Rowan's POV
The chains burned hotter.
I screamed until my throat felt like it was bleeding. But the pain didn't stop. It just kept getting worse.
"Hold still," Marcus said calmly. Like he was asking me to pass the salt at dinner. "Fighting makes it hurt more."
"Let me go!" I thrashed against the cursed silver chains wrapped around my wrists. "Please, Marcus, please stop!"
He didn't stop. His eyes glowed brighter as he pulled more of my energy through the chains.
The crowd around us had gone silent. No more gasps. No more screams. Just horrible, suffocating silence as they watched their Alpha steal my soul.
Through the pain, I saw faces I recognized. Pack members I'd known my whole life. They looked shocked. Scared. But nobody moved to help me.
Nobody dared go against the Alpha.
"Do you want to know the truth, Rowan?" Marcus's voice was so casual. So normal. Like we were having a regular conversation. "I never loved you. Not even a little bit."
The words hurt worse than the chains.
"You're lying," I gasped. "We're fated mates. You said"
"I said what you wanted to hear." He laughed. Actually laughed while I was dying. "You were so easy to manipulate. Bring you flowers, tell you you're special, and suddenly you trust me completely."
Tears poured down my face. "Why? Why would you do this?"
"Because you're useful." He yanked the chains harder. Another wave of agony tore through me. "The Hart family carries ancient bloodline magic. Power that's been sleeping for generations. And I need that power."
My wolf spirit was being pulled out of me inch by inch. I could feel her my other half, my companion since I was thirteen being dragged away against her will.
She was howling inside my head. Crying. Fighting.
But the chains were too strong.
"The Frostborn legend," Marcus continued, his voice getting excited. "Everyone thinks it's just a story. But I know the truth. The Hart family descends from the original Frostborn wolf. That ice magic is in your blood. Hidden. Dormant. But still there."
"I don't have any ice magic!" I sobbed. "I'm just a regular wolf! There's nothing special about me!"
"Wrong." His smile grew wider. "You just never knew how to access it. But I do. And once I take your wolf spirit, I'll take that ancient power too."
The chains pulsed with sickly green light. My wolf's presence inside me was fading. Getting weaker.
"No," I whispered. "Please, not my wolf. Take anything else. Anything!"
"I'm taking everything," Marcus said simply.
I felt it then. The exact moment my wolf spirit tore free from my soul.
It was like having my heart ripped out through my chest. Like dying but being forced to stay alive and feel every second of it.
I screamed so loud my voice broke.
Silver energy my wolf's essence flowed from my body into Marcus through the cursed chains. He threw his head back, eyes blazing gold as he absorbed my power.
"YES!" he roared. "I can feel it! The strength! The magic!"
My body went limp. The chains were the only thing keeping me upright.
Everything inside me felt empty. Hollow. Wrong.
My wolf was gone.
"Marcus, stop this!" Elder Willow finally found her voice. "This is forbidden magic! You've violated every sacred law!"
"I don't care about your laws." Marcus looked at her with contempt. "I'm beyond laws now. Beyond all of you."
He released the chains. They clattered to the ground.
And I fell.
I hit the ceremonial platform hard. My head cracked against stone. Blood pooled beneath me but I couldn't feel the pain.
I couldn't feel anything except the terrible emptiness where my wolf used to be.
"Rowan!" Kira's voice cut through the fog. She was still trying to reach me, still fighting the guards. "Let me go! She needs help!"
"She's beyond help," Marcus said coldly. He stood over me, his body crackling with stolen power my power. "Without her wolf spirit, she's basically dead already."
"You monster!" Kira screamed. "You lying, murdering monster!"
Marcus turned to face the crowd. The hundreds of pack members staring in horror.
"Let this be a lesson," he announced, his voice carrying across the festival grounds. "This is what happens when you have something I want. I take it. Nobody refuses the Alpha. Nobody holds power that should be mine."
"The Council will hear about this," Elder Willow said, her voice shaking. "What you've done is unforgivable. They'll strip you of your title"
"They'll do nothing." Marcus's eyes flashed dangerously. "Because if anyone speaks against me, they'll end up like her." He gestured at my broken body. "Dead or dying. Your choice."
Silence fell again. The kind of silence that meant everyone was too scared to breathe.
He'd won. Just like that.
Through the haze of pain, I heard someone sobbing. Realized it was me.
I was dying on the ground during what should have been my wedding. In front of everyone I knew. And they were all just standing there.
Watching.
"Take her away," Marcus ordered his guards. "She's ruining my festival."
"Where should we take her, Alpha?" one guard asked nervously.
