Lycan King Treasured Luna E-Book

Laura Dutton

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

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2026

Beschreibung

Rejected. Banished. Marked with shame… and left to die beyond the boundary stones.
Mara Ashridge was never meant to matter in her pack. She worked, obeyed, and kept her head down—until one cruel night in the Great Hall shatters what little she had. Her name is stripped. Her mark is carved away. Even the wolf who should have claimed her turns his eyes to the fire and lets her fall.
But the wild doesn’t swallow Mara.
Out past the stones, something ancient watches her struggle to survive—a Lycan King with a shadowed past and a law of his own. When war brews and a rotten rule threatens to grind the pack into dust, Mara is dragged back into the world that broke her… not as a servant, but as a force no one can ignore.
To take back her life, she must face the wolves who betrayed her, end the old punishments that destroy the weak, and decide what she truly wants: revenge that feels good for a moment… or a hard, earned justice that can change everything.
In a world where loyalty is bought with fear and love is treated like a chain, Mara must fight for a place that can’t be taken from her again—even if the crown she never asked for costs her the one person who made her believe in home.
Lycan King Treasured Luna is a fast-paced, emotional werewolf romance about banishment, second chances, and the brutal price of building a kinder law under an old moon.

Leseprobe

Lycan King Treasured Luna

A Banished Omega’s Rejected-Mate Werewolf Romance

Laura Dutton

Copyright © 2026 Laura DuttonAll rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the prior written permission of the author, except for brief quotations used in reviews or other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

PROLOGUE

The Moon’s Hard Verdict

Banishment Road, Blood-Cold Wind

Blackwood’s Teeth and Shadows

A Stranger in a Worn Cloak

Firelight Oath, No True Names

The King’s Mark, Branded in Quiet

Back to the Pack That Cast Me Out

A Hall of Wolves and False Smiles

Old Law, Iron Tongue

The Luna Test, Set to Break Me

Heat-Song Rising, Hunger Unchained

A Knife in the Feast-Hour

Run, Girl—Run with the King

Den of Outlaws, Den of Truths

The King’s Confession in Ash and Snow

A Claim Spoken Before the Wild Moon

Challenge at Dawn, Blood for the Crown

War Howls Across the Ridge-Line

The Pack’s Kneel—or Their Fall

Treasured Luna, Crowned by the Old Moon

EPILOGUE

PROLOGUE

They say the pack is a home.

That’s a sweet lie folks tell pups so they’ll sleep easy and stop asking hard questions. A pack is a blade with a handle made of warm hands. You hold it close until the day those hands turn, and you learn what it feels like when the steel goes in.

The night they cast me out, the air smelled like wet fur and old smoke. Pine pitch, ash, and the sour bite of fear hiding under everyone’s neat faces. The Great Hall was full. Shoulder to shoulder. Wolves packed tight, eyes bright in the torchlight. No laughter. No music. Just that hush a crowd makes when it wants blood but doesn’t want to say the word.

I stood in the center ring where they settle disputes. Where they marry. Where they crown. Where they break.

My bare feet were on cold stone. The floor had a dark stain that never scrubbed out. Folks said it was from a boar feast years ago. I knew better. Wolves don’t like to talk about what they’ve done. They like to call it “old law” and let the past rot quiet in the corner.

My wrists were tied with rawhide. Tight enough to bite. Loose enough to remind me I was still seen as pack, just for a breath longer. That was the cruel part. They kept me close so I could smell what I was losing.

Above me, the rafters creaked. A storm crawled over the mountain, slow and heavy. Rain tapped the roof like knuckles at a door nobody wanted to answer.

I looked for my mother first.

That’s what you do, even when you’re grown. Even when you’ve bled. Even when you’ve buried your own pain so deep you forget it has a name. You look for the one face you trust.

She sat near the back, half-hidden behind bigger bodies. Her hands were clenched in her lap like she was trying to hold herself together by force. Her mouth was pressed thin. Her eyes were wet but steady.

She didn’t wave. She didn’t smile. She didn’t beg.

I don’t blame her.

If she moved wrong, they’d drag her into the ring with me. That’s how this pack kept the rest in line. Don’t speak, or you’ll share the same rope.

I searched for my brother next.

Kellan wasn’t there. I knew why. The enforcers had shoved him out earlier when he tried to fight them. He’s all elbows and fire. Too much heart for his own good. I’d heard his shout down the hall, wild and cracked, before the door slammed and swallowed it.

