Luna POV
The sound of screaming woke up.
I bolted upright in my bed, heart pounding against my chest. The screams were coming from outside, near the pack houses. Multiple voices, all screaming at once. Sothing was badly wrong.
I threw on my robe and ran barefoot into the cold morning air. Other pack mbers were walking out of their hos too, looking confused and scared. The yelling was getting louder.
"What’s happening?" soone yelled.
That’s when I saw them.
A group of our strongest warriors were backing away from the tree line, their faces white with fear. They were looking at sothing in the shadows between the trees. Sothing that made big wolves whimper like puppies.
"Shadow creatures," one of them gasped. "Dozens of them. Just standing there, watching us."
My blood turned to ice. I’d heard the stories about what happened at the event, but seeing those things in real life was different. They looked like dogs made of living darkness, with eyes that glowed red like burning coals.
But that wasn’t the worst part.
The worst part was seeing Lily standing among them like she belonged there.
She wasn’t running or fighting or yelling. She was just standing quietly in the middle of all those monsters, her hand resting on one of their heads like it was a pet dog. Her face showed no feeling at all - not fear, not anger, nothing. It was like looking at a stranger wearing Lily’s face.
"Lily!" Caleb’s voice cracked as he pushed through the crowd. "Lily, get away from those things!"
She turned to look at him, and I saw sothing that made my stomach twist. For just a second, she looked at Caleb like she didn’t recognize him. Like he was just another stranger.
"Why?" she asked, her voice strangely calm. "They’re not hurting anyone."
"They’re monsters!" Brock shouted, stepping protectively in front of so of the younger pack mbers.
Lily tilted her head, studying him. "Are they? Or are we just afraid of things we don’t understand?"
That’s when I noticed it - the change between her and Caleb. Yesterday, those two couldn’t be in the sa room without touching each other sohow. Always holding hands, sharing secret smiles, finishing each other’s lines. It used to make sick with jealousy.
Now Caleb was reaching out to her like he was drowning, and she was looking at him like he was a complete stranger.
"Lily, please," Caleb begged. "It’s . It’s Caleb. Your mate. Don’t you rember?"
She blinked slowly. "I rember that you used to be important to . But I can’t rember why."
The words hit Caleb like a physical blow. He stumbled backward, his face cracking with pain. Around us, pack mbers started whispering nervously.
"The mate bond," Elder Iris whispered, her old voice shaking. "It’s broken."
I felt a horrible mix of feelings crash through . Part of - the bitter, jealous part - felt a spike of joy. The perfect pair wasn’t so perfect anymore. Lily had lost the thing I’d always wanted most.
But another part of , a part I didn’t like to accept existed, actually felt sorry for them. Watching Caleb’s heart break in real ti was awful. He looked like soone had ripped his soul out.
And Lily... there was sothing scary about how empty she seed. Like soone had taken out everything that made her human and left behind a shell.
"What happened to you?" I found myself asking, stepping closer despite the shadow things.
Lily’s cold look turned to . "I saved everyone. I swallowed the Shadow Beast to protect the pack. But apparently, love was the price I had to pay."
"Love isn’t sothing you lose," Aiden said desperately. "It’s sothing you choose."
"You can’t choose sothing you can’t feel," Lily answered matter-of-factly. "Would you choose to eat food that has no taste? Touch sothing you can’t feel? Love soone who ans nothing to you?"
The shadow creatures shifted restlessly around her, like they were reacting to her emotions - or lack of them. One of them nuzzled against her hand, and she patted it absently.
"This is temporary," Caleb said, his voice breaking. "It has to be. You’ll rember. You’ll feel again."
Lily looked at him with sothing that might have been pity. "Will I? And what if I don’t want to? What if this is better?"
"Better?" Caleb choked out.
"No pain," she said simply. "No fear. No sadness. No jealousy or anger or sadness. Just... peace."
But it wasn’t peace I saw in her eyes. It was nothingness. Like looking into a deep, dark hole where a person used to be.
Alpha Marcus stepped forward, his face grave. "Lily, you’re scaring the pack. These creatures need to leave."
"They go where I go," Lily said quietly. "And I haven’t decided where that is yet."
The threat in her words was quiet but clear. She wasn’t asking approval anymore. She was telling us how things were going to be.
"You can’t stay here with those things," Brock said strongly.
"Can’t I?" Lily asked, and for the first ti, there was a hint of sothing dangerous in her words. "Who’s going to stop ?"
The shadow creatures all turned to look at us then, their red eyes glowing brighter. Even our strongest fighters took a step back.
That’s when I realized the horrible truth. Lily wasn’t just ntally empty - she was powerful. More powerful than any of us had imagined. And without love or compassion to lead her, that power could destroy everything.
"The Triple Moon Bearer has awakened," Elder Iris whispered, her face pale with fear. "But she’s chosen darkness instead of light."
Lily smiled then, but it wasn’t the friendly smile I rembered. It was cold and sharp, like a blade.
"I haven’t chosen anything yet," she said. "But I’m starting to see the appeal of not caring what happens to people who never cared about ."
Her look swept over the pack, and I saw several wolves flinch under that empty stare.
"Lily, please," I said, startling myself. "This isn’t you."
"Isn’t it?" she asked. "Maybe this is who I was always ant to be. Maybe loving was just weakness holding back."
The shadow things began to move, circling the pack like predators surrounding prey. And in the middle of them all stood Lily - no longer the gentle oga who’d won everyone’s hearts, but sothing else entirely.
Sothing that might decide our pack wasn’t worth saving after all.
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