My Alpha Punished Me for His Luna’s Lies

The dungeon smells like rot and old fear.

I'm chained to the wall, wrists raw where the iron bites into skin. The stone is damp against my back, cold seeping through my clothes and into my bones. There's no light down here except what bleeds through the crack under the door—a thin, sickly yellow line that does nothing but make the darkness feel heavier.

My bag is gone. My escape is gone. Everything is gone except the sound of my own breathing and the distant thunder still rolling through the night.

Footsteps echo in the corridor above. Heavy. Pacing. Back and forth, back and forth, like a caged animal.

Stefan.

I close my eyes and try to find something inside me that isn't terror. Some reserve of strength or dignity or rage. But there's nothing. Just the hollow knowledge that this is how it ends. In the dark. Alone. Blamed for a crime I didn't commit by the man who was supposed to love me.

The door slams open.

Light floods the cell, blinding after so long in blackness. I squint against it and see Stefan's silhouette filling the doorway. He's breathing hard, his chest heaving, and even from here I can see the tremor in his hands.

"You killed my son." His voice is raw. Broken. "You killed my heir."

I don't answer. What's the point? He won't hear me. Won't believe me. The truth died the moment Harlow threw herself down those stairs.

"Say something!" He's shouting now, and the Alpha Command in his voice makes my wolf—what's left of her—whimper and curl into nothing. "Defend yourself! Tell me why!"

"There's nothing to say," I whisper. "You've already decided."

He crosses the cell in two strides and grabs my face, forcing me to look at him. His eyes are black, pupils blown wide, and there's something fractured behind them. Something screaming.

"I gave you everything," he hisses. "A place in this pack. A roof over your head. And you repay me by murdering my child?"

I taste blood where my teeth cut into my cheek. "I didn't—"

"Liar!" He releases me so violently my head cracks against the stone. Stars burst across my vision. "Harlow saw you. The whole pack saw you standing there with your bag, running away like the coward you are."

"She staged it," I say, even though I know it's useless. "She threw herself down the stairs. She's been lying to you for years, Stefan. About everything."

His hand connects with my face before I finish. The slap echoes through the cell, and I taste more blood. My cheek throbs, hot and swelling.

"Don't you dare speak her name." His voice drops to something deadly quiet. "Don't you dare try to poison me against the mother of my child."

"Your child is fine," I say through split lips. "She was never pregnant. Or if she was, she ended it herself. Check the blood, Stefan. Check the scent. It's not—"

He hits me again. Harder this time. My vision goes white.

When I can see again, he's pacing. Back and forth in the small cell, hands in his hair, muttering to himself. I catch fragments: "...can't be... wolf is screaming... doesn't make sense..."

Then he stops. Goes very still.

"A life for a life," he says slowly, like he's working through a puzzle. "That's the law. You took my heir. My future. My bloodline."

I feel ice slide down my spine.

"So I'll take yours." He turns to face me, and his smile is terrible. "You'll never bear children, Maya. Never carry a pup. Never know what it means to create life. That's your sentence."

"Stefan—" My voice cracks. "Please. Don't do this."

"Harlow provided the medicine." He pulls a vial from his pocket. Clear liquid that catches the light like water but feels wrong somehow. Darker. "Concentrated Wolfsbane. Enough to burn out your womb. Enough to sever whatever pathetic connection you have left to the Moon Goddess."

I'm shaking now, chains rattling against stone. "You'll kill me."

"No." He crouches in front of me, and his eyes are empty. "You'll live. You'll live knowing you can never be what Harlow is. Never be a mother. Never be worthy."

He uncorks the vial.

The smell hits me immediately—bitter and chemical and wrong. My wolf, already so weak, recoils in my mind. Whimpering. Dying.

"Open your mouth," Stefan says.

I press my lips together. Shake my head.

The Alpha Command slams into me like a physical force. My jaw unlocks against my will, mouth opening, and I'm screaming inside my own head but my body won't obey.

Stefan's hand grips my jaw. Tilts my head back.

"This is justice," he whispers.

And he pours the Wolfsbane down my throat.