The scent of copper and burnt pine was the last thing I expected to smell on my third wedding anniversary.

I knelt in the freezing mud of the Blackwood border, my palms glowing with a flickering, pale gold light that was rapidly fading. My breath came in ragged, shallow gasps, each one tearing at my lungs like shards of jagged glass. Rain lashed down, mixing with the sweat and blood on my face, blurring my vision until the world was nothing but a smear of grey and red.

Across from me lay Kaelen, my husband and the Alpha of the Blackwood Pack. He was a man built of granite and moonlight, usually the most formidable force in the forest. But today, he was broken. His chest had been shredded by silver-tipped claws during the rogue ambush, the flesh weeping a blackened, toxic pus that hissed whenever my healing light touched it.

"Stay with me, Kaelen," I whispered, my voice cracking under the weight of my exhaustion. "I’ve almost got it. Just... just a little more. Don't you dare close your eyes."

I poured every ounce of my spiritual energy—my very soul—into the wound. As a Pack Healer, my life was a vessel for others. For three years, I had been the silent pillar of this pack. I had healed their broken bones, cured their fevers, and even taken their physical pain into my own body so they could fight longer. But today, I was empty. I had been healing his frontline warriors for twelve hours straight without a single moment to breathe or eat. My vision was tunneling, spots of black dancing in my eyes like soot from a dying fire.

"Elara... stop," Kaelen groaned, his hand weakly gripping my wrist. His grip, once so warm and protective, felt like a shackle.

For a second, a foolish, desperate spark of hope ignited in my chest. Was he worried about me? Was he finally seeing that I was fading, that my skin was turning the color of ash just to keep him standing? Did he finally realize that his "weak" mate was the only thing keeping him from the Goddess’s gates?

"Save... save your strength," he wheezed, his eyes tracking something behind me.

"I can do it, Kaelen. I’m your mate. I won’t let you leave me," I sobbed, pressing my palms harder against the silver-burned meat of his shoulder. The gold light flared with a final, violent intensity. I felt a sharp, agonizing pull in the center of my chest—the feeling of my own life force being scraped from the bottom of the barrel. It felt like my veins were being filled with molten lead.

Then, the bushes parted.

A woman stumbled out into the clearing. It was Sienna, the daughter of our Beta. She was wearing a silk dress that looked suspiciously pristine, though it was torn in just the right places to reveal her pale, flawless shoulders. She didn't have a single scratch on her. Her hair wasn't even matted with the mud that covered me from head to toe. Yet, she was wailing as if she were the one with a hole in her chest.

"Kaelen! Help me!" she screamed, throwing herself onto the wet ground just a few feet away. "The rogues... they touched me! I can feel the poison in my blood! It burns, Kaelen! It hurts so much!"

Kaelen’s head snapped toward her. The man who had been too weak to speak seconds ago suddenly found a miraculous reservoir of strength. He shoved my hands away—the very hands that were knitting his muscle and bone back together—and scrambled through the mud toward her.

"Sienna? No... no, not you," Kaelen gasped. His voice was raw, filled with a terrifying, primal devotion he had never once shown me, not even on our wedding night.

"She’s fine, Kaelen," I said, my voice trembling as I collapsed backward, my strength finally breaking. My heart gave a sickening thud, skipping a beat. "She isn't wounded. I can see her aura, Kaelen... it’s bright. She’s fine! I’m the one... I’m losing my connection. Kaelen, if I don't finish the seal on your chest, the silver will reach your heart in minutes. You’ll die."

He didn't even look back at me. He was cradling Sienna in his arms, his face buried in the crook of her neck, murmuring words of comfort that felt like daggers in my ears.

"Elara, heal her. Now!" Kaelen barked, his Alpha command hitting me like a physical blow to the stomach. "She says she’s poisoned. Don't just sit there being selfish!"

"Selfish?" I whispered, a hysterical laugh bubbling up in my throat. I looked down at my hands; they were trembling so hard I couldn't hold them still. My fingernails were blue. "I have given this pack everything. I have given you everything! I am dying right in front of you, and she is lying!"

Kaelen turned his head then. His eyes, which I once thought were the color of warm earth, were cold and narrowed with disgust. "You have always been jealous of her, Elara. Even now, when she’s suffering, you think only of your own 'exhaustion.' You are the Luna. Your life belongs to this pack. It belongs to me. Now, heal her, or I will consider this an act of treason against your Alpha. I will strip you of your title here in the mud."

The words broke something inside me that no healing magic could fix. The mating bond in my chest, that golden cord that was supposed to be a source of strength, turned into a cold, heavy chain.

I looked at Sienna. Over Kaelen’s shoulder, her sobbing stopped instantly. Her eyes met mine—they were sharp, cruel, and dancing with a dark triumph. She didn't look like a victim. She looked like a predator. She mouthed three words, silent and deadly: “He’s mine now.”

Driven by a lifetime of conditioning and a desperate, pathetic hope that if I just sacrificed one more piece of myself, he would finally love me, I reached out. I touched Sienna’s hand.

I didn't heal her—there was nothing to heal—but Kaelen used our mate bond as a bridge. He forced his will through me, siphoning my remaining vitality and pouring it into her just to soothe her "nerves."

I felt the moment my heart began to fail. It was a cold, hollow sensation, like a candle being snuffed out in a dark room. My internal wolf, a small white creature I had kept hidden and quiet to be the perfect, submissive Healer, curled up and let out a final, mournful howl.

"That’s... that's better," Sienna sighed, her voice purring with health as she absorbed my very life. "I feel so much stronger, Alpha. Your mate is... so helpful."

