Moonlit Vows When the Rejected Omega Found Her True Alpha

My childhood scent-match, Fenris Ashcroft, postponed our Mating Ceremony.

He said he needed to take a secondary mate first.

Pack Law was clear: any unmated Omega past their third Blood Moon after coming of age would be assigned a mate by the Capital Pack Council. Fenris pitied this other she-wolf, who was already approaching her final Blood Moon. He feared she would be matched with some lesser Alpha unworthy of her.

But he forgot about me. I had waited five years for him, and next moon cycle, my own third Blood Moon would rise.

My mother brought me to the Ashcroft Pack Den to demand an explanation. All we received was a single, ice-cold sentence:

"She's waited this long. A little longer won't kill her."

Then he added, as though it were the most reasonable thing in the world: "Who else would claim her besides me? Seraphina Nighthollow, you still have your parents looking out for you. But Ivy is different. She has no one. She only has me."

Later, my mother scrambled to arrange a new mating for me.

As fate would have it, my Mating Ceremony and his Secondary Mate Moon Ceremony fell on the very same day.

My procession wound through the forest trail between territories, and there I passed Fenris Ashcroft astride a great black stallion in his ceremonial furs, silver torcs gleaming at his throat. Our eyes met. Every drop of color drained from his face.

——

"Mother, I am not going to mate Fenris Ashcroft."

My mother's hand jerked. The clay cup slipped from her fingers and shattered against the stone floor. "You... are you certain?"

I understood her shock. Pack Law required every Omega to be mated before their third Blood Moon after coming of age, and every Alpha before their twenty-fifth year. Anyone who failed to comply would have a mate assigned by the Capital Pack Council.

My Blood Moon was next month. If I did not mate Fenris, I would be matched with a complete stranger, my future handed over to the unknown.

I expected my mother to scold me, or tell me to endure it. Instead, Elara Nighthollow let out a long breath, and I caught the shift in her scent: the sharp edge of fury softening into something fiercer, something protective. The lavender and rain-washed petals that always clung to her turned steely.

"I always believed that boy from the Ashcroft Pack would give you a good life. I never imagined he would turn out to be..." She trailed off, pressing her lips together. Her jaw tightened, and for a moment her eyes flickered, a flash of pale gold before she steadied herself. "Seraphina, don't worry. Even if we only have one moon cycle, your father and I will find you a worthy Alpha."

My eyes burned. Deep within me, my wolf whimpered, curling small and wounded in a hollow place behind my ribs. There was a time I had believed the same thing my mother had.

Fenris and I had known each other since we were pups. The very first time he caught my scent, he grabbed the sleeve of my dress and refused to let go.

"She smells like moonlight," he declared, his little nose pressed to my wrist. "I'm going to protect her. Nobody will ever bully her!"

His father, Theron Ashcroft, the Supreme Alpha of the Capital Pack Council, laughed and ruffled his hair. "A true Alpha keeps his word, son."

"I will!" Little Fenris nodded with fierce determination, his eyes flashing bright amber, the way pups' eyes did before they learned to control the shift.

After that, whenever he found something delicious or exciting, I was always the first one he thought of. I was restless as a pup, too fidgety to sit through the lore lessons at the academy. Every time the elder threatened to rap my knuckles with a birch switch, Fenris would step in and take the punishment for me, baring his small teeth in a defiant grin as if the sting meant nothing.

I could not say exactly when that easy childhood bond had deepened into something else. By the time I realized it, I was already clutching the moonstone pendant he had given me as a token of his devotion, its surface warm against my skin, pulsing faintly whenever he was near.

He told me it would be just the two of us, for the rest of our lives. He told me I would be his only mate. And I believed him, my wolf singing in quiet contentment, heart brimming with joy, content to wait.

The first year, he earned the title of Alpha Ascendant, the highest-ranked young Alpha in the territory. "Once I take my seat on the Pack Council," he said, "I'll come to your family with a formal mating petition."

The second year, he took his seat among the Council. "Let me build something first. I want to give you the very best of everything."

The third year, he rose to one of the most powerful positions in the Capital Territory, his Alpha aura alone enough to make seasoned wolves lower their gaze. "Once things settle down, I'll send the grandest mating procession the territory has ever seen."

Year after year. It was not until five years had passed, when I was already approaching my final Blood Moon, that a ceremony date was finally set. I told myself, naively, that Fenris had only delayed because he wanted to give me a better life.

Then Ivy Mossgrove appeared, and I realized how wrong I had been.

Ivy was a packless orphan I had rescued. She had been running recklessly through a crowded market square during a Blood Moon Festival and nearly ended up trampled beneath the hooves of Fenris's warhorse. Fenris wanted to toss her a few gold moons and be done with it, but I worried the incident would tarnish his standing among the packs. So I took her into the Nighthollow household and looked after her myself.

Her scent was strange from the start. Faint, almost deliberately muted, like wildflowers crushed beneath something sharper. I could never quite place it.

From that day on, Ivy clung to me like a shadow. She grew familiar with Fenris too, slowly, steadily. Fenris even praised me for it. "You're too softhearted, Seraphina. I couldn't bear to watch you shoulder the burden of caring for her alone."

But little by little, I noticed that Fenris and Ivy were growing closer than they should have been. His gaze lingered on her a beat too long. His scent carried traces of hers when he returned from what he claimed were Council meetings. I tried to speak to him about it. Ivy was a young she-wolf, after all. There needed to be boundaries.