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### Chapter 1: Chapter 1
The Wolf Prince’s Unwanted Mate is a story about the kind of love that finds you after the world has made you feel unworthy of being chosen.
Jessica Marks begins this journey as an ordinary girl with a soft heart, a quiet life, and a belief in fairy-tale love. She does not crave power, a crown, or a place in royal halls. She only wants to be loved gently and completely. But when fate gives her to Prince Edward Silverstorm, she learns that even a bond blessed by the Moon can become a wound in the hands of someone too weak to honour it.
Then comes Jasper Blackarrow. Feared by kingdoms and whispered about like a monster, Jasper is everything Jessica never imagined for herself — dangerous, scarred, possessive, and brutally honest. Yet where a prince rejects her, this feared Alpha kneels.
This is a story of rejection and healing, softness and power, heartbreak and devotion. It is for every reader who loves a wounded heroine, a dangerous Alpha who falls completely, jealous rage, royal betrayal, deadly pack politics, and a love strong enough to turn an unwanted mate into a woman worth starting a war for.
I hope Jessica and Jasper make you ache, smile, blush, and believe that sometimes the love meant for you does not arrive the way you dreamed.
Jessica Marks has never been in love. At twenty-one, she still believes in the quiet magic of fairy tales — in soft mornings, stolen glances, and a love that chooses you gently and completely. So when every unmated female is summoned to Silverstorm Castle so the crown can find a bride for Prince Edward Silverstorm of the Thundering Storm Pack, Jessica expects nothing more than a brief glimpse of royal life before returning home. She never expects the Moon to choose her. Edward is beautiful, powerful, and already in love with another woman. To him, Jessica is not a blessing. She is an embarrassment. A mistake. An unwanted mate he cannot wait to reject. But rejection is only the beginning. Broken by a bond she never asked for, Jessica wanders into a council room filled with the most dangerous Alphas in the realm — and watches in disbelief as Alpha Jasper Blackarrow of the South Paw Pack rises before them all and kneels at her feet. Jasper is feared, brutal, and merciless in battle. They call him a monster. But when the world casts Jessica aside, the monster claims her as his own. Now Jessica must survive a jealous prince, a murderous rival, and a bond powerful enough to start a war.
Complete Chapters 46 Rating 4.7 ( 48 reviews ) Age Rating 16+ {"language":"en","storyId":1782461,"genres":[{"name":"Romance","path":"/genres/romance"}],"authorName":"Drowned Abyss","authorPath":"/DrownedAbyss","status":"complete","lastUpdatedAt":1791046286,"chaptersCount":46,"rating":4.729166666666667,"reviewsCount":48,"ageRating":"16+"} The Announcement at the Village Square Chapter One -The Announcement at the Village Square
Jessica Marks had always loved the hour just before dusk. There was something tender about it, something almost secret, as though the world had taken one long breath and was holding it. The fields beyond her family’s cottage softened beneath a veil of gold. The small white flowers that grew along the fence leaned towards the fading sun. Smoke rose from chimneys in slow blue ribbons, and somewhere beyond the lane, Mrs Calder’s youngest boy was laughing so hard he hiccupped.
It was an ordinary evening. Jessica loved ordinary evenings. She loved the sound of her mother humming in the kitchen while bread cooled beneath a clean cloth. She loved the clink of her father’s tools from the shed behind the house, the warm, woody smell of freshly carved chair legs and polished oak. She loved the way the village settled into itself at the end of each day, as if every home were a small lantern against the dark.
Other girls dreamed of jewels. Jessica dreamed of a life where someone came home to her - someone kind. Someone who would remember the small things without being asked. How she liked honey in her tea when the rain came down hard. How she read the last page of a book twice when she did not want it to end. How she pressed flowers between old pages and forgot them there until months later, when they fell out like memories.
She had never been in love, not even once. At twenty-one, most unmated girls in the Thundering Storm Pack had already known at least one heartbreak, one stolen kiss behind a barn, one whispered promise beneath a summer moon. Jessica had known books. She had known stories. She had known princes who crossed forests for girls in towers, wolves who guarded maidens from the dark, kings who loved poor girls for their goodness, not their bloodline.
She knew real life was not like that, of course she did - Jessica was romantic, not stupid. Still, some tender, foolish part of her kept believing that love should feel like being chosen gently. Completely. Without having to beg for it.
