They bullied my son, never once realizing I was the Luna

POV: Sarah

They wiped the bully’s hands with sanitized wipes.

But they let my son stand in the corner with a bleeding palm.

That was the moment I realized the adults were the real monsters.

The sharp, metallic scent of my son’s blood hit the back of my throat before my brain fully registered what had happened. For a werewolf, the smell of their pup’s blood is the ultimate trigger. It bypasses logic. It silences reason. It only leaves the primal, consuming urge to kill whatever caused it.

I didn't open the heavy iron gate. I vaulted over it.

My boots hit the manicured grass of the playground without a sound, and I crossed the distance in a blur of motion. I shoved past a group of startled children, dropping to my knees right beside Milo in the mud.

"Milo," I gasped, carefully taking his tiny wrist in my hand.

A bright crimson line stretched across his soft palm. It wasn't a deep cut, but it was enough to make my inner wolf thrash violently against her mental cage, howling for the blood of the boy who had done this. Milo wasn't crying, but his lower lip was trembling. He was staring at the muddy puddle where his carefully washed piece of glass now lay, completely ignoring his own bleeding hand.

Before I could even pull a tissue from my pocket, a shrill, breathless voice pierced the air.

"Excuse me! You can't just barge onto the school premises!"

I looked up. A woman in a pressed beige cardigan—Miss Gable, the head teacher—was marching toward us, her face flushed with indignation. She didn't look at my bleeding child. She didn't ask what happened. Instead, she rushed straight to Leo, who was standing a few feet away, entirely unharmed and looking incredibly smug.

"Oh, Leo, sweetheart, are you okay?" Miss Gable cooed, kneeling beside the bully. She pulled a pack of antibacterial wet wipes from her apron. "Did the dirty boy touch you? Let me wipe your hands, honey. We don't want you catching any nasty germs."

I froze. Time seemed to stop. I watched, completely paralyzed by the sheer absurdity of the situation, as the teacher carefully and meticulously sanitized the hands of the boy who had just struck my child, while my son stood in the mud, bleeding.

"My son is bleeding," I said, my voice dropping an octave, echoing with a dangerous, unnatural resonance that made Miss Gable flinch. "That boy slapped a piece of broken glass out of his hand."

Miss Gable stood up, puffing out her chest defensively. She looked down her nose at me, taking in my simple, unbranded clothing. She didn't know that the fabric was custom-tailored in Milan specifically for the Night Pack's Luna. To her, a lack of logos meant a lack of wealth.

"Well, perhaps if your son didn't have a bizarre habit of digging through the trash and picking up dangerous debris, this wouldn't have happened," Miss Gable snapped, crossing her arms. "I've told you before, Ms. Vance. Milo doesn't fit in here. He has this... this weird, medicinal smell all the time, and he acts like a feral animal in the dirt. Leo was simply defending his personal space."

The scent suppressant. The silver bracelet dampening Milo's aura smelled faintly of bitter herbs to human noses. They were calling him dirty because we were trying to protect him.

"Defending his space?" I stood up, letting go of Milo’s hand for a second to step between him and the teacher. The air around me began to drop in temperature. "He kicked my son's lunch into the mud and hit him."

"Is there a problem here?"

The clicking of sharp stiletto heels on the pavement announced her arrival before the suffocating cloud of Chanel No. 5 did. Chloe. Leo’s mother.

She walked onto the playground like she owned the very earth we stood on. She was dripping in wealth—a limited-edition Hermès Birkin hanging off her forearm, red-bottomed heels, and diamonds that caught the afternoon sun. She walked past me without making eye contact, immediately pulling Leo into her side.

"Leo, darling, did that boy bother you again?" Chloe asked loudly, ensuring every other parent and teacher in the vicinity could hear her.

"He tried to give me garbage, Mommy," Leo whined, burying his face in his mother's designer coat. "He's gross."

"I know, baby, I know," Chloe sighed dramatically. Finally, she turned her heavily contoured face toward me. Her eyes dragged up and down my outfit, her lips curling into a sneer of pure disgust.

"I truly don't understand how the admissions office let your kind slip through the cracks," Chloe said, her voice dripping with venom. "This is a private academy for the elite. Not a daycare for government-subsidized welfare cases. We pay fifty thousand dollars a semester so our children don't have to associate with... strays."

Strays.

My inner wolf slammed against the bars of her cage. My fangs ached behind my lips, begging to extend. It would be so easy. It would take me less than two seconds to close the distance, wrap my hand around her heavily perfumed throat, and show her exactly what kind of "stray" she was talking to. I could feel the blood rushing in my ears. I could feel the Luna aura leaking out, making the birds in the nearby trees suddenly take flight in a panic.

