Chapter 4

The Council throws Mira a small send-off in the pack hall.

I come out of the training yard sweaty and bruised, and there she is, sitting in the middle of the long table like a saint about to be martyred. Wolves crowded around her, hands on her shoulders, eyes wet.

"To think the lots picked *you*, Mira. Raelynn's Alpha Quinn's only bloodline heir — *she* should be the one stepping up for the pack. Instead she's busy bullying our Beta heir into mating her. Poor Mira."

"Right? And Raelynn doesn't even have the decency to come see her sister off. Heartless bitch."

Mira lowers her lashes. There's a single tear ready on the edge of one of them. But just behind that tear, I catch the flick of something else — satisfaction.

Then she sees me.

The tear forgets to fall.

She wasn't expecting me. Why would she? Last life I was tearing the pack house apart trying to drag Caden back to the mating altar by his collar. Showing up to her send-off would have been the last thing on my list.

I smile. I walk over. I find an empty chair right at her side, drop into it, cross my legs.

The wolves around her stare. The one closest to me actually pulls her chair back a couple inches.

"What's *she* doing here? Coming to gloat?"

"Don't waste your breath. Mira's just *better* than her. Mira's got the heart of a real Luna. Raelynn watches her sister get sent into rogue territory and doesn't even blink — Alpha Quinn must be ashamed every time he looks at her."

I don't argue.

These wolves were my packmates once. Last life most of them died at the border within a year. The one talking the loudest right now actually took a silver round for me on a raid I don't remember being grateful for. If they want to gossip into their drinks while they're still breathing — gods, let them. It's almost nice.

After a while it gets boring. I push back from the table and head for the door.

"Rae."

Mira catches up to me in the corridor, slips her arm through mine like we're best friends.

"Father told me. About you giving up the mating. That was so generous of you — Caden was always going to be mine anyway, right? You're not going to call it stealing, are you?"

She tilts her head up at me, sweet as poison.

"The lots picked me, but I'm letting *you* have the glory of the mission. We can call it even. So just — be nice to my friends, okay? They're worried about me."

I laugh in her face.

"Glory."

"What?"

"You think if it had been you out there, you'd have come back with glory? With *anything*?"

Her smile freezes.

"Mira. You can't run a training drill without crying. You've never bled for this pack in your life. You really thought you were going to walk into Damon Ravencroft's pack house and out-Alpha *him*?"

I lean in.

"If Father hadn't covered for you, you wouldn't even be a recognized member of this pack. You'd be a stray that wandered in behind your mother."

"I'm taking your mission because somebody has to clean up after you. Don't mistake that for charity."

Her face goes white. Then ugly red.

Then her eyes do this thing — that quick flicker I should have remembered from last life — and her hand snaps up, locks around my wrist, and yanks.

She slaps herself across the face with my own hand.

"Rae — *why* —"

I open my mouth to call her a clumsy little —

A shape blurs in from my left. A hand slams into my shoulder. I go backward, hard, and the small of my back cracks against the stone edge of the rockery.

The pain whites out my vision for a second.

When I can focus again, Caden is in front of Mira. Body angled to shield her. Eyes blazing yellow at me like *I'm* the rogue.

"Raelynn! Since when do you raise a hand on your own sister?!"

"She's leaving on an undercover mission in three days. If she gets hurt now, are *you* going to step in for her?!"