Aurelia screamed as the flames kissed her skin.
They tied her to the stake like a criminal, but she had never harmed a soul. The pack called it justice. The Alpha called it order.
Her mate… called it regret.
"You should have chosen obedience," Alpha Darius said coldly. "I chose truth," Aurelia hissed, throat raw from smoke. "And you chose fear."
He turned away, unwilling to meet her eyes as the fire roared louder.
They had accused her of witchcraft — a convenient excuse to silence a Luna who questioned too much. She had found out the truth about Darius's secret blood oath, and now they would erase her.
"I loved you," she choked, not to Darius… but to the man watching from the shadows.
Her true mate.
The one who had marked her in secret.
The one who let her burn.
As the fire climbed her legs and her bones cracked beneath the heat, Aurelia felt the last of her breath leaving her body.
"This is how I end?"
But the Moon had other plans.
Somewhere beyond death…
She awoke in a field of white thorns and glowing wolves.
Time did not exist here.
But her soul burned brighter than ever.
A voice echoed through the silver fog.
"You were betrayed by your blood… reborn through mine."
A woman stepped forward — robed in moonlight, crowned in flame.
The First Witch Alpha.
"You were never meant to serve. You were born to rule."
Aurelia gasped, her lungs full of stars.
"Am I dead?" she whispered.
"No," the Moon Goddess said. "You are reborn."
Sixteen years later…
The child stood barefoot in the woods, her eyes the color of fire and storm.
She watched as wolves ran drills on the training grounds far below the hill.
"That's the Bloodfang Pack," the voice behind her said. "Your father's enemies."
She turned to the woman at her side — cloaked in red, fingers glowing faintly with magic.
"And mine," the girl replied. "One day, I'll kill every last one of them."
"Good," the Witch Alpha said, smiling like a storm. "You're ready."
Because the girl was not just her daughter.
She was Aurelia, reborn in another's womb, carrying centuries of power and one mission:
Burn them for what they did. All of them. Even him.