4 Selena's Coming Of Age Ceremony

Alpha Damon was less than happy to receive the resignation letter from his secretary of two years. The female not only embarrassed him before his Beta but she also had the guts to throw a resigning letter in his face when he hadn't even punished her for her actions.

But when he recalled Beta Hamilton's words, his anger vanished and he felt dismissing the female was perhaps for the best.

His image and powerful reputation as alpha of the Dark Moon Pack would be tarnished and shredded to pieces if the neighboring packs came to know his secretary was a wolfless female.

A pretty secretary, no matter how tempting she was, wasn't worth such an embarrassment.

"Hmph! I didn't plan to fire her after finding out about her inability to shift. But since she herself wants to quit, then who am I to stop her?" He coldly sneered.

Within half an hour, Alpha Damon not only accepted Yusria's resignation letter but also processed her sick pay so she wouldn't have any reason to return to the company in the near future.

A few hours later, an announcement of her departure was posted on the employee page of the company website, raising an uproar in the entire branch company.

Unaware of the havoc she left in her wake, Yusria returned to the Setting Dawn Pack right before the sunset.

A chill traveled down her spine when saw the lit-up Dimitri villa.

Outside, Yusria was fearless and uncompromising.

But once she returned to this pack, it was as if an invisible cold shadow engulfed her being and seeped her courage, fighting spirit, and un-bendable will.

Before the Dimitri family, she felt as insignificant and weak as an ant.

"No...I...I cannot allow myself to fall weak. I promised. I made a promise to myself to change the course of my life."

A fierce light flashed through her violet eyes, the silver sheen swirling in her bright pupils as she clenched her fists, took a deep breath, and resolutely moved forward.

"Mom, where is that trash? I need to get my hair done before the full moon arises!"

Selena's irritated voice entered her ears before she crossed the threshold. Yusria raised her head to find her adopted sister anxiously pacing around in her red dress.

"She must be frolicking out there somewhere. Just wait. When she returns, I'll teach her a lesson she'll never forget!" Slumped on a couch with her arms and legs crossed, her adopted mother vehemently vowed with a nasty expression on her face.

"Mom, tonight is my coming of age ceremony. I don't want you scolding and beating her like a dog. It'll ruin my day."

There it was.

Intentional or unintentional, Selena was shielding her.

Yusria's heart throbbed in pain when she recalled the woman of her nightmares and compared her to the girl before her.

What in the blazing he** had gone wrong for this girl to disappear and that hideous monster to replace her?

Until the day she breathed her last, Yusria was unable to find the answer to this question.

"About time you returned. Now that you're grown and married to the Alpha's son, you must believe yourself to be above us all, don't you? Heh...Don't forget the fact that you're a wolfless trash! Do you think whoring yourself to Maximillian Adonis will raise your status in this pack? Because the day he finds his true mate, he'll abandon you like the worthless trash you are. Better yet, he might just keep you as a mistress. A whore to vent his frustrations on."

Like her daughter, Beatrice Vario supported blonde hair and gray eyes that mirrored an overcast sky on a stormy day. As she spat the venomous words upon catching sight of her figure, those stormy gray eyes of hers exuded disgust and scorn.

But where Selena's blonde shined like polished gold, hers was marred with dull strands of brown. Even then, her beauty, like those of all werewolves, was hard to mask and belied her actual age of 50.

Next to her daughter, she looked more like an older sister than a mother.

But at this moment, Yusria wasn't in the frame of mind to admire or envy the unconcealable genetic relationship of the two women. Her muscles had inadvertently tensed at the mention of her scumbag husband.

Maximillian Adonis. Yes, he was her husband.

The man she had given her heart to and blindly trusted in her previous life. The man who betrayed her with her adopted sister.

He had publicly proposed to her on his eighteenth birthday and, pressured by the burning stares of the surrounding wolves, Yusria had accepted his proposal.

But what she never expected was for the guy to rush their marriage within the week. If it wasn't for the fact that Xavier Adonis, the alpha of the Setting Dawn Pack and Maximillian's father had stepped forward to put a stop to the farce, then she would've become the first female in the history of werewolves who got marked before her coming of age ceremony.

Yes...it was this night.

The night her husband of two years would return from his exchange training from the neighboring pack. The night he would mark her under the moonlight.

Bang!

This time it was a vase. The ceramic container smashed on Yusria's head with such force that her ears rang and her surroundings spun.

"You bi**h! What the f**k are you spacing out for? Hurry up and help Selena get ready! You can scheme how to wrap the alpha heir around your thumb when you're done. Get going!"

"Yes, mother." Gritting her teeth, Yusria swallowed the silent whimper on her tongue and wiped off the trickling blood sliding in her eye.