“Jessica!” Her mother’s voice came from the kitchen window, warm and breathless.
Jessica looked up from the little patch of herbs she had been tending by the fence. Soil smudged her fingers. A curl of chestnut-brown hair had slipped loose from the ribbon at the nape of her neck and clung to her cheek. “Yes, Mama?”
Nora Marks stood in the open window, flour dusting one forearm, her eyes sharp with the kind of concern mothers pretended was ordinary curiosity. “Your father says the bell is ringing.” Nora told Jessica.
Jessica straightened automatically. The village bell did not ring at dusk. Not unless there was a fire, a death, a border warning, or a royal decree. For one strange moment, the evening seemed to tilt. The laughter down the lane stopped. A door opened. Then another. Somewhere nearby a woman called for her children.
Jessica turned towards the centre of the village as the bell rang again, deep and iron-heavy, rolling across the fields. Once. Twice. A third time. Inside Jessica’s chest, her wolf stirred. Ally had been half-asleep, curled in that warm inner place where Jessica felt her most days like a second heartbeat, soft and silver and watchful. Now she lifted her head.
Something is coming. Ally said, and Jessica froze. Her wolf did not often speak without reason. Ally was gentle by nature, more curious than fierce, more likely to notice a wounded sparrow than a threat beyond the trees. She was not timid, not exactly, but she carried her instincts quietly. She had never been like the bolder wolves Jessica heard about from other girls, wolves who snarled for mates and status and moonlit runs.
“What is it?” Jessica whispered.
Ally’s answer came like the brush of fur against Jessica’s soul: I do not know. That response frightened Jessica more than certainty would have.
Her father emerged from the shed, wiping his hands on a rag. Thomas Marks was not a large man compared with the warriors who sometimes rode through the village from the northern road, but he had a steadiness about him that had always made Jessica feel safe. His hair was more grey than brown now, his shoulders bent slightly from years of craft and labour, but when his eyes found Jessica’s, she saw the same unease she felt inside herself.
“Come,” he said. “Best we hear it with everyone else.”
Nora had already appeared at the door, shawl pulled around her shoulders, her flour-dusted hands clean enough but still pale at the knuckles. She looked at Jessica as though she wanted to say something comforting, but the bell rang again, and whatever comfort she might have offered seemed to disappear beneath the sound.
They joined the others moving towards the village square. Their village, Brackenridge, sat close enough to the royal road to hear news quickly, but far enough from Silverstorm Castle that crowns and court politics felt more like weather in another country. The Thundering Storm Pack was vast, old, and powerful, its royal family seated in a castle most villagers had only seen on coins, festival banners, and carved ceremonial tablets in the Moon Hall.
Jessica had seen a painting of Silverstorm Castle once in a travelling merchant’s book. Towers rising like spears into the clouds, silver banners snapping from impossible heights, and frost-white stone lit by moonlight. It had looked too beautiful to be lived in. It looked like something from a story.
By the time the Marks family reached the square, most of Brackenridge had gathered beneath the old clock tower. Mothers held children close. Young men stood with their arms folded, pretending not to be anxious. Several unmated girls Jessica’s age clustered together near the fountain, whispering with wide eyes. Jessica recognised them all. Clara Bell, who had golden curls and a laugh that made men turn their heads. Amelia Frost, whose father owned half the grazing land beyond the river. Tessa Vale, tall, sharp-faced, ambitious, and already dressed as though she expected the announcement to concern her personally.
Jessica stayed beside her parents. It was not that people were cruel to her ... at least they were not usually cruel. They simply did not look at her the way they looked at girls like Clara and Tessa. Jessica was liked, in the way people liked warm bread or clean linen or a familiar song. She was pleasant, dependable, sweet. No one looked at sweet girls and thought of destiny.
At the foot of the clock tower stood Beta Corwin Hale, the royal-appointed governor of their district. He was a broad, severe man with silver threading through his black beard and the faint scar of an old claw wound across his jaw. Beside him stood two mounted royal guards in dark blue uniforms trimmed with silver. The crest of the Thundering Storm Pack gleamed at their shoulders: a wolf beneath a crown, lightning splitting the sky behind it.
The square quietened. Even the children seemed to understand that something important had reached them. Beta Corwin unrolled a parchment sealed with silver wax. Jessica felt her mother’s hand slip into hers.
