Chapter 1: The healer’s verdict

The room was too bright. Too white. Too clean.

I sat on the edge of the healer’s cot, fingers twisting in my lap, while the faint smell of herbs and alcohol clung to the air. Every tick of the clock on the wall made my stomach knot tighter.

My wolf shifted weakly inside me, her presence faint and restless. It had been that way for months now—like a candle burning low, the flame threatening to sputter out at any moment.

The door clicked open.

Healer Alden stepped inside, his expression carefully guarded. He wasn’t just a healer, not to me. He’d delivered me as a child, treated every fever and fainting spell, and stitched me back together after I fell from a horse at twelve. He was a man who never wasted words, never looked unsure. And yet tonight, his shoulders carried a weight that made my chest tighten.

“Rhianna,” he said gently, closing the door behind him. “How are you feeling?”

“Just tell me,” I whispered, though my voice was steadier than I felt. “Don’t soften it. I can handle it.”

His lips pressed into a thin line. He crossed the small room and lowered himself into the chair across from me. His hands, steady and practiced, rested on his knees.

“You’ve always known your heart was fragile,” he began. “The faint spells, the exhaustion, the strain whenever your wolf tries to push past your limits.” His voice faltered, almost imperceptibly. “I’ve done every test I could. I even sent samples to the high healers in Silvermist. The truth is… your condition is worsening. Your wolf isn’t repairing the damage anymore. She’s… weakening with you.”

My throat tightened. “So what does that mean?”

His gaze met mine, heavy and full of pity I didn’t want. “It means you don’t have long. A year, maybe less.”

The words landed like a blade sliding between my ribs.

A year.

Twelve moons.

Three hundred and sixty-five days—if I was lucky.

I stared at him, searching for some flicker of hope, some mistake, but all I found was quiet certainty.

The air in the room felt too thick. My hands trembled, so I gripped the blanket under me until the stitches dug into my palms. My wolf whimpered softly inside, curling into a ball.

“I’m twenty-one,” I said, my voice small. “I haven’t even shifted. I was supposed to—” My throat closed before I could finish.

Alden’s eyes softened. “I wish I had better news for you, child. I will do everything I can to ease the strain. There are herbs, treatments, things to buy you more time. But the bond between wolf and vessel is delicate. When one fades, the other…”

“Dies,” I finished for him, my chest tightening.

Silence stretched between us, heavy and cruel.

At last, I asked the only question that mattered. “Does Sebastian know?”

His hesitation was answer enough. “No. I wanted to speak with you first. But Rhianna… he’s your mate. He’ll notice. He deserves to know.”

Sebastian Wolfe. My mate. The golden heir of the Wolfe family. The one every she-wolf envied me for. The one they all said I was lucky to have.

I shook my head sharply, hot tears stinging my eyes. “Don’t tell him. Not yet.”

Alden’s brows furrowed. “You can’t keep this from him.”

“I can.” My voice cracked, but I forced it steady. “If he knows, he’ll… I don’t know what he’ll do. Leave me? Pity me? I can’t—” My chest heaved. “Please. Give me some time.”

The old healer studied me for a long moment, then sighed heavily. “You’ve always been stubborn.”

I almost smiled, but it broke before it could form.

———

The night air hit me like a slap when I stepped out of the healer’s ward. The moon hung high, pale and round, its glow spilling silver across the packhouse grounds. Wolves laughed in the courtyard. Warriors sparred in the dirt yard, the clatter of fists and growls echoing into the night. Life went on, oblivious to the fact that mine had just been cut short.

I pulled my cloak tighter around me, though the air was warm. My wolf stirred weakly, her voice faint in my mind. We’ll be all right, she whispered, but even she didn’t believe it.

“Rhianna.”

My heart lurched at the sound of my mate’s voice.

Sebastian crossed the yard toward me, tall and broad-shouldered, his golden hair catching the moonlight. He wore confidence like a second skin. When he smiled, pack members bowed their heads as if sunlight itself had graced them.

He was the future Alpha. My mate. My husband.

And when his eyes landed on me, that smile softened. “There you are. I was looking for you.”

He reached for my hand, his touch warm and steady, but too quick, too distracted. I noticed—because I always noticed—how his gaze flickered past me toward the group of young wolves near the well, where a girl’s laughter rang out, sharp and sweet.

“I was with Healer Alden,” I said quietly.

Sebastian’s smile dimmed for a moment, then returned. “Again? You’ve been seeing him a lot lately.”

“I haven’t been well,” I admitted.

“You’ll be fine.” He brushed the words away like dust on his sleeve. He leaned down and pressed a kiss to my forehead, soft and perfunctory, before straightening again. “You always worry too much.”

I wanted to tell him. To scream the truth, to demand he hold me like I was dying, because I was. But the words caught in my throat.

Instead, I nodded. “Maybe you’re right.”

His smile returned, brighter now. But I couldn’t unsee the way his eyes drifted again, just slightly, toward the sound of that same girl’s laugh.

———

Later, I lay in bed beside him, staring at the ceiling while his breathing evened out into sleep. His arm was slung across me, heavy and warm, but I’d never felt so far away from him.

A year. That was all I had left.

But what scared me more than death itself… was the growing certainty that I’d already lost him long before the end came.