Chapter 11 Knox
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Knox
I ran through familiar forest paths toward Moonfall Lake, pushing myself until my lungs burned and my legs screamed for mercy.
But no amount of physical pain could drown out the look on Lina’s face when I called her a warm hole.
The way she’d flinched, as if I’d actually struck her.
The way her voice had gone flat and dead when she’d repeated my words back to me.
Good. Better she hates me than ends up dead because of me.
My wolf snarled at that thought, clawing at my insides with renewed fury. The beast had been in agony since I’d walked out of her apartment, and speaking those formal rejection words had only made it worse. Every step away from her felt wrong on a cellular level, but I kept running.
The Moon Goddess made a fucking mistake.
That’s what this was. A cosmic joke at my expense.
A human mate? Humans couldn’t handle the mate bond.
Their bodies weren’t built for the intensity of it, the way it rewired everything inside you.
I’d heard the stories. Human mates who died during the claiming, their hearts giving out from the strain.
Others who survived only to go insane from the overwhelming connection.
And even if by some miracle Lina survived the claiming, what then? I’d be dragging her into my world. A world where my own parents treated pack members as chess pieces to be moved and sacrificed. Where challenges to my leadership came monthly now that I’d shown weakness by letting Blake die.
My brother’s face flashed through my mind and I stumbled, catching myself against a tree. Two years. It had been two years since that night, and the wound felt as fresh as ever.
I forced myself to keep moving, the lake finally coming into view through the trees. The afternoon sun glinted off the water, peaceful and serene in a way that mocked my internal chaos. I shifted at the water’s edge, letting my wolf take over for the final sprint into the cool water.
The shock of cold against my overheated fur made me gasp, but I dove deeper, trying to wash away her scent. Trying to forget the way she’d felt in my arms, the way she’d called me mate with such trust in her voice. The way she’d given me everything, and I’d thrown it back in her face.
But the water couldn’t wash away what was already branded into my soul.
The mate bond pulsed with every heartbeat, weakened but not broken.
My wolf whined pathetically as we swam, already feeling the strain of the rejection.
Even this run, which should have been simple joy, felt wrong.
Every movement took more effort than it should, as if I was dragging myself through mud instead of water.
I shifted back to human form in the shallows, standing naked at the lake’s edge as water dripped from my hair. The forest was quiet around me, just the gentle lap of waves and the distant call of birds. Peaceful. Normal. Everything I’d never be able to give her.
That’s when Noah’s scent reached me, carried on the afternoon breeze. Pine and earth with that undertone of shared blood that marked him as family. As my brother.
My only brother now.
“You look like shit,” Noah said from the tree line.
I didn’t turn. Couldn’t. It had been two years since Blake died, and I still couldn’t look my surviving brother in the eye without seeing accusation there. Without wondering if he blamed me as much as I blamed myself. The twins had been inseparable their whole lives, and now Noah was alone.
“Thought you’d be satisfied,” Noah continued, his footsteps crunching through the undergrowth as he emerged from the woods. “Mission successful. Rogues eliminated. Town saved. The great Alpha Knox Raven, defender of humans.”
The sarcasm in his voice cut deep. Deeper than any physical wound.
“Don’t,” I warned, but my voice lacked any real authority.
“That was her, the woman at the hotel. Your mate.”
His voice had gone carefully neutral now, the way it did when he was trying not to say what he really thought. The way it had been since Blake’s funeral.
“The whole hotel reeked of a fresh mate bond,” he continued when I didn’t answer. “She smelled like you. Had claiming marks all over her. And then you...”
He didn’t finish. Didn’t need to.
“She’s human,” I said finally, the words tasting of ash.
“I noticed. So?”
“So she’d die.” I grabbed my clothes from where I’d left them, pulling them on with rough movements. “The bond would kill her, or my world would. Either way, she’s better off without me.”
Noah moved closer, and I caught his reflection in the lake’s surface. Green eyes so much like Blake’s it physically hurt to see them. Same messy dark hair. Same stubborn set to his jaw when he thought I was being an idiot. Which was often these days.
“That’s Dad talking,” Noah said quietly. “Not every human who bonds with a wolf dies. There are cases-”
“I’m not gambling with her life!” The words came out as a snarl, Alpha authority rippling through my voice despite my exhaustion.
