The Rise of the Fallen Luna

Selene's POV.

In the night I was almost killed. I was seven months pregnant with a child prophesied to save the entire kingdom.

We were ambushed on our way back to the packhouse. At first, I thought it was rogues, or one of the lesser clans challenging my husband’s authority.

But when I saw how many of them there were… how they only came for me… I knew.

They weren’t after revenge or land.

They were after my child.

The child in my womb—the one the Moon Seers called The Chosen Alpha. The one who would unite the kingdom and end the bloodshed that plagued the werewolf clans for generations. The future alpha of alphas.

And that future had painted a target on my back.

My guards fought bravely, forming a shield around me, but they were quickly overrun. I tried to defend myself, but I was too slow, too heavy. I could barely shift without tearing something.

Still, I fought until my hands were slick with blood.

I thought I was going to die.

Then I saw him—my husband.

He tore through the attackers like a beast unleashed. I screamed his name as the world started to dim around me, and just before I blacked out, I thought: We’re safe. Me and the baby… we’re safe.

That was the last lie I let myself believe.

---

The first thing I heard when I stirred was the soft, rhythmic beep of hospital monitors.

Then… voices.

I didn’t open my eyes.

I don’t know if it was instinct or fate, but something told me to listen.

And what they were saying made my blood run cold.

“…Are you really going through with it?” a voice said—familiar, tense. Thorne. My husband’s best friend. “You’re still planning to kill your own child and pass off Eliah’s baby as the Chosen One? No one would believe that lies.”

I froze.

My fingers twitched under the sheets. My throat went dry.

That can’t be right. No. I must be hallucinating. Still drugged. Still unconscious.

But then I heard the one voice I used to trust more than my own—

“That’s why I asked if I could kill them both,” my husband said, calm as ever. “No one would know the difference. When Eliah gives birth, we’ll say it’s Selene’s. The seers won’t question it. The kingdom will follow whoever we present.”

My stomach turned.

“That's your child too, in Selene’s womb!” Thorne hissed. “You think she won’t find out? You think she won’t feel it? The bond is real, Damon.”

Damon laughed, low and cruel. “The bond means nothing. I made sure the doctor pumped her with enough wolfsbane to numb anything. And besides… I promised Eliah. She gave me a second chance.”

I couldn’t breathe.

I couldn’t scream.

So I just listened.

“You said Eliah lost the baby—how are you even pulling this off?” Thorne asked, his voice quieter now.

“She didn’t. I lied to Selene. Eliah’s pregnancy was hidden for months. When she gives birth, we’ll say Selene delivered early. We switch the babies. The kingdom won’t question anything.”

There was a pause.

The silence stretched between them, heavy and suffocating.

Then Thorne spoke again, his voice low and trembling with disbelief. “Y-You’re not the man I grew up with. You’re not the friend I once knew. Wake up, bro! Are you even hearing yourself right now?” His voice broke slightly. “I get it. I get that you and Selene were arranged. I know there was no love between you two. But this? This is sick. This is... insane.”

Damon’s laugh was dry and hollow. “Don’t get sentimental on me now.”

“I’m serious,” Thorne snapped. “She’s your wife. She carried your child. And this is your plan? Murder them in cold blood and replace the prophesied heir with some child from your ex?”

“Eliah is not just some ex. She’s my true bond. The only woman I ever loved,” Damon said coldly. “And her son—my son—is worth ten of Selene’s. He’s strong, pureblood, and doesn’t come from a cursed bloodline.”

I couldn’t stop the tears from pooling in my eyes.

My baby was his child too. And he spoke about us like we were vermin. Disposables.

“I always knew you were ambitious,” Thorne whispered. “But this… You’ve completely lost your mind.”

Damon’s boots scraped against the floor. I imagined him stepping closer. His voice dropped to a dark, deadly murmur.

“So what now, Thorne? Are you going to grow a conscience and stop me?”

Another pause.

“You know what happens to people who stand in my way.”

“Don’t threaten me—”

“No,” Damon cut him off, his voice sharp as a blade. “This isn’t a threat. It’s a promise. If you try to stop me, if you even think of getting in my way, I’ll gut you and hang your wife from the gates. Your daughter? I’ll make sure she watches.”

I stopped breathing.

My heart felt like it had been impaled.

The man I married. The one who once touched my swollen belly and murmured, We’ll be good parents someday—was gone.

A monster wore his face now.

Damon exhaled slowly. “Tomorrow, during the surgery, we make it look like an accident. Cardiac arrest. Hemorrhage. I don’t care. Just make sure neither Selene nor that unborn brat makes it out alive.”

My hands clenched into fists under the sheets. I felt my nails break the skin of my palms, but I didn’t care.

“And once they’re gone…” His tone shifted again—colder, calmer. “…my son, Lucas, will be presented to the kingdom as the Chosen One. The rightful heir. The savior they’ve all been praying for.”

“You’re going to rewrite prophecy with lies?” Thorne asked bitterly.

Damon scoffed. “Prophecy is only as strong as the story we tell. People don’t want truth. They want a savior. I’ll give them one.”

“And if the Moon Seers—?”

“I’ll buy them. Kill them. Make them disappear. Whatever it takes.”

Thorne didn’t respond.

But I could hear his breath—shaky, uneven.

He didn’t agree.

But he was too afraid to say no.

They turned and began walking toward the door, their voices fading into the hallway.

Just before it clicked shut behind them, I heard Damon mutter coldly, “Make sure the doctor knows—one incision. Two deaths. No mistakes.”

Then silence.

I lay there frozen, a scream buried in my throat, every nerve in my body on fire. My baby kicked weakly beneath my ribs, like they were still fighting to live.

They’re going to kill us tomorrow.

I stared up at the ceiling, chest rising and falling, every breath more painful than the last.

Move… I begged myself. Please, just move.

But my limbs were numb. My fingers trembled as I tried to lift them. My voice refused to rise. It felt like I was trapped inside my own body, screaming at it from the inside.

Not like this… I can't die like this.

Tears streamed down my face as I turned my head slowly—agonizingly—toward the bedside drawer. I remembered the pen they used for consent forms. Maybe it was still there.

I forced my arm to move. Every inch felt like I was dragging bone through fire. My fingers curled weakly, barely grazing the handle. I pulled.

The drawer slid open.

There it was.

A black pen.

I gripped it with all the strength I had left, my hand trembling violently as I reached for a crumpled sheet of paper near the clipboard.

My vision blurred. I could hardly breathe. But I wrote one name in shaky, uneven letters.

Then, below it, just three desperate words:

“Help me. Hurry.”

I dropped the pen, my hand falling limp against the bed.

But I wasn’t done.

With the last flicker of strength, I reached my necklace where I had hidden something, an enchanted silver feather, given to me by someone long ago. Only to be used in dire moments.

I pressed the note against it, whispering his name through cracked lips.

The feather glowed faintly, shimmered and then vanished, taking the letter with it.

Carried by the penguin.

A creature no one could see. No one could stop.

It would find him.

It had to.

And just before the darkness closed in again, I prayed to the Moon Goddess that he would read my words—

Before it was too late.