Moonbound: The Rejected Healer

The battlefield reeked of iron and ash. The coppery sting of blood choked the wind, mixing with the acrid smoke of dying fires and the guttural cries of those too stubborn, or too unlucky, to die quickly. Twilight bled across the bruised sky, turning the world a shade darker with every breath.

Elara knelt amid the ruin, the hem of her tunic soaked red, her hands slick with lives she was trying desperately to keep from slipping away. Not her blood. Never her own. But the blood of warriors who clung to life with shredded bodies and fading pulses. Her golden aura pulsed in the dimness, a soft shimmer of defiance in the gloom. It spilled from her palms in waves, coaxing torn flesh to reknit, bones to align, life to hold fast. Every life she saved demanded a little more of her. And she gave it, without hesitation.

Around her, the chaos roared on. Screams. Howls. Steel clashing against claw and fang. Magic crackled in the air like lightning, but she barely noticed. Her focus narrowed to a single breath, a single body, a single chance to pull another soul back from the brink.

And then, it hit her.

Not a sound. Not a scent. A pull. Primal. Absolute.

Like the sudden tautness of a thread she hadn't known existed, one that wove through her bones, her marrow, her breath, and now, someone had yanked it. Hard.

Her breath caught.

She lifted her head slowly, as if some deep part of her already knew what she would find.

Across the carnage, past the firelit haze and the creeping dusk, stood Kael.

Or rather, stumbled. Blood poured from his side, soaking his armor, smearing down his thigh. His left flank was torn open, a savage wound that glimmered with an oily sheen. Poison. It pulsed through his veins, darkening the crimson trail he left in his wake. Yet even wounded, he looked like war incarnate. A living myth. Tall, broad-shouldered, streaked in blood and ash. His silver eyes burned beneath sweat-damp curls, his expression carved from stone.

Kael. Alpha of the Nightfang Pack. Feared. Revered. The kind of man other warriors would follow into death.

And he was hers.

The truth hit her like a thunderclap.

Mate.

The word wasn't spoken. It didn't need to be. It was a knowing, deep and unshakeable. The ancient magic etched into their bones had stirred, called, and collided. And now it screamed: His soul is bound to yours.

Elara didn't think. She moved.

"Move," she whispered, though whether to herself or to the air, she couldn't say.

Her legs carried her across the chaos, the shouts and cries fading around her like mist. It was like walking through a dream, except her heart thundered in her chest, alive and raw. Her wolf rose beneath her skin, pacing, howling, reaching.

By the time she reached Kael, he was falling, one knee in the dirt, a grimace carved across his face.

"Elara?" he rasped, disbelief flickering in his eyes. "You?"

"Quiet." Her hands were already on him, golden light blooming against his ruined side. The wound was deep, the poison spreading fast. But she could fix it. She had to.

"You'll die if you don't let me help," she said, her voice steadier than she felt.

Their eyes met. And in that breath of silence, the bond flared to life.

Her world tilted.

His scent, smoke, cedar, blood, wrapped around her like a storm. Her wolf surged, pressing against her skin with a joy so fierce it burned. Mate. Ours. Finally.

But then Kael's expression shifted. The fire in his gaze turned to ice.

"Stop," he growled, jerking back from her touch.

"You're dying," she said, panic bleeding into her voice. "Let me, "

"I said stop."

The words struck like a slap. She froze, breath catching in her throat.

"You felt it," she said, barely a whisper. "I know you did."

A heartbeat passed.

Then another.

And then, his answer.

"I reject you."

The world shattered.

Her hands dropped from him as if scalded. Around them, the battlefield faded to a distant hum. All she could hear was the ringing silence in her ears and the sound of her own heart breaking.

"I don't accept this bond," Kael said coldly, forcing himself upright. Every movement cost him, but he didn't flinch. "You're a healer. That's all. I don't need weakness tied to me."

The words were worse than the wound in his side.

"You think I'm a weakness?" she asked, the pain cracking through her voice.

He didn't blink. "I think the Moon has a cruel sense of humor."

She swayed on her feet, knees threatening to buckle. But she didn't fall. Didn't beg.

"I saved your life," she whispered.

"And I never asked you to."

Then he turned. Just like that.

By the time his warriors reached him, by the time they formed a protective ring around their wounded Alpha, Elara was already gone, standing like a ghost in the gloom, glowing hands curled at her sides, her face unreadable.

The storm never stopped burning inside her.

,

Later, back in the healer's tent, the silence followed her like a shadow. No one dared speak. No one met her gaze.

They had felt it. The bond. And they had seen it broken.

In their world, that meant only one thing.

An omen.

By dawn, the decree came.

"Exile," the High Seer said, his voice not unkind. "You must leave by sunset."

She didn't argue. Didn't weep.

She packed in silence. Her mother's herb satchel. A worn wolf-tooth pendant. A few scraps of cloth. And the grief she didn't know how to hold.

When she crossed the borders of Nightfang territory, no one followed.

But the wind whispered behind her. A sound like mourning.

Still, she didn't look back.

Didn't cry. Didn't curse.

Because in the place where her heart had once been, something new had begun to take root.

Not vengeance. Not hatred.

Resolve.

She would never be seen as weak again.