Then I looked for him.

Rowan Blackthorn.

Alpha’s son. Future Alpha. The wolf every maid in the valley watched like a hawk watches a rabbit. The wolf everyone said was born with the crown already set on his head.

My mate.

Even thinking that word made something twist in my chest, tight and hot. Like a hand closing around my ribs.

Rowan sat on the high seat beside his father, the Alpha. He wore a dark coat with silver clasps shaped like wolf teeth. His hair was tied back the old way. His face was hard. Not angry-hard. Not hurt-hard. Just… set. Like stone.

He didn’t look at me at first.

That part still haunts me, if I’m honest. Not the rope. Not the crowd. Not the way the elders leaned in like they were sniffing meat.

It was Rowan staring at the fire instead of at me.

I had loved him in a quiet way. The kind of love you don’t brag about. The kind you guard. It had lived in me like a small flame, steady through winters that tried to snuff it out.

We’d never spoken it aloud. We didn’t need to. The bond had whispered enough. A pull when he walked past. A charge when our hands brushed. The way my wolf lifted her head when he was near, like she knew his scent better than her own.

But that night, his eyes stayed on the fire.

The elder who led the hearing was Old Bram. His beard was yellow-white and his hands shook when he raised them, but his voice still carried.

“Mara Ashridge,” he said.

My name sounded wrong in his mouth. Like he’d already spit it out once and hated the taste.

“You stand accused.”

Accused. Not asked. Not questioned. Accused.

Old Bram went on, reading from a strip of hide as if the words were holy.

“Accused of breaking boundary law. Accused of leading a stranger through our woods. Accused of bringing ill luck to the pack by secret dealings. Accused of theft from the Alpha’s stores.”

Each charge landed like a stone thrown at my face.

I wanted to laugh. Not because it was funny. Because it was so damn easy for them.

I’d spent my whole life scrubbing their floors, stitching their torn coats, hauling water until my arms shook, running errands until my feet bled inside my shoes. I’d taken the worst rooms, the coldest corners, the jobs nobody wanted. Not once had I complained out loud.

And they still needed a villain.

Wolves love a villain. It makes the world simpler. It makes their own sins feel smaller.

I lifted my chin.

“I didn’t do those things,” I said.

My voice echoed in the ring, small against the hall.

Old Bram didn’t blink. “We have witnesses.”

That’s when the crowd stirred. Low noises. A few chuckles. A cough that sounded too pleased. I felt eyes on my skin like hands.

“Bring them,” Bram said.

The first was Lysa.

Lysa, who’d shared a blanket with me as pups. Lysa, who’d cried on my shoulder after her first heat came hard and ugly. Lysa, who’d once told me, with her cheek pressed to my hair, that I was the only one who made her feel safe.

She walked into the ring with her shoulders square and her chin high. She wouldn’t meet my eyes.

Old Bram asked, “What did you see?”

Lysa’s throat bobbed. “I saw Mara at the boundary stones after dusk three nights past.”

“That is within our lands,” I said quickly. “I gather herbs there. You know that.”

Old Bram held up a hand to silence me, like I was a barking dog.

Lysa went on, “She wasn’t alone.”

My stomach dropped.

“Who was with her?” Bram asked.

“A man,” Lysa said. “A stranger. Cloaked. Tall. His scent was wrong. Not pack.”

A murmur rippled through the hall. Fear loves company.

I stared at Lysa. “You’re lying,” I said. “Why would you say that?”

Her eyes flickered to mine for half a heartbeat. I saw something there. Shame, maybe. Or fear. Or both.

Then she looked away again.

Old Bram nodded like this was settled.

A second witness stepped forward. One of the storekeepers. He claimed a sack of dried meat was missing. A third said he’d seen me near the Alpha’s store room on a night I had no reason to be there.

I did have a reason.

I’d been bringing salve to Rowan’s mother.

She’d been sick all winter, coughing until her lips went pale. I’d tended her in secret because she’d once been kind to me when kindness was rare. She’d given me an extra bowl of stew when I was small and half-starved. She’d called me “lass” like I mattered.

Rowan didn’t know I was the one helping. His father didn’t know. If they had, they’d have called it shameful. An omega putting her hands on the Alpha’s mate.

So I stayed silent.

And silence, I learned, can be used like a rope too.

When Old Bram asked if I had anything to say, I did the one thing I never did.

I looked at Rowan.

“Tell them,” I said.