“By decree of Alpha King Alfred Silverstorm,” the Beta began, his voice carrying across the square, “and by the blessing of Luna Queen Livy Silverstorm, let this summons be heard in every village, town, province, and border settlement under the protection of the Thundering Storm Pack.” A murmur travelled through the crowd, and Jessica’s fingers tightened around her mother’s.
Beta Corwin continued. “The Crown hereby calls all unmated females of eligible age, born of loyal pack blood and free of existing bond, promise, or claim, to present themselves at Silverstorm Castle before the next full moon.” The world seemed to go very still for a moment. Then beside the fountain, one of the girls gasped.
Jessica blinked. All unmated females?
“The Crown believes,” Beta Corwin said, each word formal and heavy, “that the time has come for His Royal Highness, Alpha Prince Edward Silverstorm, heir to the Thundering Storm Pack, to take a bride and prepare for his future rule.”
This time, the square erupted in a million whispers. No one dared speak over the royal decree while the Beta still held the parchment. But sound rippled through the crowd all the same: sharp breaths, whispered names, a stifled laugh, a mother’s startled prayer.
Prince Edward Silverstorm, even in Brackenridge, his name had weight. Jessica had never seen him, of course; very few had. But rumours of him travelled farther than royal messengers. He was said to be beautiful beyond reason, with hair pale as winter sunlight and eyes like blue fire. He was said to be powerful, brilliant, untouchable. Some said he had never lost a sparring match. Others said his wolf was a creature of pure silver and storm.
Girls spoke of him the way they spoke of legends. Even Jessica, who did not enjoy gossip, had once heard Clara Bell sigh that the prince’s mate would be the luckiest woman alive. Now Clara stood near the fountain with both hands pressed to her mouth, her eyes shining.
Beta Corwin lifted one hand, and the murmuring faded. “All summoned females shall be received at Silverstorm Castle and presented before the royal family. The Moon’s will shall be honoured. The Prince’s bride shall be chosen in accordance with sacred law, royal tradition, and the good of the realm.”
The Moon’s will. Jessica felt Ally go very quiet inside her. A strange sensation moved over Jessica’s skin, not quite a shiver, not quite a breeze. For a heartbeat she had the impossible feeling that something had turned its face towards her from a very long way away. Then it passed, and she exhaled.
“Those who fail to attend without lawful exemption will be considered in breach of royal decree,” Beta Corwin finished. “Travel arrangements shall begin at dawn in two days’ time. Families will present names to the district office before noon tomorrow.” He rolled the parchment. The announcement was over.
For several seconds, no one moved. Then the square broke open with noise. Mothers began speaking over daughters. Fathers frowned. Girls clutched each other’s hands. Someone laughed in disbelief. Someone else began to cry. Clara Bell was surrounded at once by her sisters, all of them whispering as though she were already halfway to becoming royalty.
Jessica stood very still. This all felt absurd. Not frightening exactly, well at least not yet. It was more like someone had opened a door in the middle of her ordinary life and revealed a corridor that should not have existed - Silverstorm Castle. Prince Edward. A royal bride selection. All unmated females ...which meant her.
“Jessica,” her mother said softly.
Jessica turned to see that Nora’s face was pale. “I have to go,” Jessica said, because it was the first true thing her mind could find.
Her father’s jaw tightened. “We will see if there is some exemption.”
“There won’t be,” Nora said quietly, and Thomas looked at her. Nora’s eyes did not leave Jessica. “She is twenty-one. Unmated. No promise. No claim.” Her mouth trembled a little before she pressed it firm. “The decree applies.”
“But surely they do not expect every girl to be truly considered,” Thomas said, frustration roughening his voice. “This is politics. They will choose some Alpha’s daughter. Some noble girl raised for court. Not—” He stopped. Not our Jessica. He did not say it cruelly. That was the worst part.
Jessica almost smiled to comfort him. “I know, Papa,” she said. “I know they won’t choose me.” Because they would not. Of course they would not. Jessica thought.
Jessica Marks from Brackenridge, with soil beneath her nails and three patched hems in her travelling cloak, was not the sort of girl a prince looked at twice. She was not the sort of girl who married into castles. She was the sort of girl who read about those marriages by candlelight while her mother slept in the next room and the winter wind tapped gently at the glass. She did not belong in royal halls. She knew that.
