Rejected by the Alpha, Chosen by the Moon

The world collapsed inward.

Not with sound, but with sensation, like a heartbeat turning itself inside out.

Light fractured. Air folded.

Ash spiraled upward, dissolving like forgotten prayers. Reality shattered into shards, each reflecting time, memory, moonlight, like splintered glass sinking in black water.

And the past didn't arrive.

It returned.

Like a scream coming home.

Lyra gasped, not from fear, but from the sheer wrongness of how right it felt.

Her feet, bare.

Her body, unchanged.

But the world had reassembled around her, reformed in silver fire and warmth so vivid it burned.

She stood in the same place.

But the ruins were gone.

The village pulsed with life.

Lanterns swung from rune-carved beams, wood unburned, homes still standing.

Their glow pooled on warm stone paths. Above, a violet sky yawned, stars blooming like frost, their light trembling like held breath.

And from somewhere beyond the houses, laughter.

Bright. Distant.

Carried on the wind like a memory trying not to fade.

A lullaby drifted with it, low and slow, the kind of melody meant to keep ghosts asleep.

Then, her gaze turned to the altar.

At the center of the unbroken stone circle, a woman knelt.

Still. Regal. Eternal.

Draped in moonlit silks, shimmering like dew. Her hair, not white, but living silver, coiled like sacred smoke.

She did not speak.

She only knelt, hands cupped above the stone, arms trembling.

And her face

Lyra froze.

Her heart stuttered.

Those were her eyes.

Older.

Sharper.

Sadder.

But undeniably her own.

A soul echo. A mirror through time.

Not a reflection, but a remnant.

From the woman's fingers, blood streamed in slow, perfect lines, not torn, but ritual-cut, falling in steady droplets to the altar stone below.

Each drop glowed as it hit, forming runes that pulsed briefly before fading.

Somewhere, not seen, only heard, a voice whispered behind Lyra's ear:

"The Luna will fall…"

"…and rise again."

And the stars above shivered.

Lyra stood frozen, breath caught in her throat, as the woman moved with solemn precision.

Her bloodied hands, ritual-cut, steady despite the tremble, slid a scroll sealed in crimson wax into a hidden niche carved beneath the altar's base.

The stone drank it in, the seal glowing briefly as it vanished from sight, hidden from time but not from memory.

Lyra's gaze shifted, and there she was.

Herself.

A child no older than five, huddled behind the altar, tucked beneath a heavy slab of stone.

Her tiny hands clutched her knees. Her lips trembled.

Eyes wide, too wide, mirrors of fear and innocence and something else.

Memory.

The child stared out through the sliver of moonlight, silent as the dead.

Watching. Absorbing. Becoming.

The woman turned to her.

One last time.

And smiled.

Not with peace, but with grief and power braided together.

A look carved from sacrifice.

Then, fire.

It didn't start small.

It erupted.

Explosions split the violet sky, turning it black with smoke.

The air turned molten.

Screams.

High-pitched. Distant. Close.

Too many to count.

Armored wolves stormed the village, Crimson Fang insignias gleaming like bloody brands.

Runes burned. Symbols shattered. Torches flew. Children screamed. Homes were gutted carcasses.

The lullaby from earlier was gone now, replaced by war cries and howls of betrayal.

And still, the woman stood.

Amid the flames.

Amid the chaos.

Unmoving. Unbroken.

Her arms raised high toward the moon, which now blazed overhead like an open wound, weeping silver light down upon her as though mourning what could not be saved.

"Remember us," she whispered, voice like wind across coals.

And then the fire claimed her.

Consumed her.

Lyra gasped.

The vision shattered.

She reeled backward, staggered out of memory like a drowning woman breaking through ice.

Her breath came in ragged gulps, her skin slick with sweat, her heart pounding against her ribs like a beast trying to escape.

Her hands still rested on the altar stone.

But, it was warm now.

Alive.

A pulse throbbed beneath her fingertips. Not her own.

The ruins around her no longer felt like ruin.

They felt like evidence.

No longer random.

No longer a tragedy etched by chance.

A purge. A silencing.

Her voice broke the silence, dry, raw, shaking.

"This wasn't an accident…" she whispered.

"They destroyed us... because of me."

She looked up.

The moon still hung overhead, bright, full, unwavering.

Watching.

It knew.

And now… so did she.

"This is your doing," Kael snarled, slamming Selena against the obsidian wall of the council chamber. The impact shuddered through the stone, a hollow boom echoing through the vaulted room.

Selena only laughed low, forked, and serpentine. It slithered into the air like smoke from a cursed flame.

"No, Kael. This is yours."

She tilted her head, a queen's grace laced with venom. "You let it rot. You stood idle as the infection spread. You let it happen."

Kael's jaw tightened. "You sent men not even worthy to guard the kennel. You trusted them to eliminate her after the rejection?"

Her eyes narrowed, flames behind frost. "I sent no one. You gave the order. I simply watched the collapse you built with your own arrogance."

Her words struck like dragonfire, hot, merciless, flaying the outer layers of his fury. But Kael's eyes remained steel.

His grip tightened until she could feel her bones grind beneath his fingers.

Pain lanced through her wrist, skin beginning to split.

But Selena's mind, sharpened by cruelty and survival, refused to yield. Weakness was blood in the water.

"So what now?" she hissed. "You throw me against the wall and expect that to fix your mistake?

Fight her. Kill her. Mount her corpse on a stake for the Elders to see." Her voice dropped to a poisonous snarl, eyes locking with his in a stare that sizzled like brimstone on snow.

"That's what you want, isn't it?"

Her fire scorched past pride, straight to guilt. His grip faltered, as he turned his head downwards.

She felt the shift in him. And like a serpent in heat, Selena moved.

Despite the throb in her veins, she leaned forward, brushing her lips near his ear, an intimate whisper against the storm.

Her fingers, bruised and trembling, found his jaw.

"You make me look weak," he murmured, lips brushing the shell of her ear. A lover's caress. A assassin's knife-twist.

Her breath hitched.

Selena pressed closer, her teeth grazing his pulse. "But we both know the truth." Her hand slid down his chest, claws pricking, drawing a bead of blood.