The Luna Liora's Awakening | Read Free Preview
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Chapter 1
Liora’s POV
I am the Luna of the Blackwood Pack.
That day, I returned to the border alone, stepping into the rogue-infested territory. I had once hoped my Alpha mate would come for me… but he didn’t.
The ones who came were Rogues.
The first claw didn’t just wound...it claimed. It sank deep into my shoulder, a jagged testament to rogue madness, reeking of rot and fermented hate.
They emerged from the jagged ravines—shadows cloaked in matted fur and frenzy. They did not hunt for sustenance; they hunted for spite. Mid-leap, I shifted, bones snapping and reforming, fur erupting from my pores, meeting their chaos with my own. Teeth gnashed, sinew tore—it was a brutal symphony of survival.
I latched onto a throat, my muzzle slick with hot, metallic gold, screaming through the Mind-Link:
[Gabriel! My Alpha mate.]
The bond, sacred between Alpha and Luna, flickered. A spark of his scent brushed my consciousness… then went cold. Severed.
A Rogue’s claws raked my flank, peeling back skin and muscle. Pain screamed through me. I forced the link again, raw and desperate.
[Gabriel, they are tearing me apart at the border! Answer me!]
Silence. He had muted me.
For a heartbeat, I told myself he must be trapped—council duties, some duty binding his hands. So I bared my teeth and chose to fight alone. I would survive. I had to, to return to him.
By the time I tore the heart from the last feral beast, I was more blood than wolf. I shifted back. Pale human skin glistened with gore. My leg was a ruin of shredded meat, throbbing white-hot with every heartbeat.
Nine deaths, I counted. Nine lives I had taken tonight.
I crossed into Blackwood territory as the first frost bit. Sentries stiffened, nostrils flaring at the Rogue-stench and Luna-blood, but they did not intervene. They watched me limp past, indifferent as a wounded omega.
Trembling fingers sought my communicator. My Mind-Link was dead—but perhaps the mechanical frequency could pierce his shroud.
One chime. Two. Three.
The fourth clicked open.
"Alpha Gabriel is busy," chirped a pup, bright and predatory. "He’s performing the Lunar-Blessing for me. He brought Mommy and me shimmering spoils from the High Peaks. He has no time for a stray like you."
Elaris, five years old, already learned the art of pack-snubs.
The line shifted. Beta’s voice, thick with pity, added, "Luna Liora? The Alpha is at The Abyss. He’s hosting the welcome-feast for Lady Rowena. The… the whole Inner Circle is there."
Rowena. Elaris’ mother. Widow of Roman Wynter, Gabriel’s fallen brother-in-arms. The she-wolf the pack whispered was his true fated mate, lost to politics years ago.
"The Abyss," I whispered, staring at my reflection in the obsidian patrol post. Hair matted with briars and dried blood, silk dress hanging in red-stained tatters—I looked like carrion dragged from a scavenger’s den.
"Which chamber?"
The ascent was hell. The sanctuary carved into the mountain’s ribcage glowed with amber lanterns. Every step on stone stairs twisted my shredded hip like a serrated knife.
I reached the oak doors just as the candles inside were extinguished.
"I wish that Mommy and Alpha Gabriel and I could share the same den forever!" Elaris’ voice echoed, sweet and poisonous. "I wish Mommy could be the Great Luna!"
I stood in the doorway—a ghost of a woman held together by sheer spite.
Inside, Gabriel sat flanked by Rowena and her pup. Candlelight softened the harsh lines of his face—a storm usually turned on me. Rowena’s silver fur shimmered like moonlight. They looked… complete. Balanced.
"Hush, Elaris," Rowena purred, triumph barely veiled. "The Alpha has a Luna."
"But he doesn’t want her," a high-ranking Enforcer laughed, sloshing ale. "If Liora hadn’t used that ancient blood-debt to trap the Old Matriarch, Gabriel would never have accepted the mating-vows. It was a cage, not a union."
A scout I had once saved sneered. "Our Alpha has kept his scent pure for Lady Rowena all these years. He’s never even marked Liora. He called her a ‘Disciple of the Sacred Bond,’ and the fool believed it. She isn’t a mate; she’s a placeholder."
The words cut deeper than rogue fangs.
I remembered cold nights in our den, him turning away, insisting our bond remain “spiritual” to preserve his Alpha strength. I had honored his purity, cherished his restraint… only to realize he had been reserving himself for another.
Gabriel’s eyes lifted. Chips of frozen sea locked onto me. He didn’t rise. He didn’t protect me.
"You’re late," he said, voice low and clinical. "And you look… unkempt. Why are you here, Liora?"
