"Hi, yes you aren't dreaming, it's the chubby Kelly," I say inwardly as I see the unhappy face expression of Jason who is disheartened. 

The guests laugh at us. They call our couple all sort of names. "The prince charming and the pancakes' eater Kelly" is one I can sadly remember."

"I, Jason Bentley of the South pack, reject you Kelly Thompson as my mate and the Luna Queen," he declared fiercely.

***
Kelly Thompson, an eighteen-year-old curvaceous and wolfless she-wolf, has been quietly admiring Jason Bentley, the heir apparent to the throne of the dominant South pack, for a number of years.

Unfortunately for Kelly, she doesn't get the same attention in return from Alpha heir Jason, as the handsome daughter of his old father's Gammas, Betty Nord, is already the love of the pack's future Alpha. But, the plump Kelly has an advantage over the skinny Betty because of a strong vow made by Jason's father, the Alpha King Don Bentley, that his son will marry the daughter of his Betas who gave their lives two years ago in a fight against the North pack's fiercest adversaries in order to preserve the life of the Alpha heir.

But clearly, nothing goes as smoothly as Kelly imagines.

The Rejected Curvy Luna Queen

The north isn’t a direction—it’s a *consumption*. 


The tundra stretches endless and ravenous, devouring light, sound, hope. Ice glazes the wastes in a suffocating carapace, the air so cold it crystallizes breath into shards that slice our throats. Eden staggers, his jagged scars glowing faintly through layers of stolen furs, the green embers in his veins guttering like candles in a tomb. The heart, bound by the locket’s chain, mutters in my ribs—a drowsy, venomous thing, its voice thinned by the frost. *“Fools. The Frostbound will pick your bones.”* 


I ignore it. The Frostbound are a myth. A fireside tale the First Wolves whispered to pups. But myths, I’ve learned, are just truths wearing masks. 


To the north