"I told myself it was a way to protect the others ,it was safer this way "
Every full moon, they locked me away. Iron chains, silver-lined cuffs, and a cage dug into the earth like a pit—my prison, month after month. The curse burned hotter on those nights, twisting me into something darker than the rest of them. My packmates would run free under the moonlight, their howls shaking the forest, while I rotted in the dirt, chained like a beast.
That full moon started like the others restraints digging into my skin, the curse crawling under it like fire. it claws its way out of me, tearing my human skin apart from the inside.
First comes the burn, like molten fire pouring into my veins. My heart slams against my ribs, too fast, too heavy, and then the snapping begins. Bones breaking and reknitting, ribs pushing wider, my jaw splitting as fangs drive through like knives. My skin ripples, stretches, darkens, and I can feel the wolf clawing up from underneath, shredding the boy I pretend to be.
With every crack, with every shift, I lose a piece of myself. My vision blurs at the edges, then sharpens into something too bright, too sharp the world drowning in scents and sounds. I hear heartbeats from half a mile away, smell the fear of the ones who chained me.
The moon was high, full, blinding. And then the scent hit me. Blood. Close. Too close.
Someone was there. Watching.
I turned, eyes burning silver-white, and saw him Klaus. Ronan's son. Barely older than me, too brave for his own good. He was supposed to stay away. They all were. But curiosity was always his weakness.
"Kaelen?" he whispered, voice shaking. "You okay down there?"
"Go." My voice came out broken, distorted. "You shouldn't"
And then the cage groaned.
The metal cracked. I felt the chain links snap, one after another, like twigs. The wolfsbane fog wasn't enough this time the curse had grown stronger, angrier.
I fell forward, landing hard on my hands no, claws. My eyes caught his, and I saw the terror bloom in them. The human part of me screamed for control, but the rest the monster was already moving.
In one breath, I was on him.
He stumbled back, shouting for his father, but my claws caught his shoulder. I could smell his blood, sharp and alive. My teeth grazed his throat one more inch and it would have been over.
Then I heard him coming. Ronan.
He burst through the trees, rain slicking his fur and fury twisting his face. He shoved me off Klaus with a snarl that vibrated through the ground.
I snarled back, breath sharp and ragged, my claws half-extended, my pulse wild from the hunt. His scent rage and dominance filled the air, pressing against me like a wall.
For a heartbeat, neither of us moved. Just two forces locked in the same curse, the same bloodline, staring each other down.
Then the moon began to sink, its light dimming behind the clouds. The pull inside me broke with a snap, my claws retracting, my body trembling as the beast receded. Bones cracked. My skin burned. And when I finally dropped to my knees, I wasn't the monster anymore just a boy gasping in the cold.
Klaus lay beside me, his blood mixing with the dirt, his eyes wide. He looked at me not with hate but with horror.
Ronan stood over me, chest heaving, his eyes still glowing. And in that moment, I knew this wasn't over but I was too weak to explain and I blacked out.
When I woke again, I was back in the pit. The cold bit deep into my skin, silver chains coiled around my wrists like venom.
Ronan stood above me, rain dripping from his hair, his jaw tight. His eyes burned bright amber, glowing with that dangerous alpha light.
Ronan claws extended, scraping the tree as
his lips curled back."You almost killed my son"
he growled, every word laced with fury and grief. "The curse has gone too far, Kaelen."
he was fighting the urge to rip me apart. The pack behind him shifted uneasily, their scents thick with fear.
The rain fell hard that night cold, merciless, relentless. Every drop felt like judgment.
The pack surrounded me, their eyes glowing through the storm, fur slick and dark beneath the flashes of lightning.
And in the middle of them stood Ronan. My Alpha. My father figure. My executioner.
"You don't belong here, Kaelen," he said, his voice sharp as the wind. "Not anymore."
My pulse thundered in my ears.
"You trained me, fought beside me—and now you turn on me because of a curse I never asked for?"
Ronan's jaw tightened.
"You've become a danger to the pack. You can't control what's inside you. One slip, one full moon and we all die."
The words cut deeper than claws. The wolves behind him shifted restlessly, their unease thick in the air. I could feel their fear of me.
Something inside me snapped.
"Then fight me," I growled. "If you think you can control the monster, prove it."
Ronan didn't hesitate.
His bones cracked, his body contorted, claws sliding free, eyes glowing gold. The weight of his dominance slammed into me like a tidal wave, demanding I kneel.
But I didn't.
The moon's pull roared in my veins. My own claws extended, eyes burning bright, breath steaming in the cold. Fur burst through skin like a tearing shadow.
He lunged first.
I met him head-on.
