Lycan Destined Mate E-Book

Laura Dutton

• Herausgeber: BookRix
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2026

Beschreibung

They called Maeve Thorn cursed. A lawbreaker. A traitor.
The pack put her in the ring and waited for their Alpha to save her—because everyone can smell what the moon has tied between Maeve and Garrick Vale. But when the moment comes, Garrick chooses pack-law… and Maeve is cast beyond the boundary stones.
Out in the wild, the bond doesn’t stay quiet. It marks her. It burns. It demands.
Then the den starts to rot from the inside—betrayal in the council, fear in the halls, and rogues at the treeline led by a man who doesn’t want peace. He wants Garrick hurt… and Maeve used as the blade that gets it done.
With dawn closing in and the boundary stones calling, Maeve has one choice left: stay gone and survive… or return and make them all choke on the truth.

Leseprobe

Lycan Destined

Mate

He Rejected Her, The Moon Did Not

Laura Dutton

Copyright© 2026, Laura Dutton

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any

electronic or mechanical means, including information

storage and retrieval systems, without

permission in writing from the publisher.

Published by: Laura Dutton

DISCLAIMER

This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, settings, organizations, and events are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or to real events is entirely coincidental.

It contains themes of passion, power, supernatural conflict, and emotional intensity that may not be suitable for all readers. Reader discretion is advised.

The opinions, emotions, and actions of the characters are purely fictional and do not represent the beliefs or perspectives of the author.

Table of Contents

PROLOGUE

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

I can’t help with making writing “undetectable by AI content detectors,” but I can write you a fully original, human-sounding prologue in the voice and style you want.

Prologue(Copy/paste into Word and set line spacing to 1.15.)

The night they threw me out, the air smelled like wet pine and hot iron.

Not the clean kind of iron you find in a smithy, either. The ugly kind. Blood on a blade. Blood on hands that pretend they’re holy.

The pack yard sat below the old hall like a shallow bowl. Dirt ground hard from boots and paws. Torches stuck in the earth, flames snapping in the wind. Smoke crawled low and bitter. Above it all, the moon hung full and white, watching like it owned the place.

Maybe it did.

I stood in the center with my wrists tied. Rope biting through my sleeves, biting skin, biting pride. My arms were held back so I couldn’t cover myself, couldn’t wipe my face, couldn’t do a damn thing but stand there and take it.

I didn’t beg. Not then. Not ever.

But my throat hurt anyway. Like it knew it was about to break.

Around me, the pack formed a ring. Men and women I’d known since I was small. People who’d seen me trip in the mud as a pup and laugh. People I’d shared stew with. People I’d helped stitch up after hunts. Now they stared like I was a sick animal.

Some looked away. Most didn’t.

Old Toma, the grey-bearded elder, leaned on his cane near the front. He had that thin, pinched look he got when he thought he was doing the right thing. Like pain was proof of order.

Beside him stood my aunt Cerys, her mouth tight, her eyes hard as river stones. She had raised me after my mother died. She had fed me, slapped me, hugged me, prayed over me. Tonight she stared like she’d never known my name.

And at the far end of the ring, up on the hall steps, stood Alpha Garrick Vale.

The torchlight caught his jaw, the hard line of it. It carved his face into sharp edges. His hair was dark as crow wing, tied back with leather. His cloak hung heavy and black across his shoulders, like night itself had chosen him.

He didn’t move. Didn’t shift. Didn’t look away.

His eyes were on me the whole time.

That was the cruelest part.

I could have borne the shouting. I could have borne the spit in the dirt near my feet. I could have borne the elders calling me cursed and the pups whispering “witch” behind their hands.

But him looking at me like that—like I was a wound he couldn’t stop pressing—made something inside my ribs twist.

It made my wolf pace and snarl, trapped behind bone.

I lifted my chin anyway. I knew the rules. I knew what they wanted.

They wanted me small.

They wanted me sorry.

They wanted me to break.

Toma cleared his throat, and the pack quieted the way wolves do when the lead male tenses. The wind hissed through the trees, brushing the torch flames sideways. Somewhere out in the woods, a night bird called once and shut up fast, like it knew better.

“Maeve Thorn,” Toma said, loud enough for every ear in the yard. “Child of Riona Thorn. Blood of this pack.”

He let that last bit sit there like a weight. Like it mattered. Like it made this harder. Like any of them planned to show mercy because of it.

I didn’t answer. I stared at the dirt. There was a beetle near my boot, climbing over a clod of earth. It didn’t know it was about to be crushed by a thousand feet if this turned ugly.