A few more hours.

Just a few more hours and she would be free from this hellhole.

With her head lowered and her eyes red, she followed her adopted sister into her room and began fixing her hair.

"You know...you deserve the way she treats you. If you had developed a backbone early on, then mother wouldn't be throwing things at you like a dog." Selena remarked in an unidentifiable tone.

Her lush blonde hair and golden skin reflected in the antique mirror, displaying her haughty arrogance in full magnitude.

"A dog. You like using that term to refer to me, don't you?" Yusria asked with an ironic smile.

"If you portray yourself as one, I wouldn't have any choice but to address you as so."

"And does that make you happy, adopted sister?"

"It would have. If only it had succeeded in lighting a flame in your heart. Tell me, adopted sister. How do you feel to be addressed as a dog? Do you feel ashamed, livid, resentful, enraged? Anything at all? To allow others to walk over you as they wish, you must not have any sense of dignity at all." The other female smirked with a hint of disappointment in her tone.

An exhausted sigh passed through her lips.

The malicious woman of her dreams who laughed delightfully in her face as she carved her cheeks and forehead with a fruit knife?

Or the prideful sister who talked down to her while reprimanding her for failing to live up to her expectations?

Not for the first time, Yusria wondered who the female in front of her was.

"Even if I feel something, Selena, I wouldn't be able to forget the gratitude from that year."

"Heh! You're telling me that you're living like trash just for that single moment of assistance? If you haven't heard it already, they did it not to save you, but to save themselves."

"But adopted sister...you forget. For whatever reason, if it wasn't for that single moment back then, I wouldn't be here today." Inserting a silver crescent hairpin in the golden curls of the girl, Yusria patted Selena's shoulder and walked out of her room.

17 years ago, Beta Dimitri and his wife Beatrice Vario had saved her for their own selfish reason.

But for Yusria who had lost her family in a single night of slaughter and became stranded in the midst of a dark forest, bleeding, starved, and frostbitten on the brink of death, their selfish motive was a debt of gratitude that could never be repaid.

Because that night, the Dimitri couple had saved her life, she hadn't lost her mind for revenge after her rebirth.

For the debt of saving her that night, Yusria decided to forgive Selena for the torment she made her go through in her previous life.

A life taken for a life saved. From now on, she and the Dimitri were even.

The full moon shined brightly in the clear sky. A light autumn breeze swept through the open region, fluttering the dresses and skirts of the females spectating from the front of their houses. In the center of the pack resident, Selena Dimitri stood under the full moon as the male members of the pack showered her with praises and compliments.

"Selena, you are truly worthy of being our Beta's daughter. There is no match for your radiant beauty!"

"Selena, tonight you look as beautiful as the moon goddess!"

"Congratulation on turning eighteen! May the Moon Goddess bless you with a powerful and worthy mate!"

The fervent cries resounded in the clearing as they enthusiastically called out her name.

With her golden curls glowing like molten gold under the moonlight and the blazing torches roaring on the sides adding a mesmerizing glow to her face, Selena attracted the attention of all the unmated males in the pack.

At this moment, as they watched the glowing female receive the flower crown of maturity on her head, every unmated male present ardently prayed to the Moon Goddess to make them the true mate of the beautiful female.

After all, in both appearance and status, no she-wolf in the Setting Dawn Pack could compete with Selena Dimitri.

Not paying heed to the burning stares on her figure, the young female received her flower crown, raised her head towards the moon and, howled.

"Awhooo!"

Selena Dimitri went on all fours and slammed onto the ground. Her expression filled with pain as she visibly convulsed and twisted on the stone floor, blood following in the trail of her scrapping nails.

Slowly, her clothes ripped and shredded apart, claws replaced nails and before long, the female changed into a brown wolf. The wolf laid limp on the ground for a brief moment, its shallow, uneven gasps resounded in the silent atmosphere before it lifted its head and swept its gaze over the eager males.

"Awhooo!"

With a proud howl, it pushed to its feet, jumped into the crowd, and dashed into the woods.

"Our pack's female will find her mate tonight! Everyone, chase! May the Moon Goddess bless such a beautiful mate to a worthy male!"

"May the Moon Goddess bless such a beautiful mate to a worthy male!"

"Grrrrr!"

"Awhoo!"

Excited growls and eager howls filled the night. Under the full moon of the autumn sky, the males of the Setting Dawn Pack shifted and charged into the woods with feverish, lustful eyes in search of the brown wolf.

Under the same full moon and cover of the dark night, a lean shadow stealthily dashed between the wooden houses of the pack and entered the dark forest.