Anya ran. She didn't know where she was going, only that every step needed to take her further from the Stonehaven hall, from Rhys's venomous words, and from the searing agony of the rejection. The pain in her chest was a raw, gaping wound, and it pulsed with every frantic beat of her heart. Lyra, her wolf, was a silent, whimpering presence deep within her, curled into a ball of shattered spirit, offering no comfort, no guidance, only profound despair.
The night air was a shock to her lungs, cold and unforgiving compared to the stifling warmth of the hall. She stumbled through the unfamiliar landscape, the trees of Stonehaven territory towering over her, ancient and menacing. Unlike the gentle, embracing woods of Whisperwood, these felt watchful, judgmental. Roots tripped her, branches lashed at her face, but she barely registered the scrapes and bruises. All she felt was the tearing void where the mate bond had been, and the chilling echoes of Rhys's accusations. Tainted by deceit and treachery. What had he meant?
It made no sense.
She ran until her lungs burned and her legs screamed, until the grand structures of Stonehaven were mere pinpricks of light far behind her. When she finally collapsed, it wasn't onto soft moss but hard, unforgiving earth beneath a dense thicket of thorny bushes. She curled into a ball, shivering, not just from the cold, but from the shock that rattled her very bones.
Tears, hot and relentless, streamed down her face, soaking into the dirt. She cried for the mate bond that had been given and then so brutally snatched away. She cried for the humiliation, the public shame that would surely follow her forever. Most of all, she cried for the utter loneliness that enveloped her, a crushing weight that promised to suffocate her. Lyra remained silent, a profound emptiness where her wolf's comforting presence usually resided. It was as if a part of her soul had simply ceased to exist.
Hours passed, or perhaps only minutes; time had lost all meaning. The moon, usually a source of comfort and strength for her kind, seemed to mock her tonight, casting long, eerie shadows through the trees. She was a rogue now, without a pack, without a mate, utterly adrift. Fear, cold and sharp, began to prick at the edges of her grief. Rogues, wild animals, the unforgiving elements—she knew nothing of survival in the wilderness. In Whisperwood, she had always been protected. Here, she was nothing but prey.
A distant howl cut through the silence, sharp and chilling. It wasn't the welcoming call of a pack, but something wilder, hungrier. Anya froze, her breath catching in her throat. Her body screamed at her to shift, to run, but her wolf was still unresponsive, a dull ache in her core. She couldn't shift. She couldn't protect herself.
Panic, cold and raw, flooded her. She was going to die out here. Alone. Just as she had always feared. The thought, ironically, brought a strange clarity. She couldn't just lie there and give up. Not yet. A tiny, defiant spark, buried deep beneath the layers of pain and despair, flickered to life. If she was going to die, it wouldn't be without trying. She had to keep moving. She had to find... something. Anything.
With a monumental effort, Anya pushed herself up, her limbs protesting with every movement. Her heart was a raw, exposed nerve, but her feet, against all odds, kept moving forward, guided by nothing more than a desperate, primal need to escape, to survive, to simply not be where she was. She was no longer just running from the rejection; she was running for her life. And the vast, shadowed wilderness stretched out before her, an indifferent, formidable adversary.