Lucky beetle.

Toma went on. “You stand accused of drawing blood within the boundary stones. Of breaking pack-law. Of betraying your own kind.”

A low murmur ran through the ring. Some faces turned even colder, as if they hadn’t already decided my guilt.

I forced my eyes up. “I didn’t betray anyone.”

My voice came out rough. Blunt. It sounded like I’d swallowed gravel.

Toma’s gaze sharpened. “So you deny it?”

“I deny the lie you’re feeding them,” I said.

A hissed breath. A few growls. My aunt’s lips parted like she was about to speak, then closed again.

Toma lifted a hand and the pack quieted once more. “We don’t trade in pretty words here. We trade in truth.”

“Then you’ll choke,” I muttered.

That earned me a slap from the guard behind me. Not a hard one. Just enough to warn me. Rope jerked tight around my wrists, pulling my shoulders back until pain flashed white behind my eyes.

I didn’t cry out.

Garrick’s jaw jumped once. His eyes narrowed, just a fraction. He looked like he wanted to come down those steps and tear the rope away with his own hands.

He didn’t.

He stood still, like stone.

Toma turned a slow circle, addressing the whole ring. “Three nights past, near the river bend, a scout named Fen was found bleeding and broken. He swore, before the healer and the Alpha, that it was Maeve Thorn who struck him.”

Fen stood at the edge of the ring, his arm in a sling, his face pale in the firelight. He wouldn’t meet my eyes. He stared at the ground, at his own boots, at anything but me.

My stomach knotted. “Fen,” I said, and my voice went sharp. “Look at me.”

He didn’t.

“Look at me,” I said again, louder.

He flinched, like my words were blows. Still he kept his head down.

“You’re lying,” I said, and it came out plain as day. No fancy. No softness.

A woman in the crowd spat. “She’s got no shame.”

I laughed once, short and ugly. “Not for telling the truth.”

Toma lifted his cane and pointed it at me. “Fen has no reason to lie.”

That, right there, was where they always hid. In simple words that sounded clean. Like “no reason.” Like “pack-law.” Like “for the good.”

I turned my head, slow, scanning the ring. I saw what they wouldn’t say out loud.

Fen was the nephew of Brannick, one of the elders. Fen was favored. Fen was the kind of wolf they wanted—quiet, obedient, ready to snap his teeth when told. Fen was not me.

And Fen had reason. Plenty of it.

I looked back to Garrick, because I couldn’t help it. Because even now, with rope burning my wrists, I still wanted him to see.

He didn’t flinch away. He didn’t hide.

But his face was locked up tight. A man holding a door shut against a storm.

“Let me speak,” I said.

Toma gave a thin nod. “Speak.”

I took in a breath that tasted like smoke. “Fen followed me. He cornered me by the river. He said things he shouldn’t have said. He put his hands on me.”

A ripple went through the pack. Shock in some eyes. Anger in others.

My aunt’s head snapped up.

Garrick’s gaze darkened.

Fen finally lifted his head, and I saw fear in him. Real fear. Not of me. Of the truth.

I kept going. I didn’t look away. “I shoved him off. I told him no. He grabbed harder. So I hit him.”

“That’s admission,” Toma said fast.

“It’s defense,” I shot back. “I didn’t hunt him. I didn’t ambush him. I didn’t draw steel. I didn’t mean to do more than make him let go.”

Fen opened his mouth, then closed it. His face flushed red and blotchy.

Toma’s eyes narrowed. “And yet he bled. Broken.”

“Not by my hands,” I said.

A silence fell, sharp as frost.

Because that was the part they didn’t want to hear.

“You’re saying someone else attacked him,” Toma said.

I nodded once. “Yes.”

“And who would that be?” His voice had a bite now. He wanted me cornered. He wanted me named a liar in front of all of them.

I swallowed. “I don’t know.”

A snort came from somewhere. “Convenient.”

I ignored it. “I ran when I heard movement in the brush. Heavy steps. Too heavy for Fen. Too heavy for me. I saw a shape, but it was dark. I smelled… I smelled ash.”

That last word made several heads turn.

Ash scent in our woods meant one thing: outsiders.

Rogues.

Men who didn’t answer to any Alpha, any law, any bond.

Toma’s expression shifted for half a breath. He didn’t like that. It made the world bigger than his rules. It made room for danger he couldn’t control with a vote.

He recovered quick. “A tale,” he said. “No proof.”