Noah didn’t even flinch. We’d grown up together. He’d seen me at my worst long before I had any real power.
“And even if she survived,” I continued, pulling my shirt on with more force than necessary, “what then? Bring her here? Present her to our parents? You know what they’d do.”
Marcus and Serena Raven hadn’t held power for thirty years by being soft. They’d see a human Luna as weakness at best, a tool to manipulate at worst. They’d test her, push her, break her down until she either became like them or shattered completely.
“The Raven line has never been weak,” my mother had said at Blake’s funeral, ice in every word. “We’ll have to ensure this... lapse... doesn’t repeat.”
The same way they’d tried to shape their sons.
“So you destroyed her first,” Noah said quietly. “Very noble. Exactly what they would do.”
The words hit harder than any physical blow could have. I spun to face him finally, ready to rage, to pull rank, to do anything to make him stop. But the look on his face killed the words in my throat.
Disappointment. Not anger, not accusation. Just bone-deep disappointment.
“Knox-”
“Don’t.” I turned away again, staring across the lake toward Ravenshollow. Toward home. Toward duty. “It’s done. She’ll move on, find someone human, someone safe. Someone who won’t get her killed.”
“Someone who won’t love her the way a mate would.”
“Someone who won’t destroy her life,” I countered.
Noah was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke again, his voice was soft. Sad.
“Blake was always scared you’d turn out just like them.” He shook his head slowly. “You were proving him wrong, you know. Until now.”
Then he walked away, leaving me alone with that parting shot echoing in my head.
Blake was always scared you’d turn out just like them.
The words burrowed under my skin, finding every doubt, every fear I’d been carrying since the night my youngest brother died.
Blake, who’d believed in fairy tales despite our parents’ example.
Blake, who’d been convinced that love could conquer anything, that mates were sacred, that the Moon Goddess didn’t make mistakes.
Blake, who’d died at twenty-one with his whole life ahead of him.
I dressed mechanically, movements automatic while my mind spun.
Blake had died just three months after I’d taken the Alpha title.
Three months after our father had stepped down at fifty-five, following centuries of Raven tradition.
The powerful led during their prime years, then passed the torch before age weakened them.
I’d barely learned to navigate pack politics when I’d lost my brother. Two years later, I was still failing. Still fighting challenges from wolves who smelled weakness. Still trying to prove I deserved the title when I couldn’t even protect my own family.
How could I protect someone as fragile as Lina?
The image of her in that alley flashed through my mind. Scrambling backward from the rogue, terror in those brown eyes. If I’d been thirty seconds later...
No. This was the right choice. The only choice.
My wolf whined again, weaker this time. The rejected bond was already taking its toll, making me nauseous and shaky in a way that had nothing to do with the run. But I was Alpha. I’d endure. I’d survived Blake’s death. I’d survive this too.
Alone, just as I should have stayed from the beginning.
The walk back to pack territory was agony. Each step felt heavier than the last, as if gravity itself had increased. My wolf had gone quiet, curled into a miserable ball in the back of my mind. The mate bond pulsed with phantom pain, reaching for something that wasn’t there.
By the time I reached the border markers, the sun was starting to set. The guards on duty straightened as they caught my scent, nodding respectfully.
“Alpha,” Marvin greeted, not quite meeting my eyes. “Welcome home.”
Home. Five thousand wolves who looked to me for leadership. A council that questioned every decision. Parents who showed their disappointment in increasingly creative ways.
The guards exchanged glances as I passed, probably wondering why their Alpha looked half-dead. Let them wonder. Let them gossip. As long as none of them knew the truth.
That Knox Raven, Alpha of the Ravenshollow Pack, had found his mate and rejected her. That he was already dying inside from a choice he’d made to keep her safe.
“Better alone than another grave to visit,” I muttered to myself as the pack house came into view.
The words sounded hollow even to my own ears. But I repeated them anyway, a mantra against the pain that was already threatening to bring me to my knees.
The pack house doors loomed before me, and I straightened my spine, shoving the pain down deep where no one would see it. I was Alpha. I would not show weakness.
Even if that weakness was all I had left.