My voice cracked on the words. I hated that. I hated giving them my weakness.

Rowan’s gaze lifted at last, slow as a door opening.

The bond between us pulled, sharp and aching. My wolf surged under my skin like she wanted to run to him. Like she wanted to press her head against his chest and say, This is ours. Don’t let them take it.

His eyes were gray in the torchlight. Like storm clouds.

He didn’t soften.

He didn’t flinch.

I said, “You know where I was that night. You know.”

Because he did.

He’d passed me on the path near his mother’s cabin. He’d paused, sniffed the air, and his eyes had narrowed like he’d caught a scent he couldn’t name. I’d held my breath, salve hidden in my shawl. He’d looked at me for a long moment.

Then he’d walked on.

No words. No questions.

Just that quiet, heavy look.

Now, on the high seat, he stared down at me like I was a stranger.

His father, Alpha Garrick, leaned forward.

“Rowan,” Garrick said. “Speak.”

Rowan’s jaw worked once. Like he was chewing something bitter.

He stood.

The hall went still. Even the rain seemed to hush for him.

Rowan stepped to the edge of the high dais and looked down at me. He didn’t come closer. He didn’t step into the ring. He kept the distance like it mattered.

Maybe it did.

Old Bram asked, “Do you claim this wolf as mate?”

That question is old as bone. It’s how packs bind. It’s how they make it lawful. It’s how they make love into a chain.

My heart thudded so hard I thought it might split me open.

Rowan’s eyes held mine.

And in that one breath, I saw it.

Not love. Not longing.

Decision.

He said, “No.”

One word.

That was all.

No speech. No excuse. No gentle letdown.

Just “No,” flat as a plank.

The bond didn’t snap like a twig. It didn’t break clean. It tore. Slow. Hot. Like flesh pulled from flesh.

My knees buckled. The rawhide bit as I fell forward, catching myself on my hands. The stone was cold, but the pain was inside, deeper than cold.

I heard a sound and realized it came from me. A small, broken noise, like an animal caught in a trap.

The hall stayed quiet.

Not one person stepped forward.

Not my mother.

Not the wolves who owed me favors.

Not the elders who’d once praised my work.

Not even Rowan’s mother, who sat pale beside the Alpha’s seat, eyes wide with horror she didn’t dare show.

Old Bram’s voice rang out again.

“By old law, the accused has no claim. By old law, the pack is cut from her.”

He turned to the guards.

“Mark her.”

Two enforcers hauled me upright. Their hands were rough, not cruel for the sake of it, just careless. Like I was already less than wolf.

One held my arm out. The other drew a small knife. Not long. Just sharp enough.

I won’t dress it up. It hurt.

It wasn’t the cut that broke me, not really. It was what it meant.

They carved away the little scar at my wrist where the pack had marked me at thirteen. A thin line, nothing fancy. But it had been mine. Proof I belonged somewhere.

When it was done, the enforcer wiped the blade on his sleeve like I was dirt.

Old Bram raised his staff and struck it once on the stone.

“Banishment,” he declared. “Mara Ashridge is cast beyond the boundary stones. She is not to be fed. Not to be sheltered. Not to be spoken to. Any wolf who aids her will share her punishment.”

A low approval moved through the crowd. Not cheers. They weren’t bold enough for that. Just that same sound folks make when they feel safe because someone else is being hurt instead of them.

I looked at Rowan again.

He stood like a carved statue. Strong. Clean. Untouched.

His eyes flicked to my wrist. Just a flick. Like he’d noticed the blood, like it bothered him.

Then his gaze slid away.

That was it.

That was the moment something in me went quiet.

It wasn’t hatred. Not yet.

It was the death of hope.

They cut my rope and dragged me to the doors.

Outside, the storm had turned the yard into mud. The sky was a low, ugly bruise. The moon was hidden. A bad sign, the elders would say. The kind of night where wolves do wrong things and blame the dark for it.

They shoved a small bundle into my hands—my cloak, my boots, a pouch with a bit of dried grain. Not mercy. Just enough to tell themselves they weren’t monsters.

The pack gathered in the yard to watch. Torches flared. Rain hissed on flame. Shadows jumped on wet ground.

My mother stepped forward at last.

Not far. Just one step. The smallest rebellion.

Her face was streaked with rain and tears. She didn’t wipe them away. She didn’t try to look proud.

Her lips trembled.

“Mara,” she whispered.

