Second Chance to Free Myself

I woke to agony.

Not the soft morning light filtering through silk curtains. Not the distant sounds of pack members beginning their day. Just pain—white-hot and visceral, tearing through my abdomen like phantom claws ripping me apart from the inside.

My hands flew to my stomach, clutching at flesh that bore no wounds. But I felt it. Every slash. Every tear. The exact moment life had drained from my body while I bled out on cold stone, my unborn pup's heartbeat stuttering to silence beneath my palm.

I counted. One. Two. Three. Four.

My own heartbeat. Steady. Alive.

The counting calmed me—a habit born in another lifetime, when I'd pressed my hand to my swollen belly and listened for the flutter of my child's heart. The child who never got to take a first breath. The child who died because I'd tried to stop Nolan from abandoning me one last time.

Blair. It had always been Blair.

I forced my eyes open. The Luna's quarters—my quarters, though they'd never truly felt like mine—materialized around me. Pale gray walls. Minimalist furniture. Everything chosen by the former Luna, Nolan's mother, who'd made it clear from day one that I was a placeholder until her son came to his senses and chose Blair.

My phone sat on the nightstand, screen glowing with the date.

Today.

The wolf-strengthening ritual. The procedure that was supposed to fix my "weak" wolf, to finally make me worthy of being Shadowcrest's Luna. In my past life, I'd begged Nolan to come with me, clinging to his arm while Blair watched with those calculating eyes. He'd promised he would. Right up until Blair called twenty minutes before we were supposed to leave.

I sat up slowly, my fingers drifting to my neck. The mark there felt incomplete—a half-formed claim that had never fully bonded. Three years as his chosen mate, and the connection remained thin as spider silk where it should have been steel cable.

Because it was false. Because I was never meant to be his.

The Moon Goddess had given me a gift—a second chance wrapped in the memories of my own death. Most wolves would kill for such mercy. But all I felt was cold determination settling into my bones like frost.

I would not beg this time.

The bathroom tiles were freezing beneath my bare feet as I moved through my morning routine on autopilot. The mirror reflected a face I barely recognized—twenty-one years old but eyes aged by death and rebirth. Dark hair that Nolan had once called beautiful before he stopped looking at me altogether. Brown eyes that had cried themselves dry in another timeline.

No tears today.

I dressed in simple leggings and a loose sweater—practical clothing for the ritual that didn't require an audience. My fingers trembled only slightly as I braided my hair back. The phantom pains in my abdomen had dulled to an ache, but I knew they'd never fully disappear. Some wounds transcended timelines.

Nolan's footsteps approached down