Substitute Bride, I See the Alpha’s Soul

My name is Roxana. Since I was a child, I have been able to see the departing spirits of dying werewolves. But in the Moonstone Pack, no one ever treated this as a gift. My father called it a curse. My mother said I was a she-wolf forgotten by the Moon Goddess. The best food, the finest room, and the most beautiful dresses in our home all went to my adopted sister, Brittany. Later, Brittany became the promised mate of Alexander, the Alpha heir of the Blackstone Pack. But on the night before the bonding ceremony, Alexander was gravely wounded by a silver-dust trap. His body fell into a coma, while his spirit wandered nearby. The Blackstone Pack demanded that Brittany honor her commitment—stay by Alexander's side and call his spirit back. But in front of everyone, she scorned him as a half-dead, worthless wolf and chose to break the pact rather than waste her life on him. Only I saw the spirit of Alexander standing behind her—and heard his cold promise: whoever would tend to his body, should he wake, would be granted the border herb estate, six hundred thousand gold coins, and the lifelong protection of the Blackstone Pack. So I took Brittany's place and went to the Blackstone Pack. The first time I bathed Alexander's body, his wolf bit my hand. In my panic, I revealed that I could see Alexander's spirit. From that moment on, I no longer had to pretend I couldn't hear him—I began interacting with his spirit directly. Over the next five months, I changed his dressings, read border reports to him, and used cedar, blood orange, and moonleaf to awaken his senses. But just as Alexander was about to wake, Brittany returned to claim the credit, trying to drive me away and take back her place as the future Luna. She thought I was still the "omen of death" she could bully—but she didn't know that Alexander's spirit had been watching all her lies. When Alexander opened his eyes, everyone expected him to recognize Brittany. But he called out to me instead, exposed Brittany's deception with his own hands, annulled their mate contract, and transferred the herb estate and six hundred thousand gold coins into my name. Brittany lost her Luna candidacy and was cast out by the Moonstone Pack that had once spoiled her. My parents were forced to issue a public apology, and the Moonstone Pack paid the price for its complicity in the lies. And I finally understood—I. I was never a curse. I was the anchor that brought Alexander back to life, and the one who could choose her own future.