I Rejected My Mate After He Chose My Sister for the Ninth TimeChapter 1
"Miss Ashenvale, I must ask you to weigh this decision one final time." The pack scribe's voice carried a solemn weight. "Once you enter the Academy in Cresthaven Territory, you will fall under the Council's protection. But the cost is steep—you must sever all bonds with your birth pack. For five years, you cannot set foot in Wolfridge Territory or make direct contact with any former pack member. Not even those who share your blood."
Lyra Ashenvale's hand shook as she gripped the ceremonial quill. The tip dragged a crooked line of ink past the oath-seal's edge.
But in the next heartbeat, her knuckles went bone-white. The last trace of doubt in her amber eyes crystallized into iron resolve. She carved her name into the parchment with strokes as sharp as claws.
"I am certain." The words scraped through her throat—raw but steady, carrying the desperate strength of someone who had already torched every path behind her.
The scribe's brows rose in surprise. After asking her twice more, he could only bow his head and file the Sanctuary Oath with a resigned sigh. "As you wish. Your acceptance summons will reach your scent-tag within one moon cycle. Keep watch for it."
Lyra said nothing more. She turned and walked out of the Elder Hall.
The midday sun blazed overhead, yet cold crept through her bones as if winter had taken root in her marrow. Her fingers moved across her communication crystal without pause, booking passage beyond the borders—a ship departing in one moon's time. Her only escape from this wreckage.
The confirmation had barely flashed when a howl-network alert exploded across her senses, the message screaming through pack channels like wildfire:
BREAKING: High-born Omega Lyra Ashenvale's Shameful Secret Life Exposed—Intimate Scry-Records Leaked! Suspected of Carrying Rogue Taint. Blackmoor Pack Officially Announces Bond Rejection at Dawn Today!
Beneath it, a formal declaration from Fenris Blackmoor's inner circle. The words were ice-forged, each sentence another claw raking across her name. And those deliberately distorted scry-images—the female in them was clearly Selene Ashenvale, yet Fenris's pack had twisted the evidence to frame Lyra instead.
The ninth time.