Ally shifted inside her and asked. Do we have to go?
Jessica’s heart softened. “Yes,” she whispered inwardly. “I think we do.”
Around them, the village continued to churn with excitement and fear. Tessa Vale’s mother was already discussing gowns. Clara Bell was crying now, but smiling through it, as if overwhelmed by the possibility of being chosen. Amelia Frost stood very straight, chin lifted, eyes bright with calculation.
Jessica watched them and felt oddly distant. There were girls here who wanted this. Girls who would step into Silverstorm Castle with hope blazing in their chests. Girls who had imagined a prince seeing them and knowing, instantly and forever, that they were the one the Moon had made for him.
Jessica had imagined love like that too, not with a prince, never with anyone so grand. But in secret, in the tender privacy of her own heart, she had imagined recognition. A man looking at her and softening. A wolf seeing Ally and choosing her. A bond that felt not like a trap, not like a duty, but like coming home. Her cheeks warmed at the thought, and she looked down before anyone could see the foolishness in her face.
It was only a visit, she told herself. Two days of travel. A presentation. Perhaps a glimpse of the castle library, if she was lucky. A hall full of girls far more suitable than she would ever be. Then home again to Brackenridge, to her mother’s bread and her father’s steady hands and the little herb garden by the fence. Nothing more.
“Jess,” her father said, voice gentler now and she looked up. Thomas reached for her free hand. There was worry in his eyes, but something like pride too, which made Jessica’s throat ache. “You keep your head up there, do you hear me? Crown or no crown, castle or no castle, you are no less than any girl in this kingdom.”
Jessica swallowed. “I know.” She did not know, not really. But she loved him for saying it.
Nora touched Jessica’s cheek with semi flour-rough fingers. “And you remember that beauty can be loud, but goodness lasts longer.”
Jessica let out a soft, shaky laugh. “Mama.”
“I mean it.” Nora’s eyes shone. “Do not let those polished girls make you feel small.”
Jessica glanced again at Clara, Tessa, Amelia, all bright and excited and already half-transformed by possibility. “I do feel small,” she admitted.
Her mother’s face changed, tenderness folding into something fiercer. “Then feel small and go anyway.”
For some reason, those words settled deep in Jessica's bones. Feel small and go anyway. Jessica nodded.
Above the square, the first star appeared in the lavender sky. The Moon had not yet risen, but Jessica felt its absence the way one felt a room before someone important entered it. The air seemed charged, waiting and watching. She looked towards the north, where the royal road vanished beyond the hills. Silverstorm Castle waited somewhere at the end of it. The prince waited too, but not for her, of course. There was no way he could be waiting for her.
Still, inside her chest, Ally stood and turned towards the road, ears pricked, silver eyes fixed on something Jessica could not see. Jessica pressed a hand lightly over her heart. “What is it?” she whispered again.
For a long moment, her wolf did not answer. Then Ally said, very softly, very uncertainly: The Moon feels restless.
Jessica stood in the village square beneath the fading gold of an ordinary evening, surrounded by girls dreaming of crowns, parents whispering of duty, and royal guards waiting beside silver-crested horses. She tried to tell herself nothing was beginning. She tried to tell herself she would go to the castle, stand at the back, be overlooked, and return home unchanged. But far above Brackenridge, beyond the clouds gathering over the northern hills, the unseen Moon seemed to pull one thin silver thread through the darkening sky, and somewhere deep inside Jessica Marks, something answered.
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### Chapter 2: Chapter 2
By the time Jessica returned home from the village square, the bread on the kitchen table had gone cold. It sat beneath the clean cloth her mother had embroidered years ago, the one with tiny blue flowers stitched around the edges, and somehow the sight of it made Jessica’s throat ache. Only an hour ago, it had been part of an ordinary evening. Her mother had been humming. Her father had been sanding wood in the shed. Jessica had been kneeling beside the herb patch with soil on her fingers, thinking about mint and rosemary and whether the rain would come before morning.
Now the bread looked like something left behind by another life. The cottage was warm when they stepped inside, though no one moved towards the hearth. Nora closed the door and stood with one hand still resting against it, as if the world outside might force its way in if she let go. Thomas hung his coat on the peg by the wall, missed the hook the first time, then muttered under his breath and tried again. Jessica noticed these small things because she did not know where else to put her eyes. The royal decree had followed them home. It was there in the silence. In the untouched loaf. In the way her mother kept glancing towards Jessica and then away again, as if looking at her too long might make her vanish. It sat between the three of them like an uninvited guest.
