"It has never been heard of."
The words were a frantic, breathless whisper, bouncing off the polished mahogany panels of the Alpha’s private wing.
"In three hundred years of the North Ridge lineage, it has never been heard of."
The corridor outside the Pack Alpha’s office was packed tight. The twenty-one Elders, men and women who usually commanded whole battalions with a flick of their wrists, were huddled together like peasants awaiting a plague verdict.
At the front of the crowd, the Head Shaman was still in shock, his robes still smelling of the freezing ritual smoke from the inner sanctum.
Next to him, Luna Satire remained silent, staring blankly at the heavy oak door of the Alpha’s study room.
"We doubted her judgment, and she–"
Just then, the heavy doors clicked. Alpha Alphaeus stepped into the frame.
His dark eyes hardened as flint and instantly swept over the crowd, narrowing to slits the moment they landed on the Head Shaman’s robes.
The weight of Alphaeus’s command pressure forced a few of the weaker Betas in the hallway to instinctively drop their gazes.
Alphaeus despised the shamans. Decades ago, he had stripped them of their pack titles and banished them to the frozen caves of the mountain side, viewing them as archaic, parasitic frauds.
To see them standing on his floor, led by his own wife, made his jaw lock with sudden irritation.
"What is this?" He looked directly at Luna Satire, his upper lip curling in disgust. "What are you doing bringing them here, Satire? Is this the nineties? Are we suddenly consulting cave-dwelling zealots now?"
"Alpha Alphaeus, please," Satire said, her voice dropping into a breathless, urgent tone. She gestured toward the open threshold. "We need to step inside. The Elders and the Shamans... we have something to inquire from you."
Alphaeus stared at her for a long time before stepping aside, allowing the tense, silent group to file into his office.
The door clicked shut.
Alpha Alphaeus walked behind his massive desk but refused to sit. He leaned his palms against the dark wood, glaring at the Shaman. "Speak. What is this about?"
The Shaman swallowed hard, looking at the floor. "It is about Lena, Alpha."
Alphaeus’s expression didn’t soften. "What about her?"
"We... we performed a ritual on her," the Shaman stammered.
Alpha Alphaeus’s eyes suddenly widened. He slammed his fist against the desk, the wood breaking into two under the impact. "You did what? Who gave you the authority to touch anyone in my house with your primitive, fraudulent garbage?"
"I did," Satire interrupted, stepping forward to shield the Shaman. Her voice was tight and desperate. "I granted the permission, Alphaeus. Listen to what they have to say first."
The Head Shaman bowed so low his nose almost touched his knees, wringing his trembling hands in pure anxiety.
"Please, Alpha, do not be angry. But... the girl. Lena. She awakened today at school. The mark appeared."
The Alpha’s anger completely vanished from his face, replaced by a sudden stillness. "That is impossible. She has no wolf."
"It is true," Luna Satire said, her voice shaking with a bitter, toxic resentment. "Everyone at the school saw it. But the readings from the council–the prophecies–they all predicted the Awakening would come from your bloodline this time! It was supposed to be Victoria!"
Alphaeus stared past his wife, his mind clearly racing as he tried to process the information. "Then the readings were wrong. As I say and will always say, Shamans are frauds who have no place in this Pack."
"The prophecy wasn’t wrong, Alpha," the Shaman whispered, taking a cautious step toward the broken desk. "Because after we performed the ritual... after we begged the Great Mother to fix the anomaly... the darkness took the sanctum. The Moon Goddess responded."
Alphaeus’s posture went entirely deadly. He straightened up, his eyes locking onto the Shaman like a predator tracking a target. "Did you kill her?"
"No! No, she is alive," the Shaman cried out, raising his hands in defense. "But something that has never occurred in our entire history happened... When the lights returned, we inspected her hands. The goddess did not take the mark back, Alpha. She marked the girl again! On her other palm. She carries two separate marks!"
The only sound that could be heard in the office was the quiet ticking of the grandfather clock in the corner.
The Shaman watched the Alpha closely, a sudden, dangerous realization dawning in the old man’s eyes. He stepped closer to the desk, his voice dropping into a knowing whisper.
"You can call me a fraud. But the Moon Goddess does not make mistakes, Alpha Alphaeus. And she does not grant such marks to a stranger. I think... I think you know exactly why she was marked. It is time to come clean."
Alphaeus remained entirely silent for five minutes. He closed his eyes, his broad shoulders shifting as he let out a long breath that sounded like a man surrendering to a ghost.
When he opened his eyes, he looked straight at his wife, whose breath was hitched in her throat.
"Lena is..." Alphaeus whispered. "...my daughter."