But then, a tiny, warm hand tugged on the hem of my sweater.

"Mommy," Milo whispered. "It hurts."

I looked down at his bleeding hand, and then at his confused, innocent hazel eyes. If I killed this woman right now, if I shifted and let the monster out, the human authorities would swarm the pack. The rival Alphas tracking us would know exactly where my son was. I would be putting Milo's life in unimaginable danger just to satisfy my own pride.

Ethan and I were the most powerful predators in the city, but right now, I had to swallow glass. I had to let a sheep insult a wolf.

I took a deep, shuddering breath, pulling my aura back in and locking it down so tightly it physically burned my chest.

"We are leaving," I said quietly.

I didn't yell. I didn't argue. I just bent down, scooped my beautiful, bleeding boy into my arms, and walked away. Behind me, I could hear Chloe scoffing, telling the teacher that she expected the "feral child" to be suspended for bringing glass onto the playground.

I didn't look back. I just promised myself, with absolute, terrifying certainty, that Chloe and her husband would eventually burn for this.

The car ride back to the estate was suffocatingly quiet. Usually, Milo would be bouncing in his car seat, telling me about the clouds or the cars passing by. Today, he was completely silent, staring down at the colorful cartoon band-aid I had wrapped around his palm.

When we pulled up to the heavily guarded gates of our home, our Lead Enforcer opened my door. He immediately caught the scent of Milo’s blood. The massive man stiffened, his eyes flashing gold, a low growl rumbling in his chest as he looked around for the threat. I gave him a sharp, silent shake of my head. He backed down immediately, bowing his head, but his fists were clenched white.

Milo didn't run to the kitchen for his afternoon snack. He didn't ask to go see the other pups. He walked straight up the grand staircase and went into his bedroom, gently closing the door behind him.

I gave him ten minutes of space before I couldn't take it anymore. I walked down the carpeted hallway and quietly pushed his bedroom door open.

"Milo?" I called out softly.

He wasn't playing with his toys. He wasn't drawing. The room was perfectly still. I walked over to his massive, custom-built bed and saw a tiny lump hiding completely under the heavy duvet.

My heart shattered into a million pieces. I sat on the edge of the mattress and gently pulled the blanket back.

Milo was sitting with his knees pulled up to his chest. In his lap was a bright yellow box of superhero band-aids. But that wasn't what made the breath leave my lungs.

Milo had peeled off half a dozen band-aids and stuck them awkwardly all over his own face. They were on his cheeks, across his little nose, and on his forehead.

"Baby..." I choked out, tears instantly blurring my vision. I reached out, my hands trembling as I hovered over his face. "What are you doing? Are you hurt anywhere else? Did they hit your face?"

Milo looked up at me, his large hazel eyes swimming in unshed tears. He sniffled, wiping his nose with the back of his uninjured hand.

"Mommy," his voice was small, shaking with a kind of heartbreak no five-year-old should ever have to feel. "My fangs didn't come out. I didn't use my claws. I tried to be a good human boy."

"I know, sweetie. You were so good. You were perfect," I whispered, a tear slipping down my cheek.

"Then why do they still think I'm a scary monster?" he asked, his little voice cracking on the last word.

He pointed a chubby finger to the band-aid crookedly stuck across his nose.

"Is my human face broken, Mommy?" he sobbed, the tears finally spilling over his cheeks, soaking into the adhesive of the bandages. "If I put the magic band-aids on my face... will it fix me? If I fix my face, will Leo let me be his packmate?"

He thought he was the problem.

They had abused him, insulted him, and drawn his blood, and my perfect, innocent little Alpha was sitting in the dark, trying to bandage his own face because he thought he was too ugly for them to love.

I pulled him into my chest, wrapping my arms tightly around his small body as he finally broke down, crying into my shoulder. I buried my face in his dark hair, inhaling his sweet, suppressed scent, and let my own tears fall into his curls.

"You are not broken, Milo," I whispered fiercely against his hair, rocking him back and forth. "You are perfect. You are the most beautiful, perfect boy in the entire world, and there is absolutely nothing wrong with you."

As I held my crying son, a cold, dark calmness washed over me. The maternal instinct to protect had shifted into something much more dangerous. It had shifted into the Luna's instinct to destroy.

Tomorrow was the school's disciplinary hearing. They wanted an apology. They wanted to humiliate us and kick us out.

I rubbed Milo's back as his cries softened into exhausted hiccups. I stared at the wall, my eyes flashing a brilliant, lethal gold in the dim light of the bedroom.

You want to see a stray? I thought to myself, the voice of my inner wolf echoing in my mind with a bloodthirsty snarl. Tomorrow, I will show you exactly what kind of monsters you’ve been playing with.