Chapter 22
Moira’s face twisted in horror–shock, grief, and revulsion entwined.
“All this time… we thought you were the good one,” she choked. “But it was all an act.”
“You lied to your own parents. You condemned your sister. You stole her life!”
Her voice cracked on the last word, each syllable a dagger.
Marina knew she couldn’t hide it anymore.
Eyes red, she screamed, “Why is this my fault?! I didn’t kill her!”
“It was you who cast her out of the den! You told her she wasn’t part of our bloodline. Thorne was the one who severed her Luna.Sigil. T did nothing I was the most innocent of you all!”
“You all hated her. You used to whisper that the pack would be better off if she just disappeared! So now that she’s gone, why are you crying? What kind of parents are you to mourn the daughter you cursed?”
Cedric’s face turned purple with rage. He clutched his chest, staggering, barely able to breathe.
But Marina wasn’t done. Tears burned down her cheeks, fury in every word.
“You were the ones who told me my heart defect was Selene’s fault! That she drained my vitality even in the womb. That she owed me her life!”
“Mother–you said it yourself, remember? ‘If only I had birthed just one daughter.“” Her voice trembled as she laughed bitterly. “Well now your wish came true. She’s dead. Her heart beats in me. So why can’t you just accept that I’m the only one left?”
The room dropped into silence
Moira stared at her, finally realizing the curse she herself had cast–the poison of her words taking root and blooming into tragedy.
And for the first time in her life she fell to her knees.
She clutched Selene’s portrait in her arms and wept like a broken thing
“It’s my fault,” she wailed. “I did this… I poisoned my own daughter’s soul. I taught her to envy, to steal, to kill…
Tears soaked the floor, and her frame shuddered with griet as if it aged her by decades in seconds.
By the time Thorne arrived, the scene was a ruin: Cedric collapsed in convulsions, Moira curled on the ground sobbing, and Marina silent, stiff–watching it all with cold detachment.
She was about to leave when Thorne blocked the door,
His eyes were crimson, burning with fury. “Why did you destroy her?” he whispered.
Marina, still fueled by anger, yanked her arm back. “Don’t you dare blame me!”
“You did it. You carved out her heart. You’re the one who killed her.”
“And you,” she hissed, “You pretended to love her. You all did. But you never really did.”
“Hypocrites. All of you.”
“You should thank me,” she added with a venomous smile. “If not for me, she’d have been burned to ashes. At least now… part of her lives on.”
She tapped her chest, where Selene’s Moonmark once pulsed.
Thorne swayed where he stood. Then he laughed.
A dry, broken sound that echoed with despair.
Chapter 22
“You’re right,” he murmured. “I am all of those things.”
“Selfish. Blind. Cowardly.”
“But you you should never have been chosen to carry her heart!!
His voice roared like a storm, and he lunged forward, gripping Marina by the throat.
Her eyes widened with terror as he drove her into the floor, the wind knocked from her lungs.
She thrashed and kicked, gasping “Thorne–please–I didn’t mean it!”
But he didn’t see Marina anymore. He saw Selene, begging him to stop. He saw blood on his hands. He heard the Moon’s silence.
And then–he saw the blade.
In his hand, trembling, was a surgical knife–one he didn’t even remember picking up.
Marina’s voice cracked in terror. “Thorne–please–I said I was sorry–don’t do this—!”
He took a step forward.
Selene’s voice echoed in his mind–faint but sharp.
This is not justice. This is vengeance.
Thorne froze.
His fingers opened. The blade clattered to the floor.
Marina collapsed, coughing violently, backing away in horror.
He stared down at his hands as if they didn’t belong to him.
He had become the monster Selene once begged him not to be
A nurse burst into the hallway. “Alpha Thorne! What’s going on-
Marina bolted. She vanished into the dark, leaving silence behind.
Thorne said nothing.
He turned and stumbled back to his quarters, where he opened Marina’s sacred wellness scrolls.
And there it was: plain as moonlight.
Her condition had never required a sacred heart transfer. She had let it worsen. She had refused treatment. She had starved herself of healing moonlight, skipped her rituals–just to seem sicker.
Just to get what she wanted.
Selene.
The soul she never deserved.
Thorne laughed again. Bitter. Hollow
Then he stood, and for the second time that day, he walked out into the storm–seeking no redemption.
Only remembrance.
