Chapter 2

(Sebastian POV)

The cold October drizzle feels like freezing needles against my skin as I watch the pallbearers carry Gwendolyn’s casket from the temple to the ancestral burial grounds. The sky is a flat, unforgiving gray, mirroring the heavy, suffocating weight pressing down on my chest. It’s hard to fathom how the pack managed to organize an event of this magnitude in less than twenty-four hours. Thousands of wolves are gathered here. The sheer volume of elaborate floral arrangements—ironically, utilizing rich autumn colors, a scheme I normally love—is a devastating testament to how deeply my future Luna was revered, not just within Obsidian Crest, but across neighboring territories.

As the future Alpha of a pack boasting over ten thousand members, my daily schedule is a relentless grind of meetings, border disputes, and training sessions. I couldn't even tell you what trivial pack function was supposed to happen today. All I know is the yawning void where my future used to be. Gwendolyn Vance was the undisputed love of my life. In exactly three months, her twentieth birthday would have arrived, the mate bond would have flared to life, and our wolves would have inextricably tied our souls together. I had spent countless nights fantasizing about officially claiming her, feeling the legendary sparks, plunging into the intoxicating depths of the mating run.

Instead of welcoming her warm, beautiful body into my bed, I am currently marching behind a polished wooden box containing nothing but her blood-soaked garments and ripped clumps of her blonde hair. The rogues hadn't even left us an unblemished corpse to bury.

The rage boiling beneath my skin is toxic. This isn't how our story was supposed to end.

As the procession filters through the wrought-iron gates of the burial grounds, my parents and I assume our customary positions near the entrance to receive the mourners. Through the sea of black umbrellas, my eyes lock onto a figure standing slightly behind Beta Cordelia. Seraphina. Gwendolyn’s wretched younger sister. The little brat looks pathetic, shifting nervously in her oversized dress, peering through those massive, thick-rimmed glasses. The sight of her innocent, mildly sad expression acts as a bellows to the furnace of my anger. *She* is the reason Gwendolyn is dead.

*Flashback to last night.*

Gwendolyn and I were curled together on the plush leather sofa of the packhouse living room, an old movie droning on the television. The rest of the packhouse was asleep. My hand was resting high on her bare thigh, my thumb tracing soft circles on her skin. I leaned in to capture her lips, the heat between us rising, when her phone angrily vibrated on the coffee table. She snatched it up quickly, angling the screen completely out of my line of sight—a habit that usually annoyed me, but I never pushed it.

Her gorgeous face tightened with worry. "It's Seraphina," she whispered, hastily typing a reply. "She snuck out into the deep woods to meet some rogue boy, and now she's lost and terrified."

The Little Brat was barely fourteen, right in the thick of teenage rebellion and stupidity. I groaned in frustration at the interrupted moment and immediately stood up. "I'll shift and go grab her."

"No!" Gwendolyn stood up, placing a hand on my chest. "If you or the guards go, she'll face a pack tribunal for sneaking out. She’ll be so embarrassed. Let me go, Sebastian. I know the Western trails. I'll just bring her back quietly."

My wolf, Silas, scratched at the back of my mind, a low whine of unease vibrating in my chest. I didn't want her going out there alone. But Gwendolyn had a way of looking at me—a weaponized sweetness—that completely dismantled my defenses. I sighed, gave her a quick peck on the lips, and told her I would wait in my father's office.

An hour later, the mind-link exploded. Pack warriors screaming about a patrol finding the Little Brat running out of the woods, screaming for help. I didn't even bother taking the stairs. I leaped from the second-story balcony, shifting mid-air, and hit the ground as Silas. We tore through the forest, following the faint, sweet scent of Gwendolyn mixed with the putrid, rotting-meat stench of rogues.

We found the clearing. It was a slaughterhouse. Blood painted the silver bark of the birch trees. Gwendolyn’s favorite pink sweater was torn to absolute shreds, soaked in the mud. The horrific realization that she had been ambushed, outnumbered, and ultimately destroyed by rogue wolves while looking for her foolish sister brought me to my knees.

*End Flashback.*

Tears threaten to spill over my lower lashes, but I swallow them back, using my seething hatred for the Little Brat as an anchor. I want to march over there, grab Seraphina by her mousy brown hair, and drag her in front of the entire pack to answer for her fatal stupidity. Her reckless teenage hormones cost me my mate!

*Calm down,* Silas growls in my mind, his massive presence pressing against my consciousness. *This is Gwendolyn's ceremony. She deserves reverence, not a spectacle. Do not ruin this by attacking a pup.*

It’s a rare occurrence for the wolf to be the voice of reason while the human aches for violence. But Silas is right. I force my fists to unclench. I will not taint my love's final farewell. But the delay only crystallizes my resolve. I will make Seraphina pay. I just have to bide my time.

The final rites stretch on agonizingly for hours. The sky darkens from gray to a bruised, purple-black. The temperature drops, but nobody dares to leave. I watch Gwendolyn's parents clinging to each other in the front row. Beta Reginald, a warrior who hasn't flinched in the face of death, is openly weeping. My best friend, Nathaniel, holds his mate Juliette close, tears carving clean tracks through the dirt on his cheeks. Even my father, the great Alpha Maximilian, has silent tears sliding into his beard.

As the moon finally climbs into the sky and the high priest begins the closing incantations, I catch movement out of the corner of my eye. Seraphina is squirming. She places a hand on her stomach, leaning over to whisper something in her mother’s ear. Cordelia turns and glares at her daughter with a disgust so palpable I can feel it from fifty feet away.

Then, right in the middle of the final, sacred prayer to guide Gwendolyn's soul to the Goddess, the Little Brat actually stands up. She stumbles out of her row and speed-walks toward the exit, looking like she's in pain. Good. I hope she's in agony. But her blatant disrespect makes my blood boil anew. Walking out on her own sister's funeral?

I take a half-step forward, ready to follow her into the dark and snap her neck. But I force myself to stop. Gwendolyn deserves my attention more than she does.

*Run, Little Brat,* I sneer internally, turning my focus back to the casket. *Enjoy your miserable life tonight. Tomorrow, your hell begins.*