The Sacred Luna

(Sanya’s POV) I check my phone again. 11:47 PM. The screen's glow cuts through the darkness like a knife, and I hate how my hands shake as I stare at the time. Thirteen minutes. He's only thirteen minutes late. But he promised. My suitcase sits at my feet, a silent witness to everything I'm leaving behind. Everything I'm running toward. I packed it three times—once in a panic, throwing in whatever I could grab. Then again, more carefully, choosing things that mattered. The third time, I unpacked half of it because Aaron said we needed to travel light. Start fresh. Leave the past where it belongs. The autumn wind picks up, cutting through my jacket, and I wrap my arms around myself. The scent of dying leaves mingles with something else. My own fear, sharp and metallic on my tongue. My wolf stirs beneath my skin, restless, pacing like she knows something I don't want to accept. Not yet. Don't think it yet. I close my eyes and let myself remember. Three weeks ago, behind the old library where no one from my pack ever goes. Aaron's hands cupping my face like I was something precious. Something worth protecting. "I'll never leave you, Sanya," he'd said, and I believed him. I still believe him. "Not even in death. Whatever happens, I'll be there. I promise." His kiss had been gentle. Reverent. Like he was sealing a vow. My phone buzzes and my heart leaps into my throat. But it's just the time updating. 11:50 PM. Twenty minutes late. I start pacing, my feet crunching against the gravel road. This spot was perfect when we chose it—far enough from Silverwood Pack territory that my brothers wouldn't think to look, close enough to the main road that we could catch a bus to anywhere. Neutral ground between his pack and mine. Now it just feels exposed. Empty. I dial his number again. It goes straight to voicemail, just like the last four times. His voice—warm, steady, everything mine isn't right now—tells me to leave a message. "Aaron, please." My voice cracks. "I'm here. I'm waiting. Just... please tell me you're okay." The wind carries away my words as soon as I speak them. Something must have happened. The thought burrows into my chest, making it hard to breathe. An accident. Car trouble. His phone died. Something. Anything. Anything except what that small, vicious voice in the back of my mind keeps whispering. He's not coming. "No." I say it out loud, like that makes it true. "He's coming. He promised." My wolf whines, a low sound of distress I can feel in my bones. She wants to shift, to run, to do something instead of standing here like prey waiting for the trap to spring. But if I shift, if I run—Aaron won't know where to find me. And he's coming. He has to be coming. I check my phone. 11:55 PM. Twenty-eight minutes late. The memories come faster now, like my mind is trying to convince my heart of something it doesn't want to know. Two months of secret meetings. His hand in mine as we walked through the forest, far from prying eyes. The way he looked at me like I was the only thing in the world that mattered. "Your brothers will never accept me," he'd said once, his thumb tracing circles on my palm. "I'm rankless. No father, just my mother. No money, no status." "I don't care about any of that." "I know." His smile had been sad. Beautiful. "That's why we have to leave. Build our own life. Our own pack, where rank doesn't matter." I'd kissed him then, fierce and desperate, trying to pour everything I felt into that one moment. All the love, all the hope, all the certainty that he was my future. He is my future. Headlights split the darkness. My heart stutters, then races. I grab my suitcase handle, relief flooding through me so fast it makes me dizzy. He came. Of course he came. I was stupid to doubt, even for a second. The vehicle comes closer and the headlights are too high. Too bright. Wrong. The SUV is black, sleek, and I know it the moment it comes into full view. I know it the way prey knows a predator's scent. My brothers. "No." The word rips from my throat. "No, no, no—" I run. The suitcase falls behind me, forgotten, and I run toward the tree line. But I'm not fast enough. I was never going to be fast enough. The SUV screeches to a halt and doors slam open and then Derek's hand is on my arm, spinning me around. "Let me go!" I claw at him, my nails leaving red streaks down his forearm. "You have no right—" "We have every right." His grip is iron. "You're our sister. Our responsibility." Brandon appears on my other side, blocking my escape. His face is grim in the SUV's headlights, and something in his expression makes my blood run cold. "No!" I thrash against Derek's hold, wild, desperate. "You don't understand—Aaron is coming for me!" The words sound hollow even as I speak them. Aaron isn't here. He should be here by now and he isn't. Derek's laugh is cruel. "Aaron isn't coming, Sanya. He never cared about you." "You're lying!" The scream tears from somewhere deep inside me. "You're lying, let me go, let me—" "Enough." Brandon's voice cuts through my hysteria. He grabs my other arm and together they drag me toward the SUV. My feet scrape against gravel, searching for purchase, finding nothing. "Please." I'm begging now, dignity abandoned. "Please, just wait. Just give him time, maybe something happened, maybe—" "Nothing happened." Derek shoves me into the backseat with enough force that I sprawl across the leather. "Wake up, Sanya. He was playing you. A rankless wolf like Aaron Knight? He was never going to throw his life away for you." The words hit like physical blows. Each one landing exactly where it'll hurt most. Brandon slides in beside me while Derek takes the driver's seat. The doors lock with a sound like a death knell. "Let me out." My voice is small now. Broken. "Please." "Can't do that." Derek starts the engine, and the SUV begins to move. Away from the meeting spot. Away from Aaron. Away from everything. "You're getting married in three days." The world tilts. "I’m what?" "Getting married. To Alpha Tyron Stone." Derek's eyes meet mine in the rearview mirror, cold and unyielding. "We've already made the arrangements." "You can't—" The words stick in my throat. "I don't even know him." "You don't need to know him." Brandon's voice is quieter than Derek's but no less final. "You need to marry him. Restore honor to our family." "Honor?" I twist to face him, and I don't recognize the sound of my own laugh. It's jagged. Painful. "What honor? I haven't done anything wrong!" "You were going to run off with a rankless wolf." Derek's knuckles are white on the steering wheel. "Shame our family, our pack. Make a mockery of our parents' memory." "Mom and dad would never—" "Mom and dad are dead." The words are brutal in their simplicity. "And we're the ones left to clean up your mess." I slump back against the seat, everything inside me crumbling. Three days. They're giving me three days. "Three days until you belong to the most powerful Alpha in the region," Derek says, and there's something almost satisfied in his tone. "And the most ruthless. Maybe that'll teach you not to shame our family by messing around with rankless wolves next time." I can't speak. Can't think. Can't do anything but stare out the window as the meeting spot disappears behind us. My brothers are marrying me off. To a man I don’t even know. What’s the difference between this and being sold off? Aaron. He promised me. He promised he would be here, no matter what. Then why isn’t he…why isn’t he here? Tears blur my vision. My brothers’ words ring in my ears, spiteful, taunting, mocking… That's when I see it. A figure, emerging from the tree line. Tall. Familiar in a way that makes my heart stop. Aaron? I press my face against the glass, straining to see, but the SUV is moving too fast. The figure is already shrinking in the distance, swallowed by darkness and trees. Was it him? Did he see them take me? Or is my desperate heart creating illusions, seeing what it wants to see in shadows and moonlight? "Aaron," I whisper against the glass, my breath fogging the window. "Aaron, I'm sorry." But the night swallows my words, and the figure—real or imagined—is gone.