Lyra has always believed in the bond between soulmates, but the day her mate, Alpha Lucian, publicly rejects her, she feels her world crumble. Cast out of the pack, she disappears without a trace. Five years later, she returns, stronger and more determined than ever. But she doesn't come back alone: a little boy with golden eyes, a carbon copy of Lucian, accompanies her. Faced with the truth she has hidden from him, Lucian will do anything to win her back, but will Lyra be able to forgive him for his past rejection?
Chapter 1 Chapitre 1
The voices of the pack had raised in a collective roar, a cry of strength and challenge, but basically, Lyra no longer heard anything. His ears burst, her heart was beating to burst his chest, and his eyes were fixed on Lucian. Their looks met, and in the suspended moment, Lyra felt a tear so violent that she failed to collapse on the spot.
The ground seemed to shirk under its feet, the murmurs of the pack, the laughter, the songs, everything gradually went. Only Lucian's face, pale and icy, remained anchored in his mind. His lips billed, and for the first time, his gaze showed no sign of the love he had promised him.
"You are not worthy of me. »»
These words struck lyra like stones launched with such violence that they broke everything in their path. First a shock, then a dull, unbearable pain. His body stretched, his fists hugged. She didn't understand. It was not possible. It was not him. It couldn't be he who said these words. He, his alpha, her soul mate, the one she had always thought to see as her rock, her refuge.
"I never wanted you. Never. »»
Words were frightened like poisonous snakes, slipping under his skin, insinuating into his soul. She felt her throat to tie. How could it be true? How could this man, the one she had loved with such fervor, be the source of the pain she felt at this precise moment?
The crowd, the members of the pack, observed, mute, suspended at each word, each movement. None moved, none seemed to want to intervene. Lyra turned her eyes to them, but she only saw faces marked by an expression of icy indifference, as if everyone was waiting for this moment, as if everyone had known, basically, that it would end like this. No support, no outstretched hand.
Lucian had always been respected, admired, venerated. He was the alpha. He embodied strength, power, authority. But at that time, he was only the man who had just destroyed his heart, to break everything they had built together.
He turned his head slowly, her eyes lowering on her, full of disdain. The void that surrounded it was worsening. It was as if everything had stopped in the world. The air was blocked in its lungs. There was this feeling of collapsing everything around her. Each breath became difficult to take.
"I'm the alpha. I don't need you. His words were cold, sharp, without the slightest trace of regret. "You are weak. You don't even understand what it means, to be the companion of an alpha. »»
Lyra felt warmth get in her face, burning and painful heat. She could feel her skin stretching, her heart tighten like a vice around her lungs. How ? How could he repel her like this? She had never been closer to him, more devoted, more loyal. And yet, at this precise moment, he rejected it without any remorse, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
Her hands were shaking as she was carrying a hand to her chest. She was trying to breathe, but each inspiration was like an assault against her body. How to react to such a blow? A blow that isolated her, which put her away from everything she had known, everything she had believed. A blow so brutal that she almost lost her bearings. She was only a shadow, a lonely shadow on a scene where she had believed that she would always be the light.
Lucian did not take her eyes off her, and his arms fell behind him, as if to mark his authority, his power. It was the alpha. He had always been the alpha. But today it was an alpha alone, an alpha without soul mate, an alpha who had just broken the link he had woven with her for years.
The murmurs finally began to be heard, but Lyra could not distinguish them. The packs of the pack mingled in a deaf cacophony, as if the world around it had become vague and indefinite. Their words were like echoes of another time, from another place, a place where it no longer belonged.
She fixed Lucian, still looking for an ounce of warmth in her gaze, a trace of the past, of what they had shared. But nothing. Just a vacuum.
"I gave you everything I had. She finally whispered, her broken voice, like a fragile thread on the point of breaking. "And you, you reject me. »»
A glow of pain passed through Lucian's eyes, but he turned quickly. "You are nothing. Nothing. This link, what you thought was ... it was an illusion. »»
Lyra felt the burn go up in her, but she did not let herself be overwhelmed. She clenched her fists until her nails sink into her palm. The disgust she felt for him, for his words, was added to the pain that devoured her. How could she have been so naive? How could she have thought that this man, this leader, the one she believed to be her equal, could do that to him?
His eyes focused on other members of the pack, but none of them moved, none intervened. They all were waiting. They were all spectators of this tragedy. Lyra suddenly felt more alone than ever. She was just a foreigner in a world she thought she knew, that she thought she had built with Lucian.
Shame, disgust and pain mingled in it, but basically, a small flame of rage began to grow. Maybe that was that. What he wanted from her. That was what he had always wanted. Make it weak, broken. But he was wrong. He didn't know who he had just repelled.