“My bruises are proof,” I snapped. “The marks on my arms. The torn cloth. Ask the healer what she saw.”

The healer, a small woman named Lysa, stood near the back. Her eyes were wide. She looked like she wanted to speak. She didn’t. She kept her hands tucked in her apron like she could hide in it.

I felt something cold settle in my chest.

They had already warned her. Already told her what would happen if she spoke for me.

So I was alone.

I turned my head to Garrick again. I hated myself for it, but I did. “You know I wouldn’t do it,” I said, and my voice cracked on the last word. “You know me.”

The pack held its breath.

Because everyone knew what sat between us. What had always sat there, snarling and sweet all at once.

The bond.

Not fully claimed, not spoken aloud for all to hear, but there in the air between us every time we got too close. Like the moon had tied a thread between our ribs and dared us to pretend we didn’t feel the pull.

Garrick’s nostrils flared. His hands flexed at his sides.

For a moment, I thought he’d step down. I thought he’d come to me and cut the rope and say, “Enough. She’s mine. She’s pack.”

Instead, he spoke without moving. His voice carried across the yard, low and steady.

“Pack-law stands,” he said.

Those three words hit harder than any slap.

My knees went weak for half a heartbeat. I held myself up by sheer spite.

I stared at him. “So that’s it?”

His eyes flickered. Pain. Anger. Something raw. Then it smoothed over like ice.

“You had your say,” he said.

I laughed again, and this time it shook. “Aye. I did. And you heard none of it.”

Toma lifted his cane again. “The council has decided.”

Of course they had. They always did, while I stood there like a post.

“For breaking the peace within our stones,” Toma said, “for bringing shame upon the pack, for refusing proper remorse—Maeve Thorn is cast out.”

A roar went up, half anger, half approval. A sound like wolves baying over a kill.

My aunt made a sound that wasn’t a sob and wasn’t a growl. Her hand flew to her mouth. Her eyes were wet, but her face stayed hard.

I didn’t look at her. If I did, I might have begged. And I would rather die than give them that.

Toma raised his voice over the noise. “She will leave before moonset. She will not return. If she returns, she will be treated as rogue. Hunted. Killed.”

The words hung in the air, clear as a bell.

Hunted. Killed.

Simple. Clean. Like a law carved in stone.

The guards behind me untied my wrists. The rope fell away, but the burn stayed. My hands shook as blood rushed back into my fingers. I flexed them, slow, biting down on the urge to rub my wrists and look weak.

Two guards stepped to either side of me. Not to help. To herd.

Toma pointed toward the dark line of trees. “Go.”

My feet didn’t move.

I lifted my eyes to Garrick again. One last time. I hated him for what he’d done. I hated myself for wanting him anyway.

“You’re letting them do this,” I said.

His voice came quieter, meant for me alone, but the yard was so still I think even the trees heard. “If I stop it, they’ll tear the pack apart.”

“And if you let it happen,” I said, “you tear me apart.”

His throat worked. He looked like he’d swallowed fire.

“Maeve,” he said, and there was a warning in it. Like he feared what he might say next if he let himself.

I stepped forward one pace. The guards tensed.

I didn’t care.

I kept my eyes on him, on the only man in this yard who had ever looked at me like I mattered.

“You once told me the old ways were meant to keep us safe,” I said. “Not to keep us quiet.”

He didn’t answer.

“You once told me,” I went on, because my voice wouldn’t stop now, “that you’d rather choke on your own pride than kneel to a lie.”

His jaw tightened.

“And here you are,” I said, my voice shaking, “standing tall while they hang a lie around my neck.”

A low growl rose in my own chest. My wolf pressed against my skin, furious, aching, wanting to shift. Wanting to fight.

I could feel my bones wanting to change. My teeth wanting to lengthen. My nails itching to become claws.

But the yard was full of wolves. I would lose. Or worse, I’d win just enough to make their fear real.

So I stayed in my skin. I stayed human. I stayed still.

Garrick’s eyes flashed gold for a moment.

He came down one step.

Only one.

His voice dropped to a rough whisper. “Don’t make this harder.”

My laugh turned into something else. A sound I didn’t know how to name. “Harder?” I said. “Is this not enough for you?”

I saw it then. The thing he was hiding behind that Alpha mask.

Fear.

Not of me. Not of the council.

Fear of what he felt.

Fear of what the bond wanted.

Fear of a choice he didn’t want to make.

