The Pale Sunset of a Soulless Alpha novel · Chapter 1 of 12
Chapter 1: The Burial
They buried Finley under the big oak, on the hillside where he used to play.
He was three years old.
We wrapped him in a blue blanket with embroidered moons, the one I had sewn for him last winter.
The entire pack came to say goodbye.
Two hundred wolves in silence, standing on the snow, heads bowed.
I didn't cry during the rite.
I stood firm, hands clasped and eyes dry, because a Luna doesn't collapse in front of her people.
When it was over, my legs were shaking so badly that Rhiannon, the woman who served tea at Council meetings, had to steady me by the elbow.
"Luna, be strong," she said in a sweet voice.
I didn't look at her.
Three days earlier, a pack hunter had found Finley in rogue territory, on the other side of the creek, his body so badly injured they wouldn't let me see him.
They told me he'd crossed the border by mistake, that rogues had attacked him, that he died right away.
Kendrick, my destined mate, the Alpha of Moonstone, had held my hand by the infirmary bed and sworn with a broken voice that he would avenge our son.
"I'm going to tear those fucking rogues apart with my own hands, Linnea. I promise you."
I believed him.
Seven years at his side and I had never doubted his word.
After the burial, the pack dispersed.
I stayed by the oak until it got dark.
I needed to be alone with the still-fresh earth.
When I finally turned to head home, I heard voices behind a toolshed, about twenty paces away.
One was Kendrick's.
The other was Wystan's, his Beta.
My she-wolf hearing caught every word, even though they were speaking low.
"I really don't understand it," Wystan was saying. "Why didn't you let the healer treat him? Finley was in bad shape, but alive when they brought him in. If we'd acted in time..."
I froze.
My breath stopped.
"It was Eamon," Kendrick said.
A silence.
"Eamon?"
"Rhiannon's boy. He pushed him. They were playing at the edge of the creek, and he pushed him into rogue territory, by accident." Kendrick's voice sounded tired, almost wounded. "Eamon is just a child. He didn't know the boundaries. He didn't mean any harm."
"So the healer..."
"If the healer had cured him, Finley would have talked. He would have said who pushed him. And the Council demands the sentence: Rhiannon to the pack prison and the boy condemned."
I felt the ground open beneath my feet.
"Eamon can't die," Kendrick went on. "He's my son."
Wystan didn't answer.
"He's my true heir, Wystan. He's the one who's going to be Alpha after me. Linnea never gave me more than one, and now..."
He fell silent.
What came next I heard clearly, word for word, like a sentence.
"Once she calms down, I'll bring Eamon to the house. We'll say he's an orphan we adopted. She'll raise him herself. She'll raise the next Alpha herself."
I leaned against the shed wall.
The wood was freezing.
My son had been alive.
My Finley, with his white curls and his mouse-like laugh, had been alive when they brought him in.
And his father, my mate, the man I had given seven years of my life to, had sent the healer away.
He had chosen.
Between my son and his lover's son, he had chosen.
I didn't scream.
I didn't collapse.
Something inside me that had been burning for three days went cold all at once, settling into a clean, still ice.
I went back to my house without a sound.
I went up to my room, sat on the bed, and pulled from the back of the closet a wooden box I hadn't opened in five years.
Inside was an old phone.
It had a single number saved.
I dialed it with steady fingers.
It rang four times.
A hoarse, old voice answered, one I hadn't heard in half a lifetime.
"Linnea?"
"It's me, Dad."
A long, fractured silence.
"Daughter."
"I've changed my mind," I said. My voice came out steady and showed no emotion. "I'm coming home. I'm going to inherit the Imperial Pack."
My father coughed.
I heard his weak breathing.
"And what about Moonstone?" he asked.
I looked out the window.
Through the trees I could see the oak, and beneath it, the turned earth.
"I want Moonstone destroyed," I said.
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