Claimed By Four: The White Wolf Luna

POV: Luna

The biting cold of the marble floor seeps through my knees like a promise I never asked for. My fingers curl tightly around the handle of the scrub brush, my knuckles white and my wrists screaming in protest from the repetitive motion. The water sloshing in my bucket is a dull, murky gray, clouded by the filth of noble boot-prints.

Remaining invisible is the only thing that keeps me breathing. The Grand Hall of Aidion is a massive beast of cold stone and vibrant stained glass, where pillars carved with intricate wolf-sigils rise toward a ceiling painted with the legends of our history. All around me, silks rustle and jewels catch the light, yet I remain on my knees in the center of it all, a shadow in a room full of light.

"Wolfless trash." The voice is as sharp as shards of glass, coming from my left. "Why is she even permitted in the hall?".

"Alpha Aiden keeps her around to scrub the blood off the stones," a cruel laugh follows. "Every pack needs its vermin".

I don't look up; I can't afford to. Instead, I focus on the searing burn in my wrists and the sting of my cracked skin. It's a distraction; better than the hollow, aching void in my chest where a wolf should have been.

A shadow suddenly stretches across my bucket, cast by silk that costs more than my entire existence. The air around me seems to curdle like soured milk as a familiar presence looms over me.

Raven.

"You missed a spot, orphan". Her voice is like honey laced with ground glass. I freeze, my heart stopping in my chest.

Her foot connects with the bucket, and dirty water sloshes across the stone, soaking through my dress. The brush clatters from my numb fingers, spinning across the wet floor.

"Look at the mess you've made." Her voice carries across the hall, drawing the amused titters of the surrounding nobles. "If Alpha Aiden has to step in filth because of your incompetence, I'll have you sent to the borderlands of Jathorne".

The borderlands. Where Jace…

I crush the thought immediately. Thinking about the exiled twin is a dangerous game I can't afford to play.

"My apologies," I murmur, pressing my forehead against the wet floor in a show of total submission. "I'll clean it immediately".

"See that you do". Her shadow remains draped over me, her eyes likely studying the curve of my spine, searching for any hint of rebellion to punish. But she won't find it; I’ve perfected the art of becoming nothing.

Beyond her, Alpha Aiden stands by the great windows, scrolls spread across the stone. His silver eyes are cold and calculating as he works, never glancing at her, and certainly never acknowledging me. His presence is absolute, a heavy weight that fills the room.

Suddenly, the heavy oak doors boom open. The stained glass in the windows rattles with the force, and every voice in the hall dies instantly. The warmth is sucked from the air, replaced by something raw, powerful, and terrifyingly alive; a cold born of sheer power rather than the weather.

Jace strides in, looking as though exile has only sharpened every lethal edge he possesses. Even to my wolfless eyes, his black wolf energy is visible, crackling around him like a storm. He is the twin who lost everything.

The hall remains dead silent. Aiden looks up from his scrolls slowly, his jaw ticking once as the twin rivalry hits the room like physical pressure.

"Did you miss me, brother?" Jace’s voice carries a smile I can't see. "Or did you just miss having someone to look down on?".

Aiden’s reply is as cold as polished steel: "You are trespassing, Jace. The truce allows your presence, not your insolence".

"Insolence." Jace laughs, a sound bitter enough to burn. "You'd know all about that, wouldn't you?".

I shrink back into the marble, my heart hammering against my ribs. The fragile truce that keeps the packs from all-out war is fracturing right before my eyes, and I'm stuck on my knees in a puddle of dirty water.

The doors don't close. Instead, the floor begins to vibrate with a deep, ancient tremor. It's something older and heavier than a wolf. Werebear King Orion enters the hall with the slow, inevitable grace of a mountain deciding to move. Earth magic hums beneath his boots, the stone itself recognizing its master, and nobles stumble back to give him space. His massive frame blocks the doorway, his eyes glinting with the weight of centuries.

"The stone remembers the old treaties, Aiden," Orion’s voice rumbles, a sound I can feel in my very bones. "See that your pack honors them today".

Then, the shadows near the pillars seem to unfold. Kai, the Mountain Lion Prince, melts out of the darkness. He is elegant and liquid, wearing a smile that promises death wrapped in beauty, with twin daggers resting at his hips. His golden eyes sweep the room with a lazy, lethal assessment.