“All right,” Nora said at last, too briskly. “We should eat.”
Jessica knew that voice. Her mother used it when storms cracked branches across the lane, when money was tight, when someone in the village fell ill, and there was nothing to do but boil water, fold cloths, and keep one’s hands busy. “Mama, I’m not hungry.”
“You will be.” Nora said calmly.
“I don’t think—” Jessica started.
“You will be,” Nora repeated, softer this time, and went to the stove.
Jessica looked at her father. Thomas had lowered himself into his chair by the table, elbows on his knees, hands clasped between them. The lamplight deepened the lines around his mouth. He was staring at the floorboards as though they might offer some hidden path around royal law. “There may still be a way,” he said.
Nora did not turn from the stove. “Thomas.”
“I said may,” Thomas said quietly.
“The decree was clear,” Nora repeated.
“Decrees are written by men who do not have daughters,” Thomas said, and her mother went still.
Jessica’s heart folded painfully. “Papa,” she whispered.
Thomas looked up, and the anger in his face broke into something rawer. “Two days’ travel,” he said. “To Silverstorm Castle. With royal guards and strangers and every ambitious family in the district throwing their daughters forward as if girls were coins to be placed on a table.”
“It is not as though they will choose me,” Jessica said gently.
Her father’s eyes sharpened. “That is not comfort.”
She tried to smile, but it did not quite work. “It was meant to be,” Jessica said.
Nora set three bowls on the table with more care than necessary. They contained stew thick with potatoes, carrots, and the last of the beef saved from market day. Jessica usually loved it. That night, the smell turned strangely heavy in her stomach.
They sat together. For a while, the only sounds were spoon against bowl, the faint spit of the fire, and the occasional groan of the cottage beams settling into night. Jessica ate because her mother watched until she did. After three bites, Nora seemed satisfied enough to let her gaze drift towards the window. The sky beyond it was dark now. The Moon had risen at last, pale and nearly full, its light spilling across the lane and catching on the frost-silvered edges of the garden fence. Jessica felt Ally stir restlessly in her chest.
Jessica lowered her spoon. “What happens when I get there?” she asked.
Neither parent answered immediately. Thomas drew a slow breath. “You will be presented, I suppose. Along with the others.”
“In the great hall,” Nora said, still looking at the Moon. “That is how the old selections were done, when royal sons had not found their mates by the proper age.”
Jessica blinked and asked. “You know about them?”
“Everyone knows a little.” Nora looked back at her. “Stories travel. Traditions too.”
Jessica had heard fragments, of course, all pack children did. That the Moon chose mates through scent, instinct, and soul-recognition. That some wolves knew instantly. That some bonds awakened slowly. That royal blood complicated everything because a prince did not merely take a mate; he chose the future Luna of an entire kingdom. But stories told beside winter fires felt very different from a sealed decree read in the village square.
“Did they ever choose someone ordinary?” Jessica asked before she could stop herself. Her father’s mouth tightened.
Nora answered, “The Moon does not care for ordinary and noble the way people do.”
Jessica looked down at her bowl. That sounded beautiful. It also sounded dangerous. In books, when the poor girl was chosen, the court eventually loved her. The prince saw goodness where others saw plainness. The cruel ladies were humbled. The heroine wore a gown that made the room gasp. Where love conquered bloodline, jealousy, and pride before the last page. Real courts were not made of paper. Real princes did not always have kind eyes.
“You are thinking too much,” Nora said.
Jessica gave a small, embarrassed laugh. “I think that is the only thing I am good at.”
“That is not true,” her father said. “You are good at many things.”
“Name three.” Jessica snorted without thinking.
He lifted his chin and said. “Growing herbs.” Despite herself, Jessica smiled.
“Reading impossibly thick books no one else understands.” Thomas continued.
“I understand most of them.” Jessica clarified.
“And making your mother and me feel as if this house has a heart.” Thomas finished with an air of pride.
The smile fell from Jessica’s face. Her mother turned away quickly, but not before Jessica saw tears in her eyes. “Oh, Mama.”
“I am fine,” Nora said at once.
“No,” she admitted, her voice breaking a little. “I am not.”
