After My Alpha Killed My Mother, I Escaped Him

Darkness swallowed me whole. The silver-lined walls of the isolation cell burned my skin with every brush of fabric, every shift of my weakened body. Three days. No food. No water. No shifting.

My wolf whimpered inside me, growing fainter with each passing hour. The silver was poison to our kind, and Jaxxon knew it.

"Eleanora..." A soft voice floated through the darkness.

"Mother?" I croaked, my throat raw from screaming. "I'm sorry... I couldn't save you."

The silver bars gleamed dully in the darkness as I curled into myself. The burns on my arms and legs throbbed with each heartbeat.

"It's not your fault, my sweet girl." My mother's voice came again, so clear I could almost see her gentle smile. "The pretty lady with the golden hair told me stories..."

I pressed my palms against my eyes, trying to stop the flow of tears. "What did she tell you?"

"That you would be sad forever if I stayed. That I was a burden." The voice was so real, so like her simple, childlike way of speaking. "She said if I went away, you could be happy with your mate."

My heart shattered anew. "No... no, that's not true!"

"I wanted you to be happy," the voice whispered, fading like mist. "Like the moon stone promised..."

I clawed at the silver floor, the pain anchoring me to reality as the hallucination faded. My wolf stirred weakly, her presence flickering like a candle in a storm.

"She's killing us both," I whispered to my wolf. "This bond... it's not love. It's a death sentence."

For the first time since Jaxxon marked me, I felt something inside me crack—not break, but shift. The mate bond stretched thin as my wolf retreated deeper inside me.

"If we survive this," I promised her, "we'll never submit to him again."

---

Three days later, the cell door swung open. I stumbled out, barely able to stand, my legs trembling beneath me. The guard avoided my eyes as he led me back to the main corridor.

"Luna," he murmured, though the title felt hollow now.

I leaned against the wall, trying to steady myself. The pack members who passed by averted their gazes—some from shame, others from fear of showing sympathy.

"Well, well. Look who's back from her timeout."

Ashlyn's voice sliced through the hallway. She stood blocking my path, her golden hair gleaming under the fluorescent lights, her perfect features arranged in a mask of false concern.

"Move," I managed, my voice barely audible.

She stepped closer, her expensive perfume suffocating me. "You know, I visited your mother before she decided to take her own life."

My head snapped up, eyes locking on hers.

"It was so easy," she whispered, leaning in so only I could hear. "I told her she was a burden to you. That you'd be exiled if she didn't remove herself from the equation." Her lips curved into a cruel smile. "The poor thing believed me. Thought she was helping you by hanging herself."

A sound escaped me—half sob, half growl.

"And the best part?" Ashlyn continued, tracing a manicured nail down my arm. "Jaxxon doesn't care. He never did. You were just a convenient Luna until someone better came along."

Heavy footsteps approached from behind. Jaxxon appeared, his imposing figure filling the hallway. His eyes swept over us, lingering on Ashlyn's hand on my arm.

"Alpha," Ashlyn purred, straightening immediately.

He nodded once, then turned away—walking past me without a glance, as if I were invisible.

In that moment, something hardened inside me. The last thread of hope snapped.

---

The pack infirmary was empty when I slipped inside. My fingers trembled as I pocketed a vial of wolfsbane extract and a small silver blade.

"Forgive me," I whispered to the pack healer who had once been kind to me.

The river that marked the eastern boundary of Silver Moon territory roared with spring runoff. I stumbled through the underbrush, leaving a trail of broken branches and disturbed earth.

Here, where the current churned white and angry, I would stage my death.

I slashed my arm with the blade, watching crimson bloom across my pale skin. The pain was nothing compared to what I'd already endured.

"Blood for blood," I murmured, letting drops fall onto the rocks and into the water.

I tore strips from my clothing, leaving them caught on branches and half-submerged in the river's edge. Each piece carried enough blood to convince trackers that something violent had happened here.

Finally, I uncorked the wolfsbane. The bitter scent made my wolf recoil deeper inside me.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, rubbing the extract into my scent glands and along my skin.

The wolfsbane would mask my living signature, making it nearly impossible for trackers to sense my life force. To them, I would be nothing but a fading echo of a she-wolf who had met a violent end.

I took one last look at the territory that had been my prison, then turned toward the misty mountains of the north. Somewhere beyond those peaks lay the Northern Clans—and perhaps, a chance at freedom.

The river swallowed my blood and tears as I walked away, leaving behind the broken pieces of Eleanora Lane, the Luna who never really was.