The room chilled. Laughter died, replaced by the pack’s sneers.
"So foul," someone whispered. "Coming into a blessing-feast smelling of Rogue-gut."
Rowena rose with the grace of a winter swan. "Liora, you’re hurt. Please, sit. Elaris, give the Luna a peace-offering of cake."
The pup approached, tail flicking with secret glee. But she drew a string of Luminous Prayer Beads from her pocket.
"Luna," she whispered, needle-sharp, "Alpha Gabriel climbed the Nine-Hundred-Ninety-Nine Steps of the Sacred Fang for Mommy and me. He risked his old knee just to bring us luck. I’ll give them to you… if you give Alpha Gabriel back to my Mommy. He hates your scent anyway."
My heart didn’t break—it calcified. I knew those steps. Years ago, Gabriel nearly lost a leg to a silver-trap. I stayed by his side seven lunar cycles, pouring my wolf-essence into his blood until my strength failed, so he could walk again. And he risked it all… for her.
I did not take the beads. I looked past the pup, into the eyes of the male who severed our link while I bled.
"Fine," I said, hollow steel in my voice. "You can have him."
Gabriel’s brow furrowed. "Watch your tongue, Luna. This is a celebration."
"I am no longer your Luna," I said, letting the words fall like stones. "Gabriel Blackwood, I am initiating the Rite of Severance. Dissolve our Pack-Bond. Burn the mating-scrolls."
Gasps rippled through the room.
"You would dissolve a Great Alliance over a few missed calls?" Gabriel’s aura flared, trying to crush me with Alpha presence.
"I dissolve it because a wolf who mutes his mate during a rogue-attack is no Alpha," I said, blood dripping from my fingers. "And a male keeping himself ‘pure’ for another’s widow is no husband. Keep your beads. Keep your purity. Keep your ghost."
I turned on my shattered heel. The pain was excruciating, but the weight lifting from my soul was greater.
"My legal emissary will deliver the Blood-Decree by dawn," I called over my shoulder. "Do not howl for me. I’ve already forgotten your scent."
I stepped into the biting winter air, leaving the warmth—and chains—of the pack behind, finally a wolf of my own making.
Chapter 2
Liora’s POV
As I limped from the chamber, my blood marking the stone floor, Rowena’s voice drifted out—honeyed, practiced, and laced with feigned contrition.
"It’s all my fault. I didn’t mean to enrage Liora," she sighed, the sound of a submissive wolf pretending distress. "Gabriel, she is your mate by covenant. Perhaps you should go after her?"
"No need," Gabriel’s voice rumbled, cold and indifferent, stopping my breath. "She has been the Luna of Blackwood for six years. Without my protection, without this Pack, she is nothing. Where would a stray like her even go?"
He spoke as if I were a pet he had grown bored of. Six years of a “Sacred Union”—sexless, touchless, a bond I honored, believing he preserved our souls—now revealed for what it truly was: he had been waiting for me to break. He thought I couldn’t survive without his scent.
"But the Stormborne Pack..." Rowena’s voice faltered. "Liora lived in their territory for years before she came to you. If Alpha Xavier Stormborne finds out—"
My heart flared at the name. Before the Vales had forced me back, the Stormbornes had treated me like a daughter of the High Seat. Xavier, my adoptive brother and Great Alpha of the Stormborne Pack, had once spent a fortune in gold and silver to win a Moon-Stone I coveted.
"The Stormbornes are done with her," Gabriel snapped, irritation flickering beneath the surface. "Alpha Xavier hasn’t sent a single messenger in six years. She’s making a scene because of the birthday. Let her howl at the moon. She loves me too much to ever truly sever the bond."
Pain in my chest went numb. He didn’t lack only love—he lacked respect. My devotion was a leash in his eyes.
I returned to the Moonlit Villa, trembling from blood loss and exhaustion. Ignoring the throbbing in my leg, I dialed my closest ally, Lyra.
"Lyra," I rasped. "Prepare the Rite of Severance documents. I’m leaving Gabriel."
"Are you insane?" Lyra gasped. "Liora, he’s the Blackwood Alpha. The Vales will tear you apart without his protection. And you worshipped that man for years. You told me he saved you from the Great Fire..."
"I married him out of gratitude," I whispered. "And because he reminded me of… someone else. But six years is enough. I’ve been a nun in a Luna’s furs for too long."
"He’s… still not touched you?" Lyra’s voice was horrified. "Is he defective? His wolf broken?"
"Maybe," I said with bitter laughter. "Or maybe his wolf only howls for Rowena."
