her face. "A powerful one. Marina needed her strength to appear strong herself."
Damien's face had gone deathly pale. "And the Mana Corruption?"
"That's what happens when a Lycan's power is trapped too long," she whispered. "The wolf begins to consume the human host."
The room fell silent as the horrible truth sank in.
"What have we done?" Luna Nelson whispered, her eyes filling with tears. "What have we done to our daughter?"
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