Cassian hadn't slept since the rejection.
He was the one who ended it. He said the words. But something inside him was still burning. Still wrong.
When he closed his eyes, he saw her. Not just her face, but her soul—tangled in moonlight, wild like the wind, storm-wrought and furious.
His wolf was pacing inside his ribs.
He couldn't focus. Couldn't train. Couldn't speak without flinching like something was tearing beneath his skin.
By the third day, his beta—Orin—grabbed him by the collar and snarled, "You look like you're dying."
"I might be," Cassian muttered.
"You rejected her. That was supposed to break it."
"It did. It should've."
But the pain didn't stop. In fact—it got worse.
He woke in the middle of the night clawing at his chest, like the bond was reknitting itself in reverse, binding thorn to bone. He stumbled out into the woods half-shifted, desperate for air—and found the trees themselves whispering her name.
Wren… Wren… Wren…
Cassian dropped to his knees and screamed.
Meanwhile, Wren's potion matured.
She hadn't used her magic so deeply in years. Not since the burning of her mother. Not since the villagers' screams echoed through the forest and her heart split in two.
Now, she brewed with purpose. The cauldron hissed. The bloodroot bloomed black. She chanted in tongues not spoken since the first witches carved spells into bones.
And she smiled.
Not because it felt good.
But because it felt right.
Let Cassian Nightborne learn what it means to reject the moon's gift. Let him wake with her name burned into his breath. Let the pain teach him what he could've had.
And what he threw away.
That night, beneath the blood moon's final arc, Wren stepped into her circle and drank the potion she had made for two.
The pain hit like wildfire.
Her magic convulsed. Her body lifted from the floor, hair lifting like a shadowy crown. The potion linked her soul to his again—only now, it was not a mating bond.
It was a curse.
The Scorn Mark.
The moment it latched, Cassian roared from across the forest. He fell, convulsing, as if something had just reached into his chest and squeezed.
Wren collapsed too, gasping, shaking.
But she laughed.
"I warned you," she whispered, alone in the dark. "You can't reject fate without a price."