My throat tightened so fast it felt like I couldn’t breathe.

I wanted to run to her. I wanted to bury my face in her neck like I used to when I was little and the world scared me. I wanted to beg her to come with me, though I knew she couldn’t. I wanted a hundred things.

But the enforcers stood between us, arms crossed, watching for any excuse.

My mother’s hands opened and closed, empty.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

That was all she could give. A sorry that didn’t change a thing.

I nodded once, because if I spoke, I would break wide open in front of them. I wouldn’t give the pack that feast.

Then I saw Kellan.

He was at the edge of the crowd, held by two older wolves. His face was split with fury, his eyes wild. Rain ran off his hair in streams.

“Mar!” he yelled. “Mar, don’t you— I’ll come—”

A hand clamped over his mouth.

He bucked like a trapped pup.

I stared at him and tried to pour every last ounce of love I had into my eyes, because words were stolen from us.

He shook his head, hard, like he could shake the world back into place.

I lifted my bound hands—still tied at the wrists with a second strip, like I might run back and bite someone—and touched my knuckles to my heart.

Our old sign.

I’m still yours. I’m still me.

His eyes filled. He made a sound behind the hand that held him. A sound I will carry to my grave.

The Alpha’s voice cut through the rain.

“Go,” Garrick said, loud enough for all to hear. “And do not return.”

The enforcers shoved me toward the boundary path.

I walked.

Each step pulled me farther from warmth, farther from smoke and stew and the familiar stink of pack life. I hated that part too, how even the things I’d complained about in my head now felt like treasures being ripped away.

The path to the boundary stones ran through the pine stand. The trees were tall, black pillars. Water dripped from needles like cold spit. The wind sighed through branches like a warning.

Behind me, the yard noises faded.

No one followed. Not truly.

They wouldn’t risk the old law. They wouldn’t risk being the next one in the ring.

I kept my head high until the pack’s torches were only small dots behind the trees. Until I could no longer smell their bodies, their hearth, their fear.

Then my strength slipped.

I stopped under a pine and leaned my forehead against the bark.

My breath came out in short, ugly pulls.

I whispered, “Rowan.”

Just his name.

And the bond answered with nothing.

Not warmth. Not pull. Not even pain now. Just a hollow place where something had lived.

I slid down the tree until I was sitting in wet needles and mud. My hands shook. I pressed them to my mouth to keep the sob in.

But it came anyway.

It came hard. It came deep.

I cried for the girl I’d been. The one who thought if she worked hard enough, if she kept her head down, if she made herself useful, she might earn love.

I cried for my mother, trapped behind that law like it was a locked door.

I cried for Kellan’s face.

I cried for Rowan, too, and that’s the part that makes me feel stupid even now. Because even after what he did, some part of me still wanted to believe there was a reason. Some part still wanted him to turn and run after me, breathless, cursing, grabbing my hand and saying, “This is wrong.”

He didn’t.

The rain soaked my cloak. Cold slid down my neck. My teeth chattered.

I forced myself up.

If I stayed there, I’d freeze. Or I’d be found by wolves who didn’t care if I lived.

The boundary stones weren’t far. The pack had set them in a rough line long ago, big slabs with old carvings worn by weather. Crossing them was more than stepping over rock. It was stepping out of protection. Out of name. Out of everything.

When the stones came into view, my stomach turned.

They stood under the trees like a row of silent judges. The carvings looked like claw marks. Maybe they were.

I walked to the line and stopped.

The air on my side still held a faint trace of home. Sap and smoke, distant. A ghost of it.

On the far side, the woods smelled different. Wilder. Sharper. Like something watching.

I took off the rawhide from my wrists with my teeth, because my fingers were numb.

It fell into the mud like a dead snake.

I stared at the stones for a long moment, rain dripping off my lashes.

I wanted to hate them.

I wanted to hate the pack.

I wanted to hate Rowan.

But in that moment, all I felt was tired. Bone-tired. Soul-tired.

I stepped over.

It was just one step.

It should not have felt like the end of a life.

But it did.

On the other side, I paused and looked back.

The trees hid the hall now. The pack’s scent was gone. No torches. No voices. No howl of farewell.

Not even that.

They didn’t honor me with a goodbye. They didn’t mourn what they’d thrown away.

I stood there and waited, like a fool, for any sign. A branch snapping. A name called. Footsteps running.

Nothing.

So I turned.

And that’s when I saw it.

At first, I thought it was just shadow. A deeper patch of dark between trunks.

