Chapter 5

I don't know how I made it back to the keep.

The lock clicked shut, sealing out the last of the noise from the grounds.

The room held only firelight and paper.

And me.

I spread the parchment flat and positioned the recording stone within easy reach, as though preparing for a trial.

The Blood Moon was rising.

I didn't have much time.

I wrote down their sins, one by one.

With every word, it felt like carving out another piece of my heart that still knew how to ache.

When I reached the final line, I paused. I raised my hand and touched the oath ring on my finger.

It had once bound me to Kade, made me believe that fate could weather anything.

Now it only reminded me of those three letters—Ari.

I slipped off the ring and set it beside the parchment.

I didn't want it anymore.

Then I began to write my farewell.

Not a plea. Not an accusation.

"This was not impulsive."

"I have fulfilled my duties as Luna."

"I will no longer beg anyone for fairness."

"Before the moon goddess, I offer this as witness—I sever my oath to him."

I folded the paper, sealed it in a plain envelope, and pressed the moon-sigil wax until it held fast. Beside the envelope, the recording stone lay still—containing a more complete record. Everything I had witnessed. The bite that had shattered every illusion.

Next came the severance.

I changed into my plainest black cloak and bound my hair tightly.

In the mirror, the woman's face was pale, but her eyes were calm as a frozen lake. The Silvermoon highlands had taught me one thing: when it was time to cut, your hand couldn't tremble.

I pushed open the window. Cold wind rushed in, carrying the damp, earthy scent of Moonshadow Forest.

In the distance, the clouds split open. Blood-red moonlight fell like a blade, carving the treetops into jagged shadows.

The Blood Moon had risen.

I slipped out through the keep's side entrance, avoiding the patrol, and followed a narrow trail deep into the forest.

Inside my chest, my wolf soul began to stir with agitation.

"You can't do this."

"I can!"

She was restless, furious, threaded with fear.

She knew what I was about to do. She resisted by instinct—to her, the fated bond was the other half of her life, running through her blood.

But I kept walking.

At last, I saw the stone altar.

An ancient platform, its base tangled in the roots of old trees, its edges carved with oath runes worn smooth by time.

This was forbidden ground.

And the only place where I could tear the brand named "Kade" from my body—skin and all.

I knelt before the altar and pressed my palm to the ice-cold stone.

Blood-red moonlight fell across the back of my hand like a fresh, searing wound. At the same instant, the invisible bond in my chest pulled taut, sending a sharp, wrenching pain through me—as though a hand had closed directly around my heart and was dragging it backward.

Kade.

Even though he wasn't here, the damned link still remembered him. Still tried to pull me back.

I drew a deep breath, bit through my fingertip, and smeared the warm blood into the dried grooves of the oath runes.

The stone came alive.

A dark glow, as though seeping from the moon's own core, spread along the blood trails and flared to life. Then agony exploded from my palm—like countless red-hot hooks driving into my veins, tearing upward through my arm, straight to my heart, nailing into bone!

I didn't scream.

I only closed my eyes and told the moon goddess: I am not here to beg forgiveness.

I raised the oath ring, gripped both ends, and snapped it in two.

Crack.

A clear, brittle sound. The ring broke into halves.

In that instant, my entire chest felt as though invisible claws had ripped it open!

My breath stopped. The coppery sweetness of blood surged up my throat. My vision flooded red; the world spun.

Deep in my consciousness, my wolf soul let out a howl I had never heard before—anguished to the point of shattering.

She thrashed and tore at the walls of my mind, trying to drag me from the altar. But I held myself down, my fingertip carving deeper blood trails into the runes.

"Sever it." I whispered.

Then the pain erupted.

I was nearly thrown by the force of it. My forehead struck the stone. All I could see was blood-red moonlight.

The price had come.

The feeling of a wolf soul being torn apart was crueler than being flayed alive.

"Enough..."

But I didn't stop.

I used the last of my strength.

The wolf who had shared my body for so many years—her restlessness, her growl, her warmth—all of it vanished.

I raised a trembling hand and pressed it to my hollow chest.

There had once been a thread there, burning and pulsing, making me believe it was the whole world.

Now there was nothing.

I gasped for breath and placed the broken ring fragments and the sealed envelope at the edge of the altar, in plain sight.

That was enough.

Anyone who came after would draw only one conclusion—the Luna of Silvermoon blood had sacrificed herself on the night of the Blood Moon, her soul returned to the moon goddess.

I braced myself against a tree root and slowly rose. Every step felt like my bones were shifting out of place.

From now on, my wolf soul would never be whole. Every night might swallow me into that void.

But I kept walking.

Because I was finally free.

I closed my eyes and tried to sense that familiar Alpha scent, to hear the echo of the bond.

This time, there was nothing.

I could no longer feel Kade.

And that meant, from this moment on, he could no longer find me.