When My Mate Offered Me to the Rogue King

The infirmary smelled of rubbing alcohol and bitter aloe, a scent that stung my nose almost as much as the throbbing ache in my left arm. I lay propped up against the stiff pillows, staring at the plaster cast that encased my limb from elbow to shoulder. Dr. Martinez had been kind, her touch gentle as she set the bone, but her eyes had held a pity that was harder to bear than the fracture itself.

The door creaked open. My heart gave a traitorous little leap. *He came.*

Theodore stepped inside, but he didn't rush to my bedside. He didn't look frantic or relieved. He looked annoyed. He checked his watch before closing the door, his massive frame filling the small room.

"How is it?" he asked, staying near the foot of the bed. He didn't reach for my hand. He didn't touch the mark on my neck that should have been there.

"It's broken, Theo," I said, my voice raspy. "The beam crushed it."

He sighed, running a hand through his hair. "You need to be more careful, Aria. You were standing in the impact zone. If I hadn't moved Macie..."

"If you hadn't pushed me," I corrected softly.

His eyes narrowed, flashing that cold amber warning. "I saved a pack member who was frozen in fear. You know the protocols. You were clumsy, and now look at the mess it's caused. Macie is inconsolable. She thinks it's her fault you got hurt. She's been crying for hours, stressing herself sick."

I stared at him, the air leaving my lungs. I was the one with the shattered bone, yet his concern was entirely for the girl who didn't have a scratch on her.

"I'm sorry she's upset," I said, the words tasting like ash. "Is that why you're here? To tell me to apologize to her?"

"I'm here because I'm the Alpha," he snapped. "And I have a pack to run. I can't be dealing with this drama when the Full Moon Run is tonight. Rest up."

He turned on his heel. He had been in the room for less than two minutes.

"Theo?" I called out, desperate for a crumb of the man I had saved seven years ago.

He didn't look back. The door clicked shut, leaving me alone with the hum of the fluorescent lights and the agonizing realization that my pain was nothing but an inconvenience to him.

***

The full moon hung heavy and yellow in the sky, casting long, skeletal shadows across the clearing where the Obsidian Crest Pack gathered. This was the most sacred night of the month. The night the Alpha and Luna ran together, their wolves leading the pack in a display of unity and strength.

I stood on the precipice of the Alpha Rock, the wind whipping my hair across my face. My arm was in a sling, throbbing in time with my heartbeat. Below me, three hundred wolves shifted and paced, their eyes glowing in the dark. They were waiting.

They were waiting for Theodore.

I scanned the edge of the forest, praying to see his massive black wolf emerge. The silence stretched, becoming awkward. Murmurs rippled through the gathered crowd.

Then, Beta Marcus stepped up onto the rock beside me. He wouldn't meet my eyes. He cleared his throat, addressing the pack below.

"The Alpha will not be joining the run tonight," Marcus announced, his voice projecting over the restless wolves. "He is conducting private training with our new guest, Macie, to help her acclimate to her wolf form during the moon's peak."

A ripple of shock went through the pack. The Alpha never missed the run. Never. To miss it for a "guest" was a slight so profound it made my knees weak.

I felt the weight of three hundred stares landing on me. They weren't angry; they were pitying. They looked at their Luna—wolfless, broken-armed, and abandoned—standing alone on the rock where her mate should be.

"Luna Aria will commence the run," Marcus said, stepping back.

I had to do it. I had to swallow the bile in my throat and be the leader they needed, even if I was a fraud. I stepped to the edge. I couldn't shift. I couldn't howl with the primal power of a wolf. So, I simply raised my good hand, signaling the start.

"Run," I whispered into the wind.

The pack howled—a mournful, confused sound that lacked the triumphant resonance of the Alpha's call—and surged forward into the trees. I watched them go, the ground trembling beneath my feet, until the last tail disappeared into the darkness.

I was the Luna of Obsidian Crest, and I had never been more alone.

***

I couldn't go back to the empty Pack House. The scent of Theodore—and the lingering, cloying sweetness of Macie's perfume—was suffocating. Instead, I walked to the edge of the territory, to the small patch of earth hidden behind the old supply sheds.

My herb garden was my sanctuary. Here, things made sense. Lavender for sleep, chamomile for calm, valerian for pain. I sank to my knees in the dirt, ignoring the twinge in my shoulder, and buried my good hand in the soil.

"You look like hell, Princess."

I didn't jump. I knew that voice. I looked up to see a pair of glowing amber eyes peering from the dense brush beyond the fence line. Alianna stepped out of the shadows, her red hair wild and tangled, a rogue's grin on her face.

"Hello, Ali," I murmured, pulling a weed from the rosemary bush.

"I heard the howl," she said, leaning against the fence. "Or rather, the lack of one. Where's the big bad Alpha?"

"Training," I said, my voice cracking.

Alianna scoffed, a harsh sound in the quiet night. "Training the blonde stray? I saw them, Aria. Near the river. They weren't doing much running."

The tears I had held back in the infirmary, the tears I had swallowed on the Alpha Rock, finally spilled over. I bowed my head, my shoulders shaking.

"Hey," Alianna's voice softened. She reached through the fence, her rough hand gripping my shoulder. "Don't do this to yourself. You're worth ten of him. Look at you—you're the one holding that pack together while he plays house with a ghost."

"I can't help it," I sobbed. "He's my mate, Ali. The Moon Goddess chose him for me."

"The Moon Goddess can be wrong," Alianna said fiercely. "Or maybe she's testing you to see how much garbage you'll take before you snap. Leave, Aria. Tonight. The border patrol is weak on the south ridge. I can get you out. We can run."

Freedom. The word tasted sweet, like the wild berries that grew in the rogue lands. To be away from the pity, the neglect, the constant ache of the empty bond.

But then I thought of Theodore. I thought of the boy I had dragged from the bloodied mud seven years ago. I thought of the flicker of pain I saw in his eyes when he looked at me, buried under layers of trauma.

I wiped my face with the back of my hand, smearing dirt on my cheek. "I can't," I whispered. "Not yet. He's just... lost. He'll wake up. He has to."

Alianna pulled her hand back, her expression grim. "Hope is a dangerous thing, Princess. It's going to kill you if you let it."

She slipped back into the shadows, leaving me alone in the dirt, waiting for a dawn that felt like it would never come.