Then the shadow moved.

A wolf stepped into view, slow and silent as fog. Bigger than any pack wolf I’d ever seen. Not fat-big. Not clumsy. Built like a war beast, shoulders high, legs long, head heavy with power.

His coat was black, but not plain black. It caught the thin light like iron.

He didn’t come close.

He just stood there, watching.

My breath caught.

Every hair on my arms lifted.

My wolf, who’d been curled up inside me like a kicked dog, raised her head.

Not in fear.

In recognition.

Not mate recognition. Not that sweet pull I’d once felt with Rowan. This was different. Older. Like hearing a song you didn’t know you knew.

The wolf’s eyes were pale.

Not bright torch-gold like pack wolves when they’re riled.

Pale as moonlit ice.

A chill went through me that had nothing to do with rain.

I opened my mouth, but no sound came.

The big wolf’s ears tipped forward. He breathed in, slow. Like he was tasting me on the air.

Then he turned his head slightly, as if listening to something far off, something I couldn’t hear.

And he stepped back into the dark.

Gone.

No snap of branch. No rush of feet.

Just swallowed by the woods like he’d never been there.

For a moment, I stood frozen, staring at the place he’d vanished.

Then I realized my hands were shaking again.

My chest ached.

And the worst part—worse than fear, worse than cold—was the thought that slid into me like a splinter:

Even out here, I’m not alone.

I started walking.

The ground dipped and rose, slick with rain. My boots squelched. My cloak dragged heavy on my shoulders. My fingers were stiff. My stomach gnawed at itself.

I kept moving because stopping meant thinking.

But my mind didn’t listen.

It replayed Rowan’s face. His flat “No.” The way he watched the fire instead of me. The way his eyes flicked to my wrist and then away.

I tried to tell myself he had to do it. That his father forced him. That the pack would have torn him apart if he spoke.

I tried.

But the truth sat in my gut, heavy and simple.

He chose.

And the pack chose with him.

The woods opened into a narrow ridge where the wind hit hard. I stumbled once, caught myself, and kept going.

Somewhere behind me, far back, a howl rose.

It wasn’t a pack howl.

It was a single voice, raw with grief.

Kellan.

I knew it like I knew my own heartbeat.

The sound slammed into me and nearly dropped me to my knees.

I pressed my fist against my mouth to keep from answering. Because if I answered, I’d run back. And if I ran back, they’d kill me. Or worse—they’d break Kellan, just to teach him what love costs.

So I kept walking.

The howl faded.

Rain kept falling.

My tears mixed with it until I couldn’t tell which was which.

At some point, my legs moved on their own. My body did what bodies do when hearts are shattered: it kept the blood going, kept the lungs working, kept the eyes open.

The sky began to lighten, just a little, like the world was daring to pretend a new day could matter.

I reached a small clearing with a fallen log and sat down hard. My hands were muddy. My hair clung to my face.

I stared at my wrist.

The pack mark was gone, replaced by a raw, burning line.

I touched it with two fingers and flinched.

Not from pain.

From the fact that it was real.

I whispered, “So that’s it.”

My voice sounded strange out here. Thin. Unimportant.

No one answered.

Not the pack.

Not the moon.

Not Rowan.

Only the woods, breathing around me.

I pulled my cloak tighter and tried to steady my breath. My chest felt bruised on the inside.

I thought of my mother sitting in the hall, hands clenched, unable to save me.

I thought of Kellan’s howl.

I thought of Rowan’s “No.”

And I felt something else, small and ugly and alive under the grief.

Anger.

Not the loud kind. Not the kind that makes you swing your fists.

A quiet anger.

A hard little coal.

Because I had been good. I had been loyal. I had been careful. And it still hadn’t been enough.

If goodness doesn’t save you, then what does?

I didn’t know.

Not yet.

But I knew one thing, sharp as a bite.

I would not lay down and die to make their lives easier.

I lifted my head and listened.

The woods were full of sounds—wind, water, distant birds waking, something small moving through brush. Life going on like my heart hadn’t just been cracked open.

I stood.

My legs trembled, but they held.

I started walking again, deeper into the wild.

With every step, the pack’s scent faded further behind me.

With every step, the hole where my bond had been felt less like a wound and more like a scar that would never let me forget.

And as the pale morning grew, one thought beat in time with my footsteps:

They banished me like I was nothing.

So I would become something they could not ignore.

Even if it broke me first.

