8

I waited three days before I went to him.

Three days of careful planning, of watching the halls and learning his patterns, of choosing the exact moment when he could not dismiss me with the excuse of duty or council or patrols. Three days of rehearsing what I would say, how I would say it, testing each word for weakness until I was certain they would hold.

I would not beg. I would not grovel. I would speak with dignity, with clarity, with the calm authority of a Luna who deserved to be heard.

But beneath all that careful planning, beneath the composed mask I wore like armor, was something raw and desperate.

I needed him to see me. Just once. I needed him to remember that I was still here, still his mate, still trying.

I found him in his study at dusk, when the light through the windows had turned golden and soft. He sat at his desk, papers spread before him, his jaw tight with concentration. The door was open. I stood at the threshold and knocked lightly on the frame.

He did not look up.

"Kael."

My voice was steady. Quiet. Not demanding, not pleading. Just his name.

He set down his quill, leaning back in his chair. His eyes lifted to mine, dark and unreadable. He did not speak. Did not invite me in. But he did not turn me away either.

I took it as permission.

I stepped inside, closing the door behind me. The click of the latch felt final, like sealing myself into a chamber where the air had already grown thin. I crossed to the center of the room, my hands folded in front of me, and waited for him to say something.

He didn't.

So I began.

"I need to speak with you. About us. About the bond."

Kael's expression did not change. He watched me with the same detached calm he used when listening to reports from his scouts   attentive, but distant. As though I were a problem to be assessed rather than a person standing before him.

"I know you've been... distant. I know the pack has noticed. I know there are whispers. But Kael, I "

I stopped. Took a breath. Started again.

"I don't understand what changed. We were bonded by the Moon Goddess herself. You chose me. You stood before the pack and claimed me as yours. And I have tried Moon Goddess, I have tried to be the Luna you need. To be strong, to be composed, to carry the weight of this role without complaint."

My voice cracked, just slightly, and I hated myself for it. I swallowed hard and forced the words out anyway.

"But you look at me now as though I am nothing. As though I am some burden you're forced to carry. You don't speak to me. You don't come to our chambers. You don't "

I stopped again. The word defend had been rising in my throat, but I choked it back. It would sound like an accusation. Like blame.

Kael leaned forward, resting his elbows on the desk. His fingers steepled beneath his chin. Still, he said nothing.

The silence stretched between us, heavy and suffocating.

"Please," I whispered, and I hated the sound of it. "Just tell me what I did wrong. Tell me what I need to do to fix this. Tell me "

"Enough."

The word cut through the air like a blade. Kael's voice was low, controlled, but there was steel beneath it.

He stood, moving around the desk with slow, deliberate steps. He did not come close. He stopped a few paces away, his arms crossed, his gaze fixed on me with something that might have been pity if it weren't so cold.

"You want to know what changed?" he said quietly. "I'll tell you. You became weak."

The word landed like a fist to the chest.

I opened my mouth, but no sound came out.

"A Luna is supposed to be strong," Kael continued, his tone almost conversational, as though he were explaining something simple to a child. "She is supposed to command respect without asking for it. She is supposed to hold the pack together, not fall apart in front of them. And you "

He shook his head, his jaw tight.

"You beg for affection like a servant begging for scraps. You question yourself. You doubt everything. You let them see your fear, your insecurity, your desperation. And the pack sees it too. They see a Luna who can't stand on her own without clinging to her mate for validation."

Each word was a nail driving deeper.

I shook my head, my hands trembling. My voice, when it came, was barely a whisper.

"I'm not I don't "

"You do," Kael said flatly. "Every time you look at me with those wounded eyes. Every time you ask me what you did wrong, as though I owe you an explanation for every decision I make. Every time you let them see you crumble."

He stepped closer now, and I hated that I flinched.

"The pack doesn't need a Luna who begs for affection, Selene. They need a Luna who commands it. Who takes it. Who makes them respect her whether they want to or not."

His eyes held mine, cold and unwavering.

"And you you don't know how to do that. You never did."

The words hung in the air between us, sharp and final.

I wanted to argue. I wanted to scream that I had tried, that I had bled for this pack, that I had endured their cruelty and their mockery and their disdain without breaking. I wanted to tell him that strength was not the absence of fear, but the choice to stand despite it.

But all I could do was stand there, trembling, as everything I had tried to build crumbled around me.

"Kael, please "

"I said enough."

He turned away from me, moving back toward his desk. His hand reached for the papers he had been reviewing, dismissing me as though I were already gone.

"You're my mate," I said, my voice breaking. "Doesn't that mean anything to you?"

Kael paused. For a moment, I thought he might turn back. Might say something anything that would soften the blow.

But when he spoke, his voice was flat. Empty.

"The bond is a chain, Selene. Not a shield. And right now, it's dragging us both down."

He sat back down, his attention already returning to the papers in front of him.

"You can go."

I stood there, frozen, staring at the back of his head. My chest felt hollow. My legs refused to move.

"Kael "

"I said you can go."

His voice was sharper now. Final.

I took a step back. Then another. My hand fumbled for the door handle, my vision blurring at the edges. I pulled the door open, the creak of the hinges loud in the silence, and stepped out into the hall.

I meant to walk. I meant to hold my head high, to leave with whatever scraps of dignity I had left.

But my legs gave out.

I collapsed against the wall just outside the door, my knees hitting the stone floor hard enough to send pain shooting up my thighs. My hands pressed flat against the cold surface, and I gasped for air, trying to force my lungs to work, trying to force the tears back before they could fall.

Weak.

That was what he had called me. That was what he saw when he looked at me now.

Weak.

I pressed my forehead against the stone, my breath coming in short, shallow bursts. My chest felt like it was caving in, collapsing under the weight of everything I had tried so hard to hold together.

And then I heard it.

A soft sound. A footstep.

I lifted my head, my vision still blurred, and looked up.

Maris stood a few paces away, just beyond the pool of light cast by the torches. Her arms were folded loosely, her head tilted slightly to one side. She was watching me.

And she was smiling.

Not a warm smile. Not the gentle, sympathetic smile she usually wore when she found me in moments like this. This smile was something else entirely.

Sharp. Satisfied. Triumphant.

She had heard everything.

Every word Kael had spoken. Every crack in my voice. Every desperate plea I had made.

She had been standing there the whole time.

My breath caught in my throat.

Maris did not move. Did not speak. She simply stood there, her smile widening just slightly, as though she were savoring the moment. As though this were exactly what she had been waiting for.

Then, slowly, deliberately, she turned and walked away.

Her footsteps echoed down the hall, soft and measured, fading into the distance. But even after she was gone, I could still feel her smile burned into my vision.

I knelt there on the cold stone floor, my hands pressed against the wall, my chest heaving with silent sobs I refused to let escape.

Kael had broken me.

And Maris had watched.

The bond mark on my wrist pulsed once faint, dying, like the last flutter of a heartbeat before it stopped entirely.

I did not move. I could not move.

All I could do was kneel there in the shadowed hallway, staring at the empty space where Maris had stood, and feel the last fragile thread of hope I had been clinging to finally, irrevocably snap.