## Chapter 13
The grove still reeked of blood and betrayal when dawn touched the horizon.
Serena lay in the healer’s arms, half-alive, her confession echoing through every mind in the pack. Damien stood rigid, his chest heaving, golden eyes burning with a rage he no longer knew where to place. The Rogue King lingered in the shadows, silver gaze hungry, patient as a storm that never leaves.
And me?
I walked out of the clearing barefoot, blood drying on my throat, snow burning against my skin, the weight of centuries of law falling away with every step.
The whispers followed me—Luna, traitor, hunter, cursed. None of them mattered. For the first time, no bond pulled me, no crown weighed me.
Only freedom.
Only fire.
I didn’t look back. Not at Serena, not at Damien, not at the Rogue King’s smile curling in the dark. They could kill each other for thrones and crowns. They could bleed the forest dry for the right to claim me.
But I had already chosen.
I was done being prey.
I was done being Luna.
I was the wolf who severed the unseverable, who walked away from the Alpha and lived.
And if the packs feared me? If Damien hunted me, if the Rogue King tempted me, if the Goddess herself marked me for ruin?
Let them.
Because the next time they whispered my name, it wouldn’t be as sister, or Luna, or prey.
It would be as Clara, the She-Wolf who rose.
And when the moon turned red again, when the packs gathered to crown their rulers, they would kneel—
Not to Damien.
Not to the Rogue King.
Not to any Alpha.
But to me.
The End