Even if the moon itself turned its face away.

Even if the only thing waiting for me out here was that black wolf with ice eyes and a shadow that felt like fate.

I walked anyway.

Because there was no home left behind me.

And somehow, that hurt worse than the cold.

The Moon’s Hard Verdict

CHAPTER 1: THE MOON’S HARD VERDICT

Daylight showed me the truth plain as bone: banishment ain’t a doorway, it’s a shove off a cliff.

The rain eased by midmorning, leaving the woods slick and loud. Every drip off pine needles sounded like a footstep. Mud clung to my boots in heavy cakes, and my cloak hung off my shoulders like a drowned thing. The pack’s stink was gone now—no smoke, no stew, no warm bodies. Just wet earth and the sharp bite of wild.

My wrist throbbed where they carved me. The skin there was angry and open, red against the grime. When I flexed my fingers, it pulled, as if the wound wanted to remind me of every word spoken in that hall.

Rowan’s “No” still sat in my skull. Not echoing like a scream, not anymore. More like a stone you can’t spit out.

A crow hopped along a branch above me and watched with one beady eye. It clicked its beak once, like a judge.

“Go on,” I muttered at it. “Tell your kin I’m easy pickings.”

The crow didn’t fly. It only cocked its head, like it knew something I didn’t.

The woods opened into a thin stretch of slope where bracken and dead ferns lay mashed down from the storm. My boots slid once, and I caught myself on a sapling. The bark scraped my palm. No blood, just a sting. Small pain. Honest pain. Easier than the other kind.

A creek cut across the slope ahead, swollen and brown. The sound of moving water pulled at me more than hunger did. Thirst makes a body simple.

Cold water numbed my teeth as I drank. I used both hands, scooped it up like a child, and let it run down my chin. When I’d had enough, I tore a strip from the inside hem of my cloak—no clean cloth left, so I made one—and wrapped my wrist tight.

The cloth darkened fast.

“Fine,” I said to the wound. “Bleed then. Get it out of your system.”

A laugh tried to come, but it died in my throat. Talk was strange out here. Words felt like they belonged to other people.

On the far bank, the mud held prints. Not deer. Not boar. Wolf. Big ones. Fresh. Deep at the toes like the beast carried weight and purpose.

My wolf stirred under my skin at the sight. Not fear. Not pride. A wary lift of the head, the way she used to do when an elder walked by and you weren’t sure if you’d be praised or struck.

“Easy,” I murmured, though it was more for me than for her.

I followed the creek downstream because it meant water and a line through the trees. Wolves make paths even when they don’t mean to. The wild has its own roads.

An hour later, the first real hunger hit. Not a polite grumble. A sharp, needy twist that made me stop and press a hand to my belly.

That was when I smelled smoke.

Not pack smoke. Not the thick, sweet kind that comes from hearthwood and fat. This was thin and bitter, like green branches burned too wet. Someone was close. Someone careless.

My feet slowed on their own. The part of me that had lived by rules wanted to turn away. The part of me that had just been thrown out like trash kept going. Pride don’t fill a belly.

The trees thinned to a small hollow. A fire smoldered there, low and mean, sheltered by rocks. Two men crouched beside it. Not wolves from my pack. Their hair was long and filthy, their clothes patched with old leather and fur. One had a scar across his cheek that made his smile pull crooked.

A third shape lay near the fire—something bundled in a cloak. A person, maybe. Or a corpse. Hard to tell.

I didn’t step into the clearing. Stayed behind a trunk, peering between branches.

The scar-faced man spat into the fire. “Told you, it’ll come,” he said.

The other one, broad and heavy, grunted. “Storm washed the scent clean.”

Scar-face laughed. “Ain’t nothing washes a she-wolf clean. Not if she’s fresh-cast.”

Fresh-cast. That phrase landed like a fist. They weren’t guessing. They knew.

My skin went tight. The air felt too open. Like the woods had pulled back its curtains to show me I was being watched even before I knew it.

The heavy one sniffed, head tilting. “Hold your jaw. I smell her.”

Both men turned toward my tree.

Stillness swallowed the hollow. Even the creek seemed quieter.

Scar-face stood first. He was lean, quick on his feet, and he carried a short spear made from a straight branch and a sharpened metal tip. “Come out, lass,” he called, voice soft as a lie. “We ain’t the pack you ran from.”

No, you’re worse, I thought. Packs at least pretend there’s law.

