MATED TO THE SECRET ALPHA-Chapter 246: Older Sister!
Reana stood away from the crowd, overlooking the courtyard, her cloak heavy with frost, her hands clenched at her sides. She watched the reunions and wished, wished it was her and Ryder. At the same time, she saw the pain of those grieving and she felt the rawness. It settled heavily on her chest.
As for the Dark Snow Pack members, their expressions were unreadable, their postures stiff, aloof, detached, watchful.
Some of Reana’s people, who found out the reason their loved ones came back alive, nodded to the Dark Snow members with gratitude, but most avoided their eyes, unsure whether to thank them or fear them. And the Dark Snow members didn’t seem to care either way.
They had done what their Alpha instructed them to do. And now, they stood there, like looming shadows, waiting for their Beta’s command.
Just like every Dark Snow member, the group also knew what had happened to their Alpha. But unlike Tamara who led a charge with bitterness and grief into the Black Moon Pack, the ones who returned from the Wastelands carried a colder, quieter kind of rage.
There was no screaming, no accusations, no bullying. Just silence. A bone-deep, suffocating silence that was somehow more terrifying than Tamara’s fiery wrath.
They didn’t need to shout. Their presence alone was enough to remind Reana of the storm still brewing behind their controlled faces.
Their Alpha was dead.
And though they didn’t say it, they blamed her.
Reana could feel their fury.
They obeyed their Alpha’s command to bring her people back safely, yes. They marched through death and ice and clawed their way back from the Wastelands with her people and supply.
Every step they took, every cart they dragged across snow and ruin, was a silent tribute to the Alpha they had lost.
And now, as they stood straight, eyes cold, aura sharp, Reana knew what was coming.
Reana’s gaze drifted across the crowd, stopping when she spotted a young boy kneeling beside a body wrapped in fur—his father, perhaps. He probably died on the way, from hardship. The child’s shoulders trembled, his small hands clinging to the man’s as though he could will life back into him. A warrior knelt beside the boy, gently pulling him away.
It was a small scene. One that reminded her of how she’d pulled her father and brothers’ bodies into her embrace. How she’d stared into the blue, peaceful sky, wondering why the goddess didn’t show them mercy, wondering if the goddess was happy about feeding her secret hatred towards her.
It reminded her of how she’d held Hale so tightly in her arms, wishing she could have done more to protect him.
But for Ryder, she didn’t even get to hold him for the last time.
A tear rolled down her cheek and she didn’t notice until it was too late. More tears rolled without permission. Her heart arched, her breath catching in her throat like a sob that never quite escaped.
She quickly turned away, wiping her cheek with the back of her gloved hand, as if that could erase the weakness. But the cold didn’t bite her skin as fiercely as the ache in her chest did.
She had buried so many.
Too many.
Her father. Her brothers. Hale.
And now Ryder.
Only... Ryder had never been buried. There was no grave to mourn. No body to hold. Only memories—and glares that made her feel like she had no right to grieve him at all.
She was their Luna. She had to be strong. Proud. Steady. But in that moment, all she could feel was the crushing weight of guilt, of exhaustion, of helplessness.
And yet, even as her grief swelled, she forced herself to stand tall. Her people needed her to be composed. They needed a Luna who wouldn’t shatter when everything else already had.
So she clenched her jaw, pressed her lips together, and breathed deeply—
Once. Twice.
Then her eyes found a man who probably shouldn’t be in this gathering. She didn’t know him. But his aura, the way he stood gallant, eyes locked onto hers like he’d been staring from the moment he stepped into her pack, sent a jolt through her.
He wasn’t dressed like a merchant or warrior. No signs of injury or frostbite. His midnight black cloak with heavy brown fur, though dusted with snow, looked untouched by hardship. Yet he stood among the battered and bruised like he belonged there, and still didn’t.
Tall, broad-shouldered, with long dark, braided and unbraided hair slicked back from the snow and eyes like frozen coals, he held himself with a calm Reana didn’t trust. There was no reverence in his gaze, no curiosity. Only a quiet, unsettling intensity, as if he already knew her. As if he was here for her.
Reana’s breath slowed. The hairs on the back of her neck prickled.
Who was he?
Her wolf stirred inside her, not in warning, but in something murkier – unease laced with intrigue.
She glanced to Kira, to see if her Gamma had noticed him too, but Kira was speaking with a healer, oblivious.
Reana looked back. The man hadn’t moved. Hadn’t blinked.
Beside him, Yaz stood. He bowed slightly to her, then turned to whisper something to the man. Although Yaz didn’t speak much, there seemed to be a quiet respect, or rather fear.
Reana recalled that Ryder spoke of Yaz as being gifted, and a beta. In other words, the respect or fear should be flowing in the opposite direction. Yet, here he stood, beside that man, like a soldier.
"Sister!"
Reana froze. She knew that voice too well. It was Karl.
Her head snapped in the direction. He was wrapped in thick layers of clothes, obviously dumped on him by his mother.
Katherine was pulling him back, refusing to let him acknowledge Reana but he had already done it. Loudly. Publicly. There was no taking it back now.
The buzz died, all eyes turned towards Karl.
"Older Sister!" Karl called again. This time, his voice cracked, not from weakness, but emotion. The kind that made grown men shake and children fall silent.
