LIORA POV
The bucket hit her in the back of the head.
Water poured down her spine, soaking through her thin gray dress. Liora didn't flinch. She didn't turn around. She just kept scrubbing the stone floor with the worn brush, her fingers raw from hours of work.
Behind her, the warriors laughed.
"Look at her," one of them called out. His voice was rough like gravel. "She moved slower today. Getting lazy, Omega?"
More laughter. It echoed through the main hall of Silvercrest Pack like wolves howling at something they wanted to hurt.
Liora's jaw tightened but she didn't respond. Responding was dangerous. She had learned that lesson a long time ago, back when she still thought kindness meant something to these wolves. Back when she thought if she worked hard enough, smiled enough, stayed quiet enough, they might see her as something other than prey.
She was wrong.
The water pooled around her knees. The bucket lay on its side near her feet, empty now. One of the younger warriors kicked it across the floor like it was nothing. Like she was nothing.
She was twenty-two years old and had spent every single one of those years being nothing.
Her silver hair hung down her back in a messy braid, coming loose from the constant work. She could feel the stares even without looking up. Her beauty was a problem. That's what the older Omega women had told her years ago when her hair started growing silver instead of the normal brown. They said a pretty face on an Omega was like putting fresh meat in front of starving wolves. It wasn't a gift. It was a curse.
They had been right.
Just yesterday, a Beta named Kross had cornered her in the supply room. His hands had been rough. His breath had smelled like beer. She had stood very still and made herself small, the way she always did, and waited for it to be over. That was how you survived in a pack where you had no rank, no protection, no value except the one men with power decided to take.
Liora dipped her brush back into the fresh bucket and kept working. The stone floor was cold beneath her bare feet. She had stopped wearing shoes months ago. They wore out faster than the pack would replace them, and no one cared if her feet bled. An Omega's pain was background noise, like the wind.
The warriors moved past her toward the great doors of the hall. Their voices faded as they headed toward the outer grounds. Good. The fewer eyes on her, the safer she was.
But then something shifted in the air.
Liora felt it first in her bones, like a vibration that came from deep inside the earth itself. It made her teeth ache. It made her skin prickle like every hair on her body was standing up. She froze with her brush in the water, staring at her own pale reflection in the bucket.
What was that?
She had never felt anything like it before. It wasn't a sound or a smell or anything she could name. It was just a presence, ancient and heavy and pressing down against her chest like a weight she couldn't escape.
The other servants working in the hall had stopped moving too. She could see it in their faces when she looked up. Fear. They could feel it too.
Old Marta, who worked in the kitchens, was staring at the ceiling like she expected it to crack open. Her hands shook as she held her cleaning cloth.
"What is that?" one of the younger servants whispered.
Nobody answered. Nobody knew.
Liora stood up slowly, her legs stiff from hours of kneeling. The feeling was getting stronger. Whatever it was, it was coming closer. She could sense it moving through the pack territory like something waking up from a very long sleep. The ancient kind of sleep. The kind that lasted centuries.
"The stone," Marta breathed out. "It's the Moonfire stone."
Liora's head snapped toward the old woman. The Moonfire Festival. Of course. Tonight was the night the sacred lunar stone shone brightest. Tonight every pack would gather for the ritual. Liora had known this all week. She had been assigned to serve during the ceremony. It was supposed to be simple. Stand in the shadows. Pour drinks. Be invisible.
But this feeling wasn't simple.
This feeling was alive.
"Girls, get dressed in your finest grays," Marta ordered, her voice shaking slightly. "The ritual begins at sunset. Every pack will be here. Every Alpha. We need to be ready."
The word 'Alpha' made Liora's stomach twist. Alphas meant power. Power meant danger for something like her. An Omega without protection was just a target.
She looked down at her soaked dress. The water was already drying in patches, leaving stains on the fabric. Her hair was a mess. But it didn't matter. She was supposed to be invisible anyway. Pretty or ugly, clean or dirty, an Omega was still an Omega.
She moved to help the other servants prepare for the evening, but her mind wasn't in the work anymore. That feeling in her bones wouldn't go away. It got stronger as the sun moved lower in the sky. It felt like anticipation. It felt like the world was holding its breath.
Marcus Thornhide, the Alpha of Silvercrest Pack, strode through the hall in the late afternoon. His massive frame filled the space. He had a scar that ran from his left eye to his jaw, a reminder of some old battle. His yellow eyes swept over the servants like they were furniture.
Liora made herself smaller. Always smaller.
But Marcus stopped. His eyes locked on her for just a second. Long enough that Liora felt her heart jump. She looked away immediately, staring hard at the bucket in her hands.
Was something wrong? Had she done something wrong?
His eyes released her and he kept walking, but Liora felt like something inside her had registered that look. That measuring look. Like he was seeing her for the first time and didn't like what he saw.
By the time the sun touched the mountains, Liora was dressed and ready. The ritual chamber was high in the mountains where the stone kept its vigil. The journey would take hours. The pack had arranged carriages for the ceremony participants, but servants like Liora would walk behind, carrying supplies.
She wrapped a thicker shawl around her shoulders against the cold that was coming with nightfall. The other servants moved around her in quiet preparation. There was an energy in the compound that felt stretched tight, like something was about to snap.
The Moonfire stone was calling.
Liora could feel it now, a pull toward the mountains that she didn't understand. It felt like hunger. It felt like destiny. It felt like her entire body was waking up to something that had always been there, sleeping under her skin.
She had no idea what it meant.
She had no idea that within hours, everything she was would burn away. That she would stop being invisible. That she would become the most hunted and feared thing in the entire werewolf world.
She had no idea that an Alpha heir from a rival pack was on his way to the ritual at this exact moment. An Alpha who would see her not as nothing, but as everything.
Liora picked up her supply bag and joined the line of servants heading toward the mountains. The moon was rising. It was enormous tonight. Brighter than she had ever seen it. It pulled at something deep inside her, something old and wild and desperate to break free.
The ritual chamber waited above them in the darkness.
The sacred stone waited.
And Liora walked toward her own transformation without knowing it, still invisible, still nothing, still unaware that the world was about to split open.