Rejected Luna's New Pack

The Vancouver moonlight bathed the gathering in silver, but I couldn't appreciate its beauty. My body felt unusually heavy, my Luna aura flickering like a candle in wind as I moved through the crowd of werewolves from various packs across the Pacific Northwest. Something was wrong with me—had been for weeks now—a weakness I couldn't explain seeping into my bones.

"Have you seen Robert?" I asked a passing Beta from the Silver Ridge Pack, trying to keep my voice steady despite the tremor in my hands.

"I believe I saw Alpha Sullivan heading toward the garden pavilion, Luna Grace," he replied with a respectful nod.

I thanked him with a smile that didn't reach my eyes. After forty years as Luna of the Moonstone Pack, these social gatherings had become second nature. Everyone knew me as the perfect, devoted mate—the stabilizing force behind Alpha Robert Sullivan's leadership. If only they knew how hollow that perfection felt sometimes.

My Luna senses guided me through the maze of pack politics and social hierarchies. Even weakened, I could feel the invisible threads connecting mates, the subtle power dynamics between Alphas, the nervous energy of unmated wolves seeking connections. This was my gift—sensing the emotional undercurrents that Robert never bothered to notice.

As I approached the garden pavilion, decorated with fairy lights for the gathering, I heard Robert's voice. Not out loud, but through our mate bond—a mind-link conversation I wasn't meant to hear.

*She's looking pale tonight. Probably that mysterious illness she keeps complaining about.*

Diana's mental voice answered him, dripping with contempt. *Does it matter? She's only good for pack duties anyway. You've always said so yourself.*

I froze, my hand gripping a stone column for support. The world tilted dangerously beneath my feet.

*True. And soon we won't need to pretend anymore. The pack will adjust once she's gone.*

Their laughter, both mental and physical, drifted from behind the flowering bushes. I should have walked away. Forty years of being the perfect Luna had taught me to smooth over conflicts, to put the pack's harmony above my own feelings. But something—perhaps the illness weakening my usual restraint, or perhaps my wolf finally reaching her breaking point—propelled me forward.

I moved silently around the hedge, my heart thundering in my chest. There they stood, Robert's hands on Diana's shoulders, their bodies close in the moonlight. The pack healer—my supposed friend for four decades—tilted her head back, exposing her neck in submission to my mate.

"It's beautiful," Diana whispered as Robert fastened something around her throat. "I've waited so long to wear it."

The moonlight caught the gleaming silver and sapphires of the ceremonial Luna necklace—the same necklace Robert had promised me on our mating day forty years ago but never delivered. The necklace that symbolized the sacred bond between an Alpha and his Luna, passed down through generations of Moonstone Pack leadership.

"It was always meant for you," Robert murmured, his fingers lingering on her skin. "You've earned it."

Something shattered inside