Jessica stood and went to her. Nora caught her before she was even fully around the table, pulling her into the kind of embrace Jessica had known all her life: flour and lavender soap, strong arms, warm shoulder, a hand pressed to the back of her head as though she were still small enough to be hidden from the world. Jessica held on tightly. She was twenty-one. A grown woman. Old enough to be summoned before royalty. Old enough for the Moon to decide her future. But in her mother’s arms, she felt suddenly five years old, frightened by thunder.
“It is only a few days,” Jessica whispered, though she did not know that. “I will go. I will stand there. The prince will choose someone who actually belongs in a palace. Then I will come home.”
Nora kissed her temple and said. “You belong anywhere you stand with your dignity intact.”
Jessica closed her eyes, and Ally made a soft sound inside her, almost like a whine. Home, her wolf said. Jessica felt it too. This cottage was not grand. The windows rattled when the northern wind blew too hard. The floorboards near the pantry creaked. The roof had needed patching twice in the past year. Her bedroom was small, with one shelf of books, one narrow bed, one chipped blue vase she filled with wildflowers whenever she could. But it was home. And leaving it because of a royal command felt less like an honour than the first step into a story whose ending she could not read.
Later, when the bowls had been washed, and her father had gone to check the horses with a lantern in one hand, Jessica climbed the narrow stairs to her room. It was just as she had left it. Her book lay open on the bed, face down, spine protesting. A pressed daisy had slipped from between the pages and landed on the quilt. Her travelling cloak hung from the peg by the door. Moonlight spilled through the little window, turning everything silver.
Jessica stood in the doorway for a moment, overcome by a ridiculous urge to apologise to the room. As though it would miss her. As though the blue vase and the worn rug and the stack of books by the bed were old friends she was abandoning. “You are being silly,” she told herself. Ally did not answer.
Jessica crossed to the bed and picked up the fallen daisy. It was flattened almost transparent, its petals faded to cream. She had pressed it last spring, after finding it near the stream on a day when rain had fallen while the sun still shone. She remembered thinking then that a sunshower felt like the kind of weather that happened when someone in a story fell in love. She gave a quiet laugh at herself.
“Hopeless,” she murmured. She set the daisy carefully back between the pages and closed the book. It was one of her favourites: a tale of a miller’s daughter who saved a cursed wolf-king from his own loneliness. The heroine had not been the most beautiful woman in the kingdom, nor the richest, nor the boldest. She had simply been kind enough to listen when everyone else feared him.
Jessica had read it six times. The wolf-king always knelt in the final chapter. Every time, it made her cry. Not because he was a king. But because he was sorry. Because he had learned love was not possession, nor pride, nor power, but a vow made with humility. Jessica touched the cover.
“Fairy tales are going to ruin me,” she whispered.
No, Ally said softly, and Jessica stilled. Her wolf’s voice was gentle, but there was something beneath it now ...not certainty, not warning exactly. It was more like grief for a future neither of them understood. They taught us what to hope for.
Jessica sat on the edge of the bed. “What if what we hope for does not exist?” Ally’s silence was answer enough.
For a long while, Jessica remained there, hands folded in her lap, watching moonlight gather on the floor. Then, with a breath that shook only slightly, she stood and took her small travelling case from beneath the bed. Packing should have been simple. Two dresses. Three underthings. Stockings. Comb. Soap. Hair ribbon. Her mother’s mending kit. The pale blue shawl she wore for festivals. A pair of soft shoes, though the soles were nearly worn through. A clean nightdress. Her best dress, which was not very grand at all, but had tiny pearl buttons at the cuffs and a neckline trimmed with lace Nora had saved for months to buy.
Jessica laid everything out on the quilt. It did not look like enough for a castle. She imagined the other girls arriving with trunks. Silk gowns. Perfume bottles. Jewelled combs. Mothers fussing over hemlines. Servants carrying hatboxes. Jessica had one case with a cracked handle and a blue shawl darned twice at the edge. Her cheeks burned even alone.
“Perhaps I should not take the best dress,” she said.
Ally gave the inner equivalent of a snort. Take the dress, Ally said.
“It will look plain,” Jessica said.
Take the dress, Ally said again.
Jessica smiled faintly. “You are very commanding tonight.”
I am a wolf, Ally said by way of explanation.
