Before the forest. Before the fever. Before all those years spent running, there was that one night, carved out of moonlight and wildfire. The night Selene met her Alpha.
It started at the edge of the borderlands. She was barely more than a shadow, just another outcast. Her village had gone up in flames that evening... rogues storming in for blood and land. Selene bolted into the trees, barefoot, her mother's screams chasing her deep into the darkness.
She ran until the noise faded behind her, until she could barely breathe. Somewhere between pure exhaustion and giving up, everything changed.
The air shifted.
The forest fell silent... so quiet.
Then he stepped out of the mist.
Michael. Alpha of the North. The youngest leader any clan had ever feared. Looking at him, you could feel the power radiating off of him. He was tall and broad, and his eyes glowed gold.
Selene had no clue who he was. All she knew was that something ancient inside her snapped awake when he looked at her.
Their eyes locked. The bond hit... sudden, wild.
No warning. No mercy. Just fire.
It tore through her, sharp as lightning, setting her veins and bones and very breath alight. Her wolf rose up, not afraid, but shivering in recognition. The whole world narrowed until it was just him and the pull between them.
She dropped to her knees.
He froze, every muscle tight. His wolf howled inside, raw and desperate. Mate.
He stepped closer. Again. Her scent, like crushed violets, hit him hard, like a punch.
Selene couldn't catch her breath. When she breathed in, she pulled him closer. When she breathes out, she loses a little more control.
"What are you?" she whispered.
His answer came rough, jagged, barely human. "Yours."
She should have run. Should've disappeared into the trees. But her body wouldn't obey. Her heartbeat pounded for him, not against him.
He knelt in front of her. Touched her cheek, just his fingertips. Her skin caught fire beneath his hand.
When his thumb traced her jaw, she could've sworn the whole universe shifted.
"You're hurt," he said, low. "You're bleeding."
"It's nothing," she whispered, though her hands shook.
His eyes darkened. "Don't lie to your Alpha."
That word Alpha... it sent shivers through her. She had no pack, no title, nothing. But the bond refused to let her fight it. Her body just... gave in to the command in his voice.
He lifted her chin. Their eyes met. That's when it happened. The bond sealed, a rush of heat running from her into him, fierce and holy all at once.
Their wolves cried out as one... one voice, one breath.
He pulled her close and for a moment, nothing mattered.
She felt his heart beating against her.
"Who are you?" he murmured.
"Selene," she breathed back.
He said her name like it meant everything.
That night, he didn't drag her to his pack. He didn't mark her, though his wolf fought him for it every second. Instead, he carried her to the river, washed her wounds, and wrapped his cloak around her shaking shoulders.
She remembered the silence after.
"I can't stay," she whispered.
"You shouldn't," he said, but his eyes gave him away. "If you do… I won't let you go."
She just met his stare. "Then you'll have to try."
His jaw tightened.
She turned to leave, and he caught her wrist. Not rough, but sure. He wasn't letting her walk away.
"You don't understand what you've done," he said, voice low.
She didn't flinch. "What have I done?"
He leaned closer.
"You've bound me," he whispered. "And gods help me, I don't want to be free."
This wasn't love. Not yet. It was something else.
He spent weeks looking for her after that night. He followed her scent, chased rumors from passing travelers, and even believed dreams so vivid they felt real. When he finally found her, she was living with healers near the border... still clueless that fate had already claimed her.
He stayed, hiding in the quiet spaces of her life. The world wasn't supposed to know about them.
Some nights, they barely spoke. They just watched the fire. He memorized how she does things.
And sometimes she'd catch him watching and smile.
The bond only tightened. With every breath, every touch, it grew. When he touched her, sparks jumped beneath their skin. When he kissed her, the earth seemed to tremble.
But power like that never stays secret.
His father's council started to murmur. The Alpha was distracted, they said. The old laws forbade him from claiming a mate without lineage. She was an outsider. A healer. A curse, they whispered.
He tried to fight it, all of it. Elder warnings, tradition, even the moon itself.
Then came the night of the hunt.
Rogues attacked on the northern border. She got caught in the chaos, fighting to shield a wounded child. He found her in the blood and noise, her wolf clawing to break free through the pain. He carried her home. In his chamber, as she woke, his wolf surged up, demanding what they'd both refused.
Mark her.
He bent to her throat, lips brushing her skin, breath shaking. "If I do this," he said, "there's no undoing it."
She looked up at him, eyes shining with tears. "Then don't. You deserve a future, Michael. I'll only ruin it."
He froze, trapped between duty and want, between the kingdom and the bond.
The silence between them was suffocating.
He let her go. And when the sun rose, she was gone.
The bond held anyway. It never let go.
Years slipped by. When she gave birth alone outside his pack, he felt it, pain echoing through the mark he'd never made, a tug that left him hurt. It haunted him like a song that never finished, a promise he couldn't keep.
Even now, somewhere in the deep forest, her heartbeat still called to him, soft, desperate.
He didn't know. Not yet. But the night she almost died in the ruins, he woke choking on her name, tasting blood and rain.
The bond had woken again.
And this time, it refused to let him rest.