Sunlight filtered through the high windows of the pack house, golden and warm, an unyielding contrast to the cold gnaw in Aria's stomach. She stood alone outside the training fields, shoulders hunched up beneath her tattered gray sweater, gazing at the sheet of paper pinned with heavy, thick nails.
Her name was there.
Aria Gray — Charged with Stable Waste, Elder Quarters, and Meal Scraps Preparation.
Each term struck like a blow. Stable waste. Meal scraps. Elder quarters. They were the lowest, most unpleasant tasks in the entire Bloodfang Pack, assigned to Omegas who had fallen out of favor—or in Aria's case, never achieved any to begin with.
Behind her, there were muffled whispers and giggles among the few Omegas waiting to serve. She didn't need to turn around to know what they were saying. She could hear it in their tone. The girl who didn't transform. The girl who shamed the entire pack. The girl the Alpha was disciplining.
But nobody knew anything.
No one knew Damien had bitten her. No one could see the thin, barely perceptible crescent-shaped scar hidden under her hairline, above the nape of her neck. The bite that had never quite healed. The one that stung from time to time.
She ripped her gaze from the list and faced away from the training grounds on the dirt path. The cold of the early morning wind burned her eyes, but she blinked the tears back before they fell. Omegas didn't weep. At least not in public.
---
The stables reeked of mold and wet hay. Aria pinched up her face as she picked up a dirty bucket in both hands, her arms trembling at the weight. Her boots sloshed through the bog to the ankles, every step a struggle. The horses snorted in their stalls, most of them uninterested in the girl who worked like a ghost among them.
Her back ached. Her hands blistered. Her stomach was empty.
From the other end of the barn was laughter—two Omegas conversing as they curried a mare. One glanced over at Aria, elbowed the other, and both burst into laughter.
"Maybe she's half horse," one whispered, not quite quiet.
"She definitely smells like it."
Aria did not raise her eyes. She did not talk. Her silence was not submission. It was survival.
---
By noon, Aria was pushing a cart of soggy vegetables and bone scraps from the butcher shop into the rear kitchen. Perspiration soaked her, braids loose, legs smeared with grime. The cook didn't even speak to her—merely waved her off with a swish of the hand.
"Put them in the feed pile and sweep the floors," the woman snapped without even glancing at her.
As Aria bent over to tip the cart, a sharp wave of nausea rolled through her. Her stomach clenched. Her legs buckled for a moment.
The bond.
That cursed bond.
Ever since Damien bit her, her body hadn't been her own. Some days it felt like her skin didn't fit right. On other days, she'd feel heat coursing through her blood without warning. Worse than any sickness. Deeper than any fever.
---
High up in the Alpha's office, Damien stood with his back against the wide windowpane, arms crossed over his chest. His eyes followed Aria's small figure as she heaved and fought with a bucket near the feed shed. From here, he could even feel the spasmodic shudder in her muscles, the way she moved like she was going to fall over.
His Beta, Maddox, stood a couple of feet behind him. He coughed.
"Cruel, you know this is," Maddox said to him. "Even for you."
Damien did not respond.
"You marked her, Damien. You didn't reject her. And now you're embarrassing her in front of the pack?"
Damien's jaw tightened. "She's not my mate. That was a mistake. A bond I did not seek."
"But your wolf sought it. And that bond? It's pestering you whether you'll admit it or not."
His fingers curled into fists.
"I won't have an Omega as my Luna," Damien stated, his words frozen. "Especially not one like hers."
"Then reject her. Break the bond."
There was only silence to his response.
Later, Aria dragged her aching body into the Elder Quarters—a long corridor of rooms smelling of herbs, musk, and age. The Elders were not unkind, but they were demanding. As the lowest-ranked Omega, she was expected to clean, fetch water, and tend to their endless needs.
One old she-wolf watched her from the corner, eyes sharp.
"You're the Alpha's Omega," the woman said suddenly.
Aria stiffened. "No… I'm not."
The grey wolf cocked her head. "You reek of Alpha's blood. And hurt. A lethal mix."
Aria ducked her head and said nothing.
By dinnertime, she snuck back into the kitchen, her legs like lead. The pack of Beta puppies had left the training area, tracking mud everywhere on the floors she'd just been cleaning. She knelt again, scrub brush in hand, fingers raw and red.
She felt him walking by with warriors around him. He didn't glance at her. His smell overwhelmed the senses instead: smoke and dark pine. Her body betrayed her. Her cheeks flushed. Her stomach churned.
He sensed it too. She could sense that.
But he just kept going as if she was nothing.
By night, Aria curled in the corner of the Omega quarters, spent to eat, too hurt to cry. She wrapped herself around herself, the hard slate against the small of her back. Her bond pulsed. Her flesh burned. And she held herself together.
They would learn one day. Not as the failed Omega, but as the survivor girl.
And Damien—he would live to wish he'd never been so cruel.
But tonight, she would sleep surrounded by grime and susurrations,
and dream of the power that she had yet to gain