Because the bond doesn’t care about councils. It doesn’t care about law. It doesn’t care about pride.

It just is.

And it was there between us, bitter and bright.

I took another step.

The guards moved, hands reaching for me.

Garrick snapped, “Let her.”

The guards froze.

Silence fell so sharp I could hear the torches crack.

I stood at the base of the steps, looking up at him. He was close now. Close enough that I caught his scent under smoke and sweat.

Pine. Steel. Storm.

It hit me right in the chest. It made my eyes burn.

“You feel it,” I said, softer. “Don’t you?”

His throat worked again. His hand twitched, like he wanted to reach for me.

Instead, he clenched it into a fist.

“If I claim you,” he said, voice hoarse, “they’ll challenge. They’ll split. Wolves will die.”

“And if you don’t,” I whispered, “I’m the one you’re letting die.”

His eyes shut for half a heartbeat.

When they opened, the gold was gone. Just dark, tired human eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

That was the first time I’d ever heard him say those words.

It didn’t help.

It made it worse.

Because it meant he knew. It meant he understood. It meant he was choosing anyway.

I nodded once, slow, like I was taking in a lesson I didn’t want. “Aye,” I said, swallowing hard. “So am I.”

He frowned. “For what?”

“For believing you,” I said.

He flinched like I’d slapped him.

I turned away before he could speak again. Before he could twist my insides with more soft words and empty regret.

The guards started to move again, but I didn’t need them.

I walked.

The pack parted like water, but not kindly. People leaned away as if I carried plague. Someone muttered, “Good riddance.” Someone else said, “She’ll come crawling back.” A pup started to cry, and his mother hushed him fast.

My aunt stood rigid, arms wrapped around herself. I stopped in front of her.

She didn’t reach for me.

Her eyes were shining bright now, wet in the torchlight. Her jaw trembled, just a little.

“You should’ve kept your head down,” she whispered.

My throat tightened. “I tried.”

She made a soft sound, almost a growl. “You always had your mother’s mouth.”

“Then you should know,” I said, voice low, “that my mother wouldn’t have bowed to this either.”

Her eyes flashed. Hurt, sharp. “Don’t you speak of her.”

I took in a breath. Let it out. Smoke and grief.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

She blinked hard. “No,” she whispered. “No, you ain’t. And that’s why you’ll survive.”

For a second—just a second—her fingers brushed my sleeve. Not a hug. Not comfort. Just a touch, quick as a sparrow’s wing.

Then she stepped back.

Like she was afraid if she held on, she wouldn’t let go.

I walked on.

At the edge of the yard stood the boundary stones. Old, half-buried slabs carved with marks no one living could read. Wolves older than memory had set them there. The pack said they were sacred.

To me, they just looked like teeth.

Beyond them lay the forest. Black trunks, tangled undergrowth, a river of shadow.

A guard followed me to the stones. “You got until moonset,” he said. He tried to sound firm. He didn’t.

I looked at him. He was young. Barely more than a boy with broad shoulders.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

He blinked. “Rhett.”

“Rhett,” I said, “when you wake up tomorrow, you’ll tell yourself you did what you had to do. You’ll say pack-law. You’ll say order. You’ll say it’s not your fault.”

His face tightened. “It ain’t.”

I nodded. “Aye. That’s what you’ll say.”

He swallowed. Looked away. “Go on.”

I stepped up to the stones.

The air on the other side felt different. Like the pack’s warmth stopped at that line and the world beyond didn’t care if I froze.

I paused with one foot still on pack ground.

And then I felt it.

A pull in my chest, deep and mean, like a hook caught in flesh.

The bond.

It yanked hard, sudden, like someone had grabbed my heart and twisted.

I sucked in a breath.

The yard behind me went quiet again. Even the wind seemed to hold.

I turned my head.

Garrick stood at the top of the steps, watching me like a starving man watches food he won’t let himself touch.

His hands were clenched so tight I could see the tendons in his wrists.

His mouth was set like he was biting back words.

I thought of all the nights we’d sparred in the training ring. All the times his shoulder had brushed mine in passing. All the times he’d said my name like it mattered.

All the times he’d stopped just short of taking what the bond offered.

I raised my voice so it carried. “If you ever find out who hurt Fen,” I said, “if you ever find out the truth… don’t you dare light a torch and come looking for me out of guilt.”

His brow furrowed. “Maeve—”

“Don’t,” I snapped. Then my voice broke, just once. “If you come, come because you mean it.”

His face tightened like it pained him to breathe.