Kaelen stood up, lifting Sienna into his arms with ease. He looked down at me as I lay shivering in the dirt, my hair matted with blood, my skin turning a sickly, translucent gray. There was no love in his eyes. There wasn't even pity. There was only the look of a man who had used a tool until it was blunt and was now ready to throw it away.

"Go back to the pack house, Elara," he said coldly. "If you can't perform your duties without making a scene and accusing others, perhaps you aren't fit to be Luna after all. We will discuss your future—and my right to take a Second Mate—when I return from patrolling the borders."

He turned his back on me. He walked away into the rain, carrying the woman who had done nothing but lie, leaving his fated mate to rot in the mud.

I tried to reach out. I tried to call his name, to tell him that the silver in his shoulder was still active, that I hadn't finished the seal. But my lungs wouldn't work. The world was turning grey.

Is this it? I thought. I healed every scratch, every broken bone, every fever. I loved him more than my own life. And in the end, I am just a battery to be drained.

As the darkness closed in, a shadow fell over me. For a fleeting, beautiful second, I thought Kaelen had come back.

But the scent wasn't sandalwood and rain. It was the cloyingly sweet smell of Sienna’s perfume. She had slipped away from Kaelen and come back to finish the job. She stood over me, the toe of her expensive leather boot pressing down on my shattered ribs.

"You were always so pathetic, Elara," she hissed. "Did you really think a powerful Alpha would want a 'Healer' for a wife? Alphas want power. They want fire. He needs a Queen who can help him conquer the neighboring territories, not someone who spends her time crying over the wounded like a common nurse."

She pulled a silver dagger from her belt—a dagger I recognized with a jolt of fresh agony. It was the one I had saved up for months to buy Kaelen for his birthday.

"Don't worry," she whispered, leaning down close to my ear. "I’ll take good care of the pack... once I’ve scrubbed your memory from every stone in the Blackwood territory. Even your little sister... Mira, was it? I'll make sure she finds a 'place' in the kitchens."

"No..." I wheezed.

"Goodbye, little Luna."

She plunged the blade into my heart.

The silver burned like liquid fire, a thousand times worse than the exhaustion. But it wasn't the pain that killed me. It was the realization that my mate bond was still open. As my life dripped out onto the grass, I could feel Kaelen’s emotions through the link. He wasn't mourning. He wasn't even worried. He was laughing at something Sienna had said earlier. He was happy.

With my final, agonizing breath, I looked up at the blood-red moon hanging through the trees.

Goddess, I screamed in the silence of my mind. I have been a vessel of mercy my whole life. I have healed the wicked, the ungrateful, and the cruel. If you can hear me... if there is any justice left in this world... let me take it back. Let me take back every bit of life I ever gave them!

________________________________________

"Elara! Wake up! You're going to be late for the Awakening! If Father sees you still in bed, he’ll have a fit!"

The voice was like a thunderclap in a silent room.

I bolted upright, my hand flying to my chest, searching for the hilt of a silver dagger. My heart was slamming against my ribs like a trapped bird, but there was no blood. No cold silver. No mud.

I was in a room filled with warm, golden sunlight. My room. My old room in my father’s house, from the time before I had married Kaelen and moved to the Blackwood estate. The curtains were the same faded blue cotton, and the smell of fresh jasmine wafted through the open window, just like it used to during the Harvest Moon.

I looked at my hands. They were soft, unscarred, and glowing with a faint, healthy pink tint. No blue fingernails. No tremors.

"Elara? Did you hear me? Or did you go deaf in your sleep?"

The door swung open, and my younger sister, Mira, stepped in. She was alive. She was barely eighteen, her face full of youth and mischief. She hadn't been killed in the Great War yet. She hadn't been starved or broken.

"The Alpha of Blackwood is downstairs with his father," Mira said, leaning against the doorframe and rolling her eyes. "He’s been waiting for over an hour. You know how Kaelen is—he thinks the sun rises and sets according to his schedule just because everyone says you two are 'fated' to be together."

Kaelen.

The name felt like a mouthful of ash and battery acid.

I looked at the calendar on my desk. It was the 14th of the Harvest Moon. Three years ago. The day of the Mate Awakening Ceremony. The day I had first looked into Kaelen’s eyes and felt the bond snap into place, thinking it was the greatest blessing the Goddess could ever bestow.

A slow, cold smile spread across my face. It wasn't the gentle, kind smile of a healer. It was the smile of a woman who had crawled out of her own grave and brought the dirt of the underworld back with her.

I didn't feel like a weak healer anymore. Deep inside, where my wolf used to huddle in fearful silence, something else was stirring. It wasn't the white wolf of my past. This thing was dark, jagged, and hungry.

"Mira," I said, my voice steady, sounding like the cracking of winter ice.

"Yeah?" Mira asked, her brow furrowing as she noticed the change in my expression. "You okay, El? You look... different."

"Tell Kaelen I'll be down in a minute," I said, standing up and catching my reflection in the full-length mirror. I looked like an angel—pale skin, golden hair, innocent eyes. But behind those eyes, the ghost of my former self was screaming for blood. "And Mira? Tell him to enjoy his coffee. Today is going to be the most important day of his life. He just doesn't know why yet."

I reached out and touched a dying rose in a vase on my nightstand. Usually, I would instinctively whisper a prayer and give it my life force to make it bloom one last time.

Instead, I focused on the cold, hollow void where my heart had been stabbed. I didn't push my energy out. I pulled.

The rose didn't bloom. It withered instantly, the petals turning to black soot that crumbled into nothingness before they even hit the floor.

I wasn't just a Healer anymore. I was a Siphon. And I was going to take back everything the Blackwood Pack stole from me—starting with their Alpha’s pride.