“You are usually a very polite wolf.” Ally countered.
I am worried. Ally said quietly.
The smile faded. Jessica folded the dress carefully and placed it in the case. She was worried too. A soft knock came at the door. “Come in,” she called.
Nora stepped inside carrying a candle and something folded over her arm. She had washed the flour from her skin, but her eyes were still too bright. “I brought you something.”
Jessica looked at the folded bundle. “Mama?”
Nora crossed the room and shook it out. It was a cloak. Jessica knew it at once, though she had not seen it in years. Deep grey wool, soft but sturdy, lined with faded blue silk at the hood. Nora’s winter cloak from before Jessica was born. The one she had worn in the old portrait tucked above the mantel, where she stood beside Thomas on their bonding day, smiling as though the world had just handed her the life she wanted.
Jessica’s lips parted. “No. I can’t take that.”
“It is yours.” Jessica tried to protest.
“And now I am giving it to you,” Nora said with a small nod.
“The road is cold,” Nora said matter of factly.
“I have my cloak.” Jessica reminded her mother.
“Your cloak lets the wind through,” Nora said steadfastly.
Jessica looked at the garment, then at her mother’s face. “You love this cloak,” she whispered softly.
Nora’s smile trembled and said. “I love you more.” The room blurred as Jessica tried not to cry. It seemed important not to begin, because if she did, she might not stop before dawn. Nora placed the cloak on the bed and smoothed one hand over the wool. “My mother gave it to me before I left home to be bonded to your father,” she said. “I was terrified.”
Nora laughed under her breath. “Completely. I thought I would disappoint everyone. I thought your father would wake one morning and realise I was not nearly as lovely or clever or useful as he had imagined.”
Jessica stared at her and said. “Papa worships you.”
“Yes.” Nora’s smile softened. “But I did not know that then.” She sat beside Jessica on the bed and took her hand. “Love is not always what girls are told it will be,” Nora said. “Sometimes it is less grand, but better. Sometimes it comes quietly. Sometimes it must be grown with patience. Sometimes the Moon chooses well ...and sometimes people fail what the Moon gives them.”
Jessica looked down at their joined hands and asked. “What does that mean?”
“It means a bond is sacred, but character still matters,” Nora said honestly.
The words settled heavily upon Jessica. She thought of Prince Edward Silverstorm, whom she had never seen, who was said to be beautiful beyond reason, powerful beyond doubt, destined beyond question. Character still matters.
“What if the prince is kind?” Jessica asked, though she did not know why.
“Then his mate will be fortunate,” Nora said quietly.
“And if he is not?” Jessica asked before she could help herself.
Nora’s thumb brushed over Jessica’s knuckles and said. “Then remember that no crown makes cruelty holy.” Jessica looked up. Her mother’s face was calm now, but fierce beneath the calm. “You listen to me, Jessica Marks,” Nora said. “If you feel small in that castle, stand anyway. If they look through you, let them. If they laugh, survive it. If someone tries to make you believe you are lesser because you were not born polished, remember that the Moon saw you before any of them did.”
Jessica’s eyes filled with tears and she cried. “Mama.”
“No.” Nora squeezed her hand and said softly. “Promise me.”
Jessica nodded and said. “I promise.”
Nora drew a breath, then reached into her apron pocket. “And this.” She opened her palm and a ribbon lay there. It was not new or expensive. It was pale blue satin, slightly faded, the ends carefully trimmed. Jessica recognised it too. It had been tied around her cradle in the old stories Nora told when she was in a sentimental mood.
“You kept that?” Jessica asked in disbelief.
“Of course I kept it.” Nora smiled through her tears. “You were the only miracle I ever had.”
That broke Jessica. She leaned forward into her mother’s arms and cried quietly, trying to be brave and failing in the safest place she knew. Nora held her without telling her to stop. For several minutes, the room contained nothing but the candle flame, the moonlight, and the soft sorrow of a mother and daughter who both understood that obedience could still feel like loss.
When Jessica finally pulled back, Nora wiped her cheeks with the corner of her sleeve. “There,” she whispered. “You will arrive with red eyes and frighten the prince away.”
A laugh burst out of Jessica before she could help it. Nora laughed too, though hers turned into another small sob at the end. Jessica picked up the ribbon. “Where should I wear it?”