"The Black Ice River." Marcus didn't even look at me anymore. Like I was trash he'd already thrown out. "Throw her in. Let nature finish what I started."
"She's still alive"
"Not for much longer." Marcus's voice went hard as steel. "The river's freezing this time of year. Even if the fall doesn't kill her, the cold will. Either way, I want her gone. Dead. Forgotten."
"You can't!" Kira broke free from the guards holding her. She dropped to her knees beside me. "Rowan, stay with me. Please stay with me."
I tried to answer but only blood came out of my mouth.
"Kira," I managed to whisper. It hurt to talk. Hurt to breathe. "Run. Get away from here."
"I'm not leaving you"
"Get her out of here too," Marcus ordered. "Lock her up. She's hysterical."
Guards grabbed Kira. She fought like a wild animal, screaming and clawing.
"ROWAN! NO! LET ME GO!"
They dragged her away. Her screams echoed across the festival grounds until they faded into nothing.
Then rough hands grabbed me. Lifted me. Started carrying me through the forest.
I couldn't fight. Couldn't even keep my eyes open.
My body felt wrong without my wolf. Like I was only half a person. Half alive.
Maybe Marcus was right. Maybe I was basically dead already.
"Almost there," one of the guards muttered.
I heard water rushing. Fast and violent. The Black Ice River.
They were really going to do it. Really going to throw me in and let me drown.
Part of me didn't even care anymore. What was the point of living without my wolf? Without the other half of my soul?
Marcus had taken everything that made me me. Left me empty and broken.
Maybe dying was easier.
We stopped at the riverbank. Through my barely-open eyes, I saw dark water churning past. Chunks of ice floated on the surface like tiny icebergs.
"On three," one guard said. "One... two..."
"Wait." The other guard sounded uncertain. "This doesn't feel right. She didn't do anything wrong. We're basically murdering her."
"Alpha's orders."
"But"
"You want to end up in the river too? Because that's what'll happen if we disobey."
Silence. Then: "No. I don't."
"Then help me throw her in."
They lifted me higher. I felt the cold air rushing up from the river below.
This was it. My last few seconds alive.
I thought about my parents. Dead for ten years now. Would I see them soon? Would they be ashamed of how stupid I'd been? How easily I'd trusted Marcus?
I thought about Kira. My best friend who tried to save me. I hoped she'd escape. Run far away and never come back.
I thought about Marcus. About how much I hated him. How I wished I could make him pay for what he'd done.
But I couldn't. I was powerless. Worthless.
Nothing.
"Three."
They let go.
I fell.
The freezing water hit me like a wall of knives. So cold it felt like burning. So cold my lungs stopped working.
The current grabbed me immediately. Pulled me under. Down into darkness.
I couldn't swim. Couldn't fight. Just sank deeper and deeper.
Water rushed into my mouth. My nose. My lungs.
I was drowning.
This was really how I died. Betrayed by the man I loved. Thrown in a river like garbage.
What a stupid, meaningless death.
My heart slowed. My brain started shutting down.
Everything went dark.
But then
Deep inside my chest where my wolf used to live something stirred.
Not my wolf. She was gone. Stolen.
Something else.
Something ancient. Powerful. Angry.
It had been sleeping my whole life. Waiting. Hidden so deep that even Marcus's dark magic hadn't found it.
Until now.
The betrayal had awakened it. The near-death had triggered it.
Heat exploded through my frozen body. Not warm heat. Cold heat. Ice heat.
The water around me started to freeze.
Not gradually. Instantly. Like time itself had stopped.
Ice crystals formed in patterns spiraling outward from my body. Beautiful and terrible.
My skin began to glow. White light so bright it cut through the darkness.
And I felt it. The ancient magic Marcus had been so desperate to steal.
Except he'd failed. Because he'd only taken my wolf spirit.
He'd left the real power behind.
The Frostborn power buried so deep in my blood that even cursed chains couldn't reach it.
Until I was dying. Until I had nothing left to lose.
Now it was waking up.
And it was furious.
My body started changing. Bones reshaping. Muscles growing. Power flooding through every cell.
I wasn't dying anymore.
I was transforming.
Into something Marcus should have been terrified of.
Into something that hadn't walked the earth in a thousand years.
Into the Frostborn.
The river froze solid around me. Ice spread in all directions. The current stopped.
And in the center of the frozen water, I opened my eyes.
They glowed blue-white. Ice-fire blue.
I took a breath my first breath with my new lungs and the air itself froze.
Marcus thought he'd killed me.
But he'd done something much worse.
He'd created a monster.
And that monster was coming for him.