He took a few steps closer, boots squelching. Heavy followed, slower, like he wasn’t worried.

My hand drifted to my belt out of habit. Nothing there. No knife. No tools. They’d sent me out with cloth and grain like that would save me. My fingers curled around a rock near my boot instead. Smooth, wet, heavy enough to hurt if I could get close.

Scar-face smiled wider. “Don’t make it hard. A banished wolf’s fair game past the stones. Old rule.”

“Old rule,” I said under my breath. Funny how everyone loves old rules when they want to take something.

His gaze flicked, sharp. “There you are.”

No use hiding now. The woods had already betrayed me.

I stepped out from behind the tree with the rock in my hand. Kept my chin level. Kept my shoulders squared. A posture is a kind of armor, even when you don’t believe in it.

Scar-face’s eyes ran over me, slow. “Pretty thing,” he said. “Pack tossed you out, did they? Must’ve been a reason.”

“They wanted one,” I replied.

Heavy let out a low chuckle. “Mouth on her.”

“Good,” Scar-face said. “I like a mouth. Makes the begging sweeter later.”

My stomach turned, but my face didn’t. Not fully. I wouldn’t give him that feast.

“What do you want?” My voice came out steady, rough around the edges.

Scar-face planted his spear tip into the mud, leaned on it like he owned the ground. “You’re on Kingland now, whether you know it or not. This stretch of woods don’t belong to your little mountain pack. Belongs to the Lycan King.”

The words pricked something in me. I’d heard old talk about a Lycan King when I was small. Just fireside stories. A ruler under an older moon, a wolf who didn’t bow to common Alphas. The elders would hush it quick, like speaking his name might summon him.

Scar-face watched my reaction. “Aye. Heard of him, have you? Good. Then you’ll understand.”

Heavy stepped closer and cracked his knuckles, eyes on my cloak, my boots, my body like I was a sack of goods.

Scar-face went on, “We take you in. You work. You don’t run. You don’t bite. Or we drag you to the King’s men and tell ’em we found a stray she-wolf sniffin’ about where she don’t belong. They’ll handle you harsher than we will.”

“So kind,” I said.

He shrugged. “World ain’t kind. Moon ain’t kind. Pack ain’t kind. You learned that one, didn’t you?”

A flash of my mother’s face hit me—wet eyes, trembling mouth. Kellan’s howl. Rowan’s stone look. The hurt was still there, but it was different now. Less like bleeding, more like a hard bruise you press by accident.

I shifted my weight, glancing past them at the bundled shape by the fire. A boot stuck out from under the cloak. Small foot. Too small for a grown man.

A child.

My jaw tightened.

“What’s under that cloak?” I asked.

Scar-face’s grin dimmed a notch. “Not your worry.”

“Looks like it is,” I said, and took one step closer.

Heavy moved fast. Faster than he looked like he should. His hand shot out to grab my arm.

The rock swung up on instinct.

It connected with his jaw with a dull crack.

He roared and stumbled, clutching his face. Spit and blood sprayed into the mud.

Scar-face swore and yanked his spear free.

I didn’t wait. Turned and ran.

The ground tried to steal my boots. Branches clawed at my cloak. My lungs burned. No fancy fear, just hard need: move or die.

Behind me, Scar-face shouted, “Get her!”

Heavy’s footsteps pounded after, uneven now with pain, but still close.

The creek was ahead, louder. The slope steepened. I threw myself down it, slipping, catching a sapling, tearing free. Mud splashed up my legs. My wrapped wrist tore open again, warm wet under the cloth.

A sharp whistle cut the air.

Then something struck the trunk beside my head with a thunk.

A throwing knife.

Scar-face was good, then. Better than I wanted him to be.

I cut left into thicker brush. Brambles snagged my skirt. My hair fell loose from its tie and whipped my face.

Another whistle. Another thunk. This one bit into a branch near my shoulder.

He’s playing, I realized. Driving me like prey.

My throat went dry. Rage flared hot. Not loud. Focused. The kind that makes your hands sure.

A fallen tree lay ahead, hollow under its trunk where roots had ripped up the earth. A dark gap. A chance.

I dove for it, belly to mud, and wriggled into the hollow. Wet rot stank strong enough to make my eyes water. I pressed my cheek against cold dirt and held still.

Footsteps slid to a stop nearby.

Heavy’s voice came first, thick with pain. “Where’d she go?”

Scar-face hissed, “Quiet. She’s close.”