The impact shattered the night, a thunderclap of fury and betrayal. His claws ripped into my shoulder; I slammed into him, sending us crashing through the mud. Teeth, claws, blood he world was red and silver and pain.
He was strong, but I was faster. I caught him across the chest, leaving deep gashes. He staggered, growling, his aura flaring brighter as he tried to dominate me again.
But I was wild,uncontrollable, Lightning lit us both.
Ronan's eyes flicked, and I saw his hand reach for something behind his belt.
Before I could react, pain exploded in my side.
A needle.
I looked down, dazed, to see him drive it in silver gleaming for just a heartbeat before the liquid fire spread through my veins.
"Wolfsbane"
My roar shook the forest. The poison burned like molten metal, crawling through every nerve, sapping my strength. My legs buckled, claws trembling. The curse howled inside me, clawing to stay awake, but the wolfsbane drowned it out.
Ronan stepped back, panting, blood dripping from his jaw.
"This is mercy, Kaelen," he said hoarsely. "You are no longer welcome here"
I tried to move. To speak. But the strength drained out of me, my vision blurring as the rain mixed with my blood.
The last thing I felt was their hands grabbing me, dragging me toward the riverbank.
Someone muttered, "He's not moving."
Another voice—Ronan's—cold and final:
"Good. Throw him in."
The world tilted. The icy water swallowed me whole. And as I sank, one truth burned through the darkness.
When I opened my eyes again, I wasn't in the river.
I was lying on a bed of moss, inside a dim cabin lit by a hundred flickering candles. The air smelled of smoke and sage, and faintly bloodroot.
An old woman sat by the fire. Her hair was white as snow, her eyes a pale, cloudy blue that still saw everything. She didn't speak at first just stirred a wooden bowl, the herbs inside glowing faintly gold.
"You shouldn't be alive," she murmured, her voice both brittle and powerful. "And yet… the river didn't want you."
I tried to sit up, but pain shot through me, sharp and deep. She pressed a hand to my chest—bony, but filled with impossible strength—and I froze.
"Easy, wolf," she said softly, but there was no kindness in her tone. "The poison hasn't left you. Neither has the curse."
Her words rolled through the room like thunder, and for a heartbeat, I swore the candle flames leaned toward her.
"Who are you?" I rasped.
She smiled slow and knowing. "Names are for those who still belong to something. You don't."
She turned back to her bowl, grinding the herbs into a dark paste. "But you may call me Eira. The forest remembers me that way."
As she spread the mixture over the wound at my side, warmth bled through my skin, followed by a surge of cold so deep it rattled my bones. My vision flickered with silver flashes wolves, moons, and blood.
"You've been marked twice," she whispered, her voice echoing strange and layered. "Once by the moon, once by fate. You are not meant to die, Kaelen. You are meant to change."
I stared at her, breath ragged. "Why save me?"
Eira looked at me then truly looked. "Because I've seen what comes when cursed blood is left to rot." She leaned closer, her eyes glinting like stormlight. "And because the moon isn't done with you yet."
I drifted in and out of fever for days, maybe weeks. The wolfsbane still burned in my veins, fighting against my bloodline, making my skin blister and my bones ache. Every full moon, the curse tried to claw its way out, and every time, I thought it would be the end of me.
But she never let me die.
The old woman nursed me with bitter herbs and strange chants. She moved like someone who had seen too much, who knew the darkness in the world and didn't fear it. Her cottage was small, tucked deep in the forest, filled with jars of roots, dried leaves, and things I couldn't name.
But when the fever broke and I opened my eyes, she was still there. "Drink," she said, pressing a bowl to my lips. Her voice was rough but steady.
I asked her once while recovering why she bothered. She only said: "Even cursed wolves have a place in the world. The question is whether you'll run from it or carve it out yourself."
She never pressed me for answers about the night I was cast out. She didn't need to. Somehow, she knew. Maybe she saw the wolf in me. Maybe she had secrets of her own.
For years, I stayed with her. She taught me how to restrain the curse, how to fight the hunger that gnawed at me every full moon. She knew things about wolfsbane, about rituals, about survival, things my pack had never taught me. And when the time came, she said the words I least expected.
"It's time you learned to hide among them."
Humans.
I hated the idea. But she was right. Wolves hunted me. Hunters would, too, if they discovered what I was. Hiding wasn't just about survival it was the only way to live.
She gave me a cover story, and sent me into the human world. A college far enough away to keep me out of the pack's shadow, but close enough to the woods that I wouldn't suffocate.
And so here I am sitting in classrooms, walking campus paths, pretending I belong. Every laugh, every exam, every normal day… it's a mask she gave me.
But masks slip. And lately, every time Serenya looks at me with those sharp, unafraid eyes, I feel mine breaking.