Rejected By The Alpha, Desired By The King

KAEL – POV

The bond had never lied before.

But now it whispered in halves.

One thread pulled toward Ayla—still breathing, still bound.

The other hummed with a different rhythm.

Same scent. Same face.

But a howl I didn't recognize.

The Luna had fractured. And half of her walked the woods outside.

We locked the sacred chamber with every seal Rylan knew.

Ayla slept within it. Her breath ragged. Her runes flaring between gold and black. Each flicker a sign of the struggle inside.

"She's holding her off," Rylan said. "Barely."

Daya stood at the door, two blades drawn.

"If she turns, I end it."

I growled.

"You won't have the chance."

Because if Ayla went dark, if the Echo fully took her—

I'd go with her. Or through her.

The camp outside the wards had doubled in a single night.

Wolves from the Eastern Barrens.

One of the Tide-born Alphas.

Even a Seer from the fractured houses. Each one marked with a single crescent rune—burned into the wrist.

The clone didn't ask for pledges.

She simply appeared.

And wolves knelt.

She called it "the soft coronation."

And by twilight, she had enough wolves to challenge Ayla's court.

Not in secret.

In full view.

I stood on the ridge, watching the red tents rise.

My wolf snarled beneath my skin.

"What's the play?" Daya asked, appearing beside me.

"Wait until Ayla wakes," I said.

"And if she wakes up someone else?"

I didn't answer, because I didn't know.

Inside the sealed chamber, Rylan knelt by Ayla's side.

He was chanting—soft, ancient words drawn from bloodroot and bone-ink.

Every now and then, Ayla's lips would twitch.

A whisper.

A name.

Mine.

Then a different one.

Cassia.

Then silence.

***

By nightfall, the Echo moved again.

She stood at the border of the wards.

She didn't call out. She didn't demand it. She simply opened her arms and wolves ran to her.

One by one.

They crossed the ward line and vanished into her camp.

Former loyalists.

One council member.

Even a young healer.

Rylan saw it from the upper perch.

"They're not bound," he said. "They're choosing."

Daya: "She's not controlling them. She's convincing them."

I watched them disappear into the red glow.

And I felt the bond stretch. Tighter. Not to me, to her.

In the chamber, Ayla screamed. Her back arched. Her runes turned black. And I felt it: The clone was pulling wolves through the tether.

Not just their loyalty. Their magic and Ayla were being drained.

I ran to her side.

Gripped her hand.

"Stay here," I begged. "Fight her."

Her lips moved.

One word:

"Kael."

I kissed her fingers.

"I'm with you. I'm with you until the end."

Then she opened her eyes.

One silver.

One black.

And she whispered:

"I'm not alone in here."

The wards didn't break.

They withered.

Bit by bit, edge by edge, the protections we'd woven around Ayla and the Council were unspooling—corroded not by force, but by choice.

The wolves who left weren't cursed.

They were convinced.

The Echo's Court wasn't a prison.

It was a mirror.

It let wolves see a version of themselves that didn't need to fight anymore. No more healing. No more reckoning. No more truth.

Only silence.

And power.

Inside the sealed chamber, Ayla's breathing became shallower. Her aura flared and fell in waves.

Rylan and I worked in shifts, layering spells of preservation. But nothing stopped the fracture growing inside her.

"She's still here," I said. "I can feel her."

Rylan's eyes were red from no sleep. "Yes. But she's holding a war inside her own body. That's not just possession. That's fusion."

"What does that mean?"

"It means... she's becoming both."

Outside, Daya returned from a perimeter sweep.

"They've begun calling it 'The Bone Court,'" she said.

"The what?"

"The Echo's camp. That's what she's named it. Wolves who join her kneel before a pyre of white crowns. Dozens."

She held up a piece of one.

It wasn't just a crown.

It was ours.

Shattered. Burned.

Stolen from the grove's burial vault. A warning and a declaration.

***

The next day, she made her first broadcast.

Every warded object across our grounds lit in tandem.

Water shimmered. Mirrors fogged. Stones pulsed.

And then, her voice:

"Wolves of the Realm," it said. "You've followed fire long enough. Burnt your claws on truth. Been told to heal, to evolve, to become."