"Fine. If he’s that useless, leave him. I’ll have the scrolls ready by dawn. But Liora… does Alpha Xavier know? Your brother at the Stormborne Pack?"
"I left that life behind," I said, closing my eyes. "I won’t crawl back to Xavier with my tail between my legs."
I fell into a fevered sleep, haunted by ghosts of fire and cedar. When I descended the stairs the next morning, two intruders were in my den.
Gabriel stood in the foyer, bags stacked behind him. My expression darkened.
"Elaris is picky about her surroundings," he said, commanding. "They’ll be staying here for a few days. I assume you don’t have an issue."
Staying here. In my sanctuary. While the scent of Roman Wynter hadn’t even faded from Rowena’s skin.
"Do what you want," I said coldly, adjusting the dark wool of my dress. The blood loss had cleared the fog of my devotion. I was sharper today.
As I reached the bottom step, kneeling to adjust the heavy bandage beneath my dress, a small, blurred shape lunged at me.
"I want it! Alpha Gabriel said everything in this house is ours now!"
Elaris didn’t reach for a toy. She reached me. Her grubby fingers snatched the Star-Shard Pendant around my neck—a relic of the Stormborne Pack, the last piece of my true home. She yanked, the silver chain biting into the soft skin of my throat.
"Let go, pup," I growled, inner wolf baring teeth.
"Elaris likes it, Liora," Rowena said, poised as though she already owned everything. "It’s just a trinket. I’ll pay ten times its value in gold. Don’t be cruel to a fatherless child."
The girl jerked again, cutting a thin line of blood.
My patience didn’t snap—it evaporated. I no longer played the "Auntie." I seized her wrists and shoved hard.
Elaris hit the marble floor with a startled yelp, sliding back.
"Liora!" Gabriel roared, Alpha pressure flooding the room like a storm. "She’s a child! Have you lost your mind?"
"She’s a thief in training," I snapped, eyes flashing silver. "Touch my belongings again, and I won’t just push her. I’ll show her how Moonvale deals with thieves."
"It’s just a necklace!" Gabriel snarled, cradling the sobbing pup.
"It’s a piece of my soul," I retorted. "Something you wouldn’t understand—you traded yours long ago." I turned to him, gaze steady. "Since you’ve turned our den into a kennel for your mistress, I’m moving out. I want the deed to the Far-Reach Villa on the coast. Consider it severance pay."
Gabriel stared, stunned by the steel in my voice.
"You’re serious," he muttered.
"Never more sober," I said. "Get the paperwork ready, Alpha. I want to be gone before sunset."
Chapter 3
Liora’s POV
When I demanded the deed to the villa, Gabriel let out a low huff—a sound that was half-laugh, half-relief.
He thought he had me figured out. That by clawing for territory, I was admitting I still needed his protection to survive. To him, the Rite of Severance was just a frantic howl from a mate who didn’t want to be forgotten.
"Fine," he said, posture settling into that arrogant Alpha stance. "I’ll have my Beta prepare the transfer of the Far-Reach Villa to your name. Stay there for a few weeks. Once Rowena and Elaris are settled and the Pack gossip dies down, you can return to our den."
Return? I smiled, though it felt like baring teeth at a ghost. There was no path back through the ashes he had made of us. Far-Reach was never truly his—it had been a gift from the Stormborne Pack, a fragment of my past I had foolishly pawned to fuel Gabriel’s internal battles when his kin tried to overthrow him. I had bled my own history dry to keep him on the throne. What a pathetic, lovesick wolf I had been.
Gabriel stepped closer, cedar and storm-clouds thick in his scent. For a heartbeat, his icy eyes softened as he reached to brush a matted strand of hair from my ear.
"Liora," he murmured, voice dipping into that deep, persuasive register he used to command the Pack. "As long as you are obedient, the title of Luna will always be yours. Rowena and the pup… they are just broken things I must mend for Roman’s sake."
A surge of acidic nausea swept through me. He wanted a harem: a “Sacred” placeholder to hold his titles, a mistress to hold his heart. And he thought I would be grateful for scraps of his loyalty.
I jerked my head away. Rowena’s voice drifted from the hallway.
"Alpha Gabriel? I can't find Elaris’s ceremonial silks… she’s crying for you."
Gabriel’s hand snapped back as if scorched. My lips curled. He feared his “broken” widow catching him in a moment of tenderness with his own mate.
"I’m coming," he called, giving me one last warning glance before following her scent.
I watched them go. They looked like a mated pair in every way that mattered. My marriage wasn’t a union—it was a crowded cage. And I was finally stepping out of the bars.
By afternoon, Lyra arrived at my temporary quarters. She didn’t just bring the Severance scrolls; she brought news that hit me like a silver bullet.