“In your hair. Around your wrist. Tucked into your book. Wherever you need reminding that you were loved long before any royal hall had an opinion about you.”
Jessica closed her fingers around it. Loved long before. She liked that.
After Nora left, Jessica finished packing by candlelight. She added the ribbon last, folding it carefully into the front pocket of her case. Then she hesitated and looked at the shelf above her bed. She could not take all her books, yet choosing just a few felt impossible. In the end, she took the wolf-king fairy tale. Perhaps it was childish. Perhaps the other girls would bring jewellery and perfume while Jessica carried a worn old romance with softened corners and tear stains on chapter twenty-three. But the book had comforted her through lonely winters, through village dances where no one asked her twice, through birthdays that came and went without even the hint of a first kiss. It had taught her that monsters could be lonely, girls could be brave while afraid, and love, real love, should make even kings kneel. She slipped it into the case beneath her shawl.
Outside, hooves sounded faintly on the road. Royal guards, perhaps, riding to the next village with the same decree. Or travellers heading home before full dark. Jessica went to the window and looked out. Her father stood by the fence below, lantern in hand, staring north. For a moment, he looked older than he had that morning. Jessica pressed her palm to the glass. She wished she could stay. The thought came so sharply it stole her breath.
She wished she could crawl back into the life she had known before the bell rang. Wake tomorrow and tend the herbs. Help her mother roll pastry. Watch her father shape wood into something useful and lasting. Walk to the stream with a basket over her arm. Come home to bread, lamplight, and an unread chapter waiting by her bed. Such small things. Such precious things. People dreamed so loudly of power that they forgot the miracle of peace. Jessica had never forgotten. That was all she wanted - peace. A home. A man who loved her with steady hands. Children laughing someday in a kitchen that smelled of cinnamon. A garden. Books stacked on shelves. Rain against windows. A life made of simple, everyday wonders most people passed through without even looking.
Was it too much to ask? she thought.
The Moon hung above the village, silver and watchful. Jessica rested her forehead against the cool glass. “Please,” she whispered, though she did not know exactly what she was asking. “Let me come home unchanged.”
Ally moved inside her, slow and uneasy. The Moonlight brightened, and for one impossible second, Jessica thought she saw a thread of silver stretching away from her window, across the lane, beyond the fields, over the dark northern hills towards a castle she had not yet seen. A thread pulled taut, waiting. Then she blinked, and it was only moonlight.
Jessica drew the curtains. She changed into her nightdress, braided her hair, and climbed into bed, though sleep felt very far away. The case sat packed beside the door. Her mother’s cloak lay folded over the chair. The fairy-tale book was hidden inside her luggage like a secret heart. The cottage creaked softly around her. Downstairs, she heard the low murmur of her parents’ voices. Her mother said something too quiet to catch. Her father answered, voice rough. Then silence.
Jessica turned onto her side and tucked one hand beneath her cheek. “Ally?”
“Do you think fate is kind?” Jessica wondered out loud.
Her wolf did not answer quickly. Jessica stared at the faint line of moonlight beneath the curtains. At last, Ally said, I think the Moon sees farther than we do.
“That is not the same thing,” Jessica said softly.
Jessica closed her eyes. Her heart beat too loudly. Tomorrow, her name would be written for the district office. The day after, she would leave Brackenridge with other unmated women and begin the two-day journey to Silverstorm Castle. There would be girls with better gowns, better manners, brighter smiles, stronger bloodlines. There would be royal halls and polished floors and a prince beautiful enough to make women dream. And Jessica would stand at the back. She would keep her head up, as her father had said. She would remember that beauty could be loud, but goodness lasted longer, as her mother had said. She would feel small and go anyway.
Perhaps no one would notice her. Perhaps the prince would choose someone else. Perhaps she would return home with stories of chandeliers and castle towers and nothing more. Jessica held that hope close. But deep inside, Ally remained awake long after Jessica’s thoughts began to blur. Her wolf sat in the silver dark of their shared soul, ears pricked towards the north, listening ...waiting.
And just before sleep finally took Jessica, she heard Ally whisper one last thing. Something is waiting for us on that road. Jessica wanted to ask whether it was good or terrible. But dreams pulled her under before she could form the words. Outside, the Moon watched over Brackenridge in silence, bright and nearly full. And far away, beyond hills and forest and the cold stone walls of Silverstorm Castle, destiny began to turn.
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