The messenger's blood dripped on the marble floor like a countdown to war. "Three hundred warriors?" Kael repeated, his voice deadly calm.
"And my dear father-in-law thinks he can threaten me?" Lyra's heart hammered against her ribs.
After ten years of quiet, her father suddenly wanted her back? It made no sense. "What trap?" she asked, grabbing Kael's arm. He jerked away from her touch like she'd burned him.
"Don't. Touch. Me."
The rejection hit harder than a physical blow.
The mate bond screamed in anger, making her chest ache. "But you said—" "I said your father was going into a trap. I didn't say I'd explain it to you." Kael turned to his Beta. "Sara, double the guards. Send scouts to watch every border trail."
"Yes, Alpha."
"And move my Luna to the tower room. She's proven she can't be trusted." Lyra's fake smile collapsed. "Tower room?" "A cell," Sara explained quietly.
"With silver bars." A jail. After everything—the ceremony, the dress, the fake promises—Kael was locking her up like a criminal. "I'm your mate!" Lyra shouted as guards surrounded her.
"Your Luna!" Kael's laugh was sharp as broken glass. "You're a weapon pointed at my pack.
Until I know why your father really wants you back, you stay where I can watch you." The guards dragged her away while the crowd muttered excitedly about the coming war.
Nobody tried to help her. Nobody even looked sorry. These people don't care about me, she realized. I'm just entertainment.
The tower room sat at the very top of the packhouse. One tiny window showed the trees beyond the walls. Silver bars covered everything—the window, the door, even the roof. The metal made the air smell sharp and dangerous.
They tossed her inside still wearing the white wedding dress.
It already had dirt stains and tears from fighting. "Dinner will come later," Sara said through the bars.
"If you behave." "What if I don't?" "Then you get hungry."
The door slammed shut with a sound like thunder. Lyra was alone. She pressed her face against the silver bars, ignoring how they burned her skin.
The packhouse spread below her like a small city. Wolves moved through the streets, working, talking, having normal lives.
They all think I'm the enemy, she thought. Maybe they're right.
Hours crawled by.
The sun set, painting the sky blood red. Her stomach growled, but no food came. Kael wasn't lying about the hunger, she realized. Footsteps echoed up the stone stairs.
Lyra backed away from the door, expecting guards or Sara. Instead, Kael himself appeared. He'd changed from his ceremony robes into simple black clothes.
Without all the fancy decoration, he looked younger. Almost... normal. "Hungry?" he asked. "Starving."
He slid a plate through a slot in the door. Bread, meat, cheese—simple food but more than she'd eaten in days.
Lyra grabbed the plate but didn't eat. "Why are you here?" "To ask questions." "I won't tell you anything about my father's plans." Kael's smile was cold.
"You don't know his plans. You've been a rogue for ten years, remember?" That stung because it was true. She knew nothing about pack politics or war tactics.
"Then what do you want?" "The truth about why you ran away." Lyra almost choked on surprise. "You know why.
I killed my sister." "Did you?" The question hung in the air like poison gas. Nobody had ever asked her that before. Everyone just assumed she was guilty. "Of course I did," she whispered. "I took her to the banned river.
She drowned because of me." "That's not what I asked." Kael stepped closer to the bars. "Did you push her in? Hold her underwater? Actually murder her?" "I..." Lyra's voice broke.
"No. But—" "Then you didn't kill her. You made a mistake. Children make mistakes."" My father said—""Your father was drunk with grief.
Drunk fathers say terrible things." For a moment, Kael's voice was almost soft. Almost kind. Then his face hardened again.
"But that doesn't explain why he wants you back now. After ten years of not caring, why declare war over one rogue daughter?" Lyra had wondered the same thing.
Her father had called her a murderer, blamed her for ruining their family. Why fight for her now? "Maybe he's changed," she offered. "Alphas don't change.
They adapt."
Kael's eyes glittered like winter ice. "Your father wants something. And until I know what, you stay locked up." He turned to leave.
"Wait!" Lyra pressed against the silver bars, ignoring the burning pain. "The mate bond... don't you feel it?" Kael stopped but didn't turn around. "I feel it."
"Then why are you so cruel to me?" His shoulders tensed. For a long moment, he said nothing.
"Because feeling it makes me weak," he finally answered. "And weak Alphas get their packs killed."
He left without another word. Bastard, Lyra thought. But part of her understood. She felt weak too when the bond pulled at her heart.
The next morning brought visitors—pack members who came to stare at the stray Luna like she was a zoo animal.
"Look at those scars on her hands," one woman whispered loudly enough for Lyra to hear.
"And her hair! When's the last time she washed it?" "The Alpha should reject her. Find a good Luna."
A group of young girls pressed their faces against the bars. "Is it true you ate raw meat?" one asked. "And slept in trees?" "Did you really kill your own sister?" Each question cut deeper than silver.
Lyra curled up in the corner, trying to ignore them.
But they kept coming. All day, pack members climbed the tower stairs to gawk at her. They brought their children, their friends, their news.
"She's not much to look at, is she?" "Poor Alpha Kael, stuck with damaged goods."
"I heard she can't even read." That one's true, Lyra admitted quietly.
Hard to learn reading when you're fighting for life every day. By afternoon, she was ready to scream. Or cry. Or both.
Then Sara appeared with lunch. "Make them stop," Lyra begged. "Please." "Stop what?" "The looking. The murmurs. I'm not an animal in a cage." Sara's face softened slightly. "You are, though. That's exactly what you are to them."
"But I'm supposed to be their Luna."
"A Luna they don't want or trust." Sara slid the food through the slot. "You want respect? Earn it." "How can I earn anything locked in here?" "Figure it out. That's what Lunas do—solve problems."
Sara left, but her words stuck in Lyra's mind. Solve problems. What problem could she solve from a metal cage? Evening came with more bad news.
The runner returned, this time with burns covering half his body. "Alpha!" he gasped as guards carried him into the great hall below.
"The Silverfang forces... they're not coming to rescue anyone." Lyra pressed her ear to the floor, trying to hear. "What do you mean?" Kael's voice was sharp with worry.
"They're carrying strange guns. Silver nets, poisoned darts. And there's someone with them... someone who isn't pack." "Explain.""A woman in a hooded robe.
She smells wrong, Alpha. Like death and old magic." Lyra's blood turned to ice. She knew that smell from her dreams.
"The woman gave me a message for you," the messenger continued.
"She said to tell the rogue Luna that her sister sends her regards." No. Lyra scrambled to her feet, pushing against the silver bars until they burned through her dress. It can't be. Elara was dead. Had been dead for ten years.
But the ghost-child had come to her on her birthday. Had spoken of fate and bonds and choices. What if she wasn't really a ghost? Kael's voice floated up from below. "Double the defenses.
If they're using dark magic, we need—" His words were cut off by a sound that made Lyra's heart stop. A child's laughter, sweet and cold, echoing through the packhouse.
Then a voice that haunted her dreams: "Hello, sister. I'm home."
The metal bars of Lyra's cage began to glow with unnatural light.
And something that looked exactly like seven-year-old Elara stepped out of the
shadows in the corner of the room.