"Liora," she whispered, eyes wide. "The scouts are howling. Alpha Xavier… your 'brother'… he’s returning from the Northern Front. He’s crossing back into these territories."
Xavier. My heart stuttered.
I had no right to call him brother anymore. When I returned to the Moonvales, and then married Gabriel, I had severed ties to the Stormbornes. I had been their jewel, their protected princess—until I threw it all away for a man who wouldn’t even mark me.
"The Stormbornes were good to me," I said, voice hollow. "I won’t let my mess stain Xavier’s legacy."
"Liora, if the Stormborne Alphas knew how the Blackwood Pack has treated you…" Lyra began, but I cut her off.
"It doesn’t matter. I’m finishing this today."
I took the scrolls and property transfer and headed to the Blackwood Stronghold—the fortress at the heart of Gabriel’s power. I had spent years operating in the shadows of this place, using my Moonvale instincts to secure hunting grounds and trade routes for the Blackwoods. The pack didn’t know I was the hidden Luna, but they respected me as a strategist.
Inside the Great Hall, the atmosphere was not the stern, militaristic discipline Gabriel demanded. Instead, shrill, spoiled laughter pierced the air.
Elaris sat at the center of the hall, surrounded by piles of marrow-bones, silk toys, and treasures. The same warriors who had ignored my bloodied state at the border now catered to her every whim.
"Is that the Alpha’s pup?" a sentinel whispered. "He’s obsessed. Built a play-den in the War Room. Missed the morning strategy meeting to help her paint her first hunting spear."
"They say she’s his daughter by blood, not just bond," another murmured, glancing at the empty Luna’s seat. "Poor Liora. Now that the true Queen has returned with an heir, she’s as good as exiled."
The pity stung worse than rogue claws. I walked past them, head high, until a small shadow blocked my path.
"You again, bad lady," Elaris hissed, puffing her chest. "Why are you here? Alpha Gabriel doesn’t want your sour scent in our hall."
I looked down at the pup. I had no energy for games.
"Move, Elaris. I have business with the Alpha."
"No! Alpha Gabriel is mine now! He bought Mommy a necklace made of Heart-Diamonds, the ones you were crying for last moon. He said you’re too ugly to wear them."
The Heart-Diamonds. I had mentioned them once, months ago. Gabriel had ignored me. Now, they adorned Rowena’s neck.
"Listen to me, little wolf," I leaned down, noses nearly touching. I let a drop of Alpha-blood authority seep into my scent. "You’ve got carrion stuck in your teeth. Move—or I become the 'bad lady' from the legends, the one who turns noisy pups into silent stones."
Her eyes went wide. Her bottom lip trembled, and a piercing wail escaped her.
I didn’t blink. Straightening, I walked into Gabriel’s private office.
He looked up, face darkening. "What did you do to her, Liora? She’s a child! She’s terrified, Rowena is distraught!"
"She’s a child who needs to learn the world doesn’t revolve around her," I snapped. "Pull the memory-logs from the Hall’s wards, or are you too busy playing ‘Daddy’ to seek the truth?"
The Blackwood Pack’s efficiency was legendary. It didn’t take long for Gabriel to review the crystal, silver mist swirling, replaying the scene with ruthless clarity.
For a moment, Gabriel softened. "Elaris is still young," he said quietly. "Rowena will teach her properly. She just needs guidance."
My thoughts were elsewhere. The Severance Decree in my hand felt heavier than any blade.
I had no interest in reminding him that youth is no excuse for cruelty. Instead, I placed the Far-Reach transfer deed alongside the Severance Decree.
"This is the transfer deed for Farpeak Den," I said evenly. "Sign it. I’ll move within two days."
Gabriel glanced at the parchment—standard territory transfer. Two copies. He signed without hesitation. The runic seal flickered faintly as the ink dried.
One month.
In the werewolf world, a mate bond did not break instantly. Once the Severance Decree was signed, the bond entered the Lunar Waning Period—thirty days for the spiritual threads to weaken, loosen, and finally snap.
Thirty days.
I folded the decree slowly, pressing my thumb over the seal. The faint warmth of the bond pulsed against my skin—not a chain, but a countdown.
I lifted my gaze to Gabriel, the Alpha who had once been the center of my world. There was nothing left reaching for him. No anger worth holding. No love worth saving.
Only distance.
"Thirty days," I said quietly.
"What thirty days?" he frowned, as if the number meant nothing.
To him, it didn’t. To me, it was everything.
Thirty days until I walked out of this pack—not as his Luna, not as his shadow, but as something I had been denied for far too long: myself.
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