She paused.

"I offer something different."

Ayla stirred on the altar.

She was hearing it too.

The Echo's voice continued:

"Peace, without proof. Belonging, without bending. A Luna who doesn't demand. A crown that doesn't command."

And then:

"Choose. Before your choice is made for you."

The light faded.

The bond inside me twisted like a rope stretched over fire.

Ayla moaned.

"I saw them," she whispered. "All of them. Kneeling. Not to her. To the version of me who never bled."

I took her hand.

"You bled. You broke. You built. And you burned for them. That's why it matters."

She opened her eyes—just silver now.

But rimmed in black.

"I need to speak," she said.

"You're not strong enough," Rylan warned.

"I wasn't strong enough the first time," she said, voice hardening. "And I still made them listen."

That night, we carried her to the ash tree.

The same place she once made the first vow.

She stood there, legs trembling.

And then, she spoke.

No magic.

No summons.

Just her.

"If you want a Luna who will never demand you rise, she waits beyond the ridge."

Her voice cracked. She kept going.

"If you want one who remembers every time you were broken, buried, and forgotten, I'm still standing."

She looked up.

"To lead. Not to save. Not to bind. To stand beside."

Her knees buckled.

I caught her.

And the wolves...They began to howl. Not all. But enough to answer. To stay.

Then, far across the divide, the Bone Court fires flared blue.

The clone stepped into the light and raised a single, bone-white banner.

Painted with Ayla's name.

And one word beneath it: "Challenged."

Wolves don't just fight for titles.

We fight for bondlines.

That's why the Echo's challenge mattered. It wasn't just a call to war. It was a demand for Ayla to prove her bond was more than story. And by the rites of our oldest laws—She couldn't refuse.

The trial was to be held at dusk three nights from the challenge.

The sacred Hollow of First Bond.

A stone arena where Luna blood had been spilled once before—when the First Luna broke her own Alpha's claim and walked away.

Fitting.

Ayla hadn't stood yet.

But her voice grew steadier with each hour.

And her silver eye no longer flickered black.

"She's retreating," Ayla said.

"The Echo?" I asked.

"No. The version of me inside her. She doesn't know what to do with mercy."

We trained in secret. Not with blades. With memory.

Rylan crafted a ritual to burn Ayla's scars into the arena's stone—so the Echo would have to fight not a copy, but every moment Ayla had earned.

Daya drilled her in wolf-form maneuvering.

I stood across from her every morning, sword sheathed, waiting.

Letting her choose the fight.

Letting her lead.

On the eve of the duel, the Bone Court sent a gift.

A silver collar.

With Ayla's name on it.

Inside the box: a note.

"For after you kneel."

The Hollow was packed by twilight.

Every surviving pack had sent at least one observer.

The Seer council arrived cloaked, silent.

Even Cassia stood in the Bone Court's ranks, lips pressed tight, eyes unreadable.

The Echo arrived bathed in bone runes.

No sword.

Only claws.

Only magic.

Ayla stepped forward with no crown, no title.

Only a mark carved into her palm—our bond rune.

The arena lit.

Twelve stones circled them. One path out. Only one could cross it. Not unless the other yielded or died.

The fight didn't start with claws.

It started with words.

"You were built from fear," Ayla said. "I was built from fire."

"And fire burns everything it touches," the Echo hissed.

"But only what can't carry it."

Then the ground cracked. And they lunged. 

Silver against shadow.

Wolf against wolf.

Memory against illusion.

At the tenth strike, the bond flared so violently I collapsed to my knees.

I saw them both—each Ayla, mirrored in pain.

The Echo smiled through blood.

"You're losing them," she whispered.

Ayla grinned back.

"No. I'm reminding them."

Then she struck.

Her claws sank into the Echo's chest—right over the bond rune.

Light exploded.

Wolves screamed.

The air broke.

And then—both Lunas fell. Side by side. Not moving.

And from the shadows, a voice I hadn't heard in moons spoke:

"The Seers said only one Luna could survive."

Rylan turned.

Daya drew her blade.

And the figure stepped into the firelight. Not Cassia. Not a clone. A third wearing my sigil.