In a momentum of pride and anger, she turned her heels. She did not want to give her the slightest dignity by staying there, waiting for a forgiveness that she would never receive. The crowd moved to let her pass, their looks full of judgments hidden behind falsely indifferent tunes.
She came out of the arena with all the dignity she could gather, her feet on the ground, her heart beating strong in her chest. She was just a breath, a silhouette in the shade, but she knew one thing: she would not submit. Not now. Not after all she had gone through. She was not going to be defined by this rejection. She was going to disappear, yes. But it would come back stronger.
She was not yet aware of the magnitude of what she had just done, what she had just lost. But basically, in a part of herself, something was already known. She would never be the same again.
Lyra walks without goal, her mind drowned in a whirlwind of thoughts, his heart smashed into a thousand pieces. Each step that she made seemed to sink her more in an abyss that she no longer knew how to flee. Her feet barely brushed against the ground, as if she were already disappearing, to fade. The image of Lucian, standing in front of the pack, rejecting her so coldly, was constantly redrawing into her mind. These words, which had registered in it as an indelible brand, repeated themselves in a loop: "You are not worthy of me. »»
She clenched her fists, trying to contain the rage that bubbed in her. A rage directed against him, against herself, against the pack which, in his silence, had accepted this humiliation. She knew that no one would come and get her. No one would understand, and at that moment, it didn't matter. Nothing left in this world she had thought she had known.
His body was a battlefield, each muscle stretched under pressure, each breathing difficult to grasp. Every minute, every second passing, she felt the grip of this betrayal enclosing her a little more. Shame was part of each fiber of his being, each thought. During all these years, she had believed that Lucian was her refuge, her soul mate. They had united under the auspices of the pack, their sacred bond reinforced by time. And now ? Now there was just a vacuum. An unfathomable abyss.
Her mind fogged down, and yet only one certainty persisted: she could no longer stay there, in this pack, with this identity which no longer meant anything. She had to disappear. She had to hide, that she disappears, that she leaves this world where everything she had built had collapsed in an instant.
Lyra rushed into the woods. She knew it was that it all started. There, at the heart of these wild lands, she could get lost, erase all traces of herself, everything that linked her to this past that she wanted to bury at all costs. The trees, the stones, everything became blurred around it. She felt like she flee not only the pack, but also this part of herself that she no longer recognized. She felt like a foreigner in her own skin.
She didn't even know how long she was walking. Everything was blurred, like a thick mist that enveloped his mind. The shadows of the trees were dancing around her, and the wind infiltrated her clothes, but she no longer felt anything. Pain, anger, shame, everything mixed in an inner whirlwind. She had believed, deep down, that her love would be enough to repair everything, to erase everything. But today she understood that there was no room for her in this world. No more space in the pack, more space at his side.
She dropped on the ground, her knees hitting the cold earth. His hands shy when they collapsed the wet grass. She closed her eyes, trying to gather her thoughts. But nothing came. The void was total. Lucian was Alpha, and she was nothing. This link that had united them, this promise of eternity, was now a simple illusion.
She got up slowly, wiping the tears that rolled on her cheeks, unnecessary, silent. She couldn't stay here anymore. There was nothing left for her. Nothing.
The night had fallen, and with it, the cold. Lyra felt her flesh stretched out in shock from the wind, but she didn't pay attention. She got up again and began to walk, without a precise destination, without direction. The world, as it had known, no longer welcomed him.
She had to disappear, that she is erased. May its traces be erased, that its presence is forgotten. There was only one option: moving away from looks, escaping from everything that could attach it to this broken world. The forest seemed to engulf it, each step leading it further from the pack, further from Lucian.
She knew what she had to do. She had to erase her identity, change her appearance. But there was an even more painful truth that she had to accept. There would be no going back. She believed that love could repair what had been broken. But now what was left of her was just crumbs from a past that she could never pick up.
She finally stopped, in the middle of the forest, exhausted and broken. She looked around, trying to spot something, a sign of life, but there was nothing. Than trees, only shadows. Nothing seemed real. Nothing seemed to mean anything.
Lyra clenched her fists and blew. She knew there was no easy way. Not for her, not in this world. So she made a decision, as hard as she is. It was time to erase all traces of its existence. Her eyes landed on the river that served in front of her. The water was dark, calm, relentless. She could erase everything, take everything with her. Her clothes, her trace, her name, everything that attached her to her old life. She knew it was the only way to hide, to disappear. To forget everything.
She turned, decided, and walked in the direction opposed to the river. Not a word, not a thought. Just the certainty that there was nothing left to wait. She would walk until her strength abandoned him. Until it is completely invisible.
Basically, she knew she could always come back. But that was a thought that she would soon chase, a thought that she would try to forget, just as she would erase her past. She had no choice but to get lost in the mist, to blend in in the shadows and to disappear, like a spectrum lost in the night.
It was all over. But pain would be a faithful companion.
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