"Treaties are just words, King Orion." Kai’s voice is silk dragged over gravel. "Shadows don't read parchment".

Four apex predators occupy a single room. And I, wolfless and insignificant, am trapped between them.

The air grows too thick to breathe. Every instinct I have screams at me to run, but my legs feel like water and my lungs like stone. Suddenly, the light changes. The gold streaming through the stained glass shifts into a bruised, bloody purple. The eclipse has begun.

And in that moment, my blood catches fire.

The pain is instantaneous, a liquid flame tracing the shape of a crescent moon beneath my skin, branding me from the inside out. My brush clatters to the floor as a gasp is torn from my throat. I’m wolfless; I shouldn’t feel the moon. I shouldn’t…

Beneath the fire, something ancient and powerful stirs. A scent hits the air like a shockwave. It isn’t just one; it’s four. 

It is radiating from me.

The four rulers freeze simultaneously, every head snapping toward the floor… toward the servant on her knees, toward the orphan who now smells like every forbidden desire they’ve ever buried.

"What is that smell?" Raven’s voice cuts through the silence. "Who dares…". She stops abruptly, her eyes locking onto me, and the color drains from her face.

I can’t breathe. Four mate bonds pull at me from four different directions, demanding I bare my neck and submit to the predators I’ve spent my entire life hiding from. It’s impossible; the Goddess couldn't have….

Four pairs of eyes lock onto mine, and their masks shatter. Aiden’s eyes bleed into a glowing silver, Jace’s flash a hot, hungry red, Orion’s burn with amber fire, and Kai’s pupils slit like a predator watching from the dark.

Their beasts roar in unison.

"Lunyx preserve us," Aiden’s voice visibly shaky, layered with a growl that vibrates through my chest.

"No." Jace’s fists clench at his sides, his chest heaving. "It’s a trick. It has to be a trick".

The bond pulls taut. Warmth begins to pool low in my belly; intoxicating and terrifying. My body arches without my permission, offering itself up to them. While my logic screams at me to run, a part of me that is no longer empty wants to crawl toward them.

I want it to stop; I want them to touch me; I want to run.

Aiden moves first, his possessiveness overriding any sense of caution. He steps forward, the crowd parting before him like prey before a hunter. His long fingers reach out, brushing sweat-damp hair from my forehead, and his touch burns with both ice and fire.

"She is mine." His voice rings out with absolute authority. "The Goddess has chosen the Alpha of Aidion. Step back, all of you".

But before his hand can grip my shoulder, a black blur intercepts him. Jace shoves his twin back, stepping between us as his charm flares so hot I can smell scorched fabric. His teeth are bared in a snarl.

"You don't get to claim what you threw away, Aiden!" His voice cracks with emotion. "She’s mine. The bond chose the exile!". His demeanor wraps around me like a brand, sparking an even fiercer heat within me.

The truce shatters like glass.

Orion steps forward, the stone cracking beneath his heavy boots. He raises a massive hand, an earth-shield shimmering into existence. "The earth rejects your squabble, wolves. The Queen belongs to the stone".

Kai drops from the shadows, his daggers drawn. His smile is deadly and entirely devoid of humor. "She belongs to the one who can keep her alive, bear. And you're all too slow".

Chaos erupts instantly. Guards draw their weapons, and nobles scream as they scramble for safety. The four rulers form a tight, lethal circle around me, each radiating a chilling intent to kill. The air grows thick with the scent of blood, and the overwhelming heat of the mating bond.

This is no longer a dispute; it is the catalyst for war. And I am the prize.

Aiden and Jace ignore the others, their focus locked entirely on one another. Slowly and deliberately, they both unsheathe their claws, the metallic snikt echoing in the sudden silence. Their red and silver eyes glow in the eerie eclipse light, illuminating my terrified face like twin moons.

"Choose your side, little wolf." Aiden’s voice is low and lethal, leaving no room for escape. "Before we choose it for you".

Four beasts. Four pairs of glowing eyes. Four sets of claws ready to tear each other …and me; apart. The bond screams at me to submit, while terror screams at me to flee. And beneath it all, the fire whispers something I cannot yet understand.

Survival. That is all that matters now.

And I have never been less sure of how to achieve it.