I waited for him to say something. Anything.

He didn’t.

The council stood like shadows around him. The elders watched. The pack watched. A thousand eyes, and none of them gave me what I needed.

So I did what they told me to do.

I left.

I stepped over the boundary stones.

The moment my boot hit the other side, the bond flared so hot I nearly stumbled. It felt like being branded from the inside. My wolf howled in my head, rage and sorrow mixed together until I couldn’t tell which was which.

I kept walking.

Behind me, someone began the old chant they used for exiles. Low. Rhythm like a drum. Words older than sense.

I didn’t look back again.

The woods swallowed me fast. Torches became distant stars between trees. The pack sounds faded into a dull roar, then nothing at all but wind and my own breath.

I walked until my legs shook.

Until my lungs burned.

Until the ground rose and the trees thinned and I found myself at a rocky ridge overlooking the valley where the pack hall sat.

From up there, I could still see the faint glow of torches. A tiny, warm spot in a sea of dark.

Home.

No. Not home anymore.

My chest ached so bad it felt like I’d been struck.

I sank to my knees, rough rock biting through my skirt. I pressed my palm against my sternum like I could hold myself together.

My wolf pushed against my skin again, desperate to shift, to run, to hunt, to do something besides hurt.

I let my head fall forward. I breathed slow. In. Out. Smoke was gone up here. Just cold air and pine and the faint scent of river.

I told myself I wouldn’t cry.

Then a sound tore out of me anyway.

Not loud. Not pretty.

Just human.

I wiped my face with the back of my hand, angry at myself. Angry at all of them. Angry at him most of all.

The moonlight laid pale across my fingers.

I stared at my palm.

There, beneath the dirt and the scrapes, was a faint mark on the skin. Not a wound. Not a bruise.

A crescent-shaped stain, like silver pressed too hard.

It hadn’t been there this morning.

I rubbed it, hard. It didn’t fade.

My breath caught.

“No,” I whispered. “No, no, no.”

Because I knew old tales. Every pup did. Stories told at the hearth when the wind was mean and the woods felt too big.

They said the bond can mark you when it’s denied. Like the moon itself gets tired of waiting. Like fate has claws and uses them.

My stomach rolled. A wave of heat swept through me, then cold.

I pressed my hand to the ground, steadying myself. My vision blurred.

I wasn’t sick. Not in the usual way.

It felt like my body had been yanked in two directions.

Toward the pack.

Toward the wild.

Toward him.

Away from him.

I lifted my head and looked down at the valley again, teeth clenched.

I wanted to hate him clean. Simple. Like pack-law.

But my heart wouldn’t obey.

Down there, far below, a single howl rose into the night.

Low. Long. Full of pain.

The sound cut through the woods like a blade.

My throat tightened so hard I couldn’t breathe for a second.

Because I knew that howl.

I’d heard it on hunts when he’d taken down an elk. I’d heard it when he’d won a challenge. I’d heard it when his wolf had been proud.

This was not pride.

This was grief.

My wolf answered inside my chest, silent but fierce, pressing against my ribs like she wanted to throw her own howl back.

I didn’t.

I bit down until I tasted blood.

Another howl rose, answering his. Then another. The pack was calling. The old call. The one that says we are one, we are many, we belong.

And still, he had sent me away.

The moon hung high, white as bone.

I stared at it until my eyes watered.

Then I spoke to it, because there was no one else to speak to.

“You saw it,” I whispered. “You tied that thread. You lit that fire. And you left me holding it.”

The wind moved through the trees below, a slow sigh.

I got to my feet, legs shaking, and turned my back on the valley.

Each step away felt like tearing cloth. Like leaving skin behind.

I walked into the dark.

Not because I was brave.

Because there was no other choice.

And as the pack’s howls faded behind me, one thought stayed, stubborn as a scar:

They cast me out like I was nothing.

But I wasn’t nothing.

Not to the bond.

Not to the moon.

Not to him, no matter how he tried to bury it.

One day, I would return.

Not crawling.

Not begging.

I would come back with the truth in my hands, and I would lay it at their feet like a severed chain.

And if Garrick Vale still stood there with those hard eyes and that soft, breaking heart—

If he asked me to forgive him—

I didn’t know what I would do.

That was the worst part.

Even now, with the cold biting and the world ahead empty and wild…

I still didn’t know if I could stop loving him.

The woods closed around me.

The night swallowed the last of the torchlight.

And the mark on my palm burned on, like a promise I never asked for.