Aysel's POV I had long understood one truth-precisely because I knew what truly mattered to a wolf, I could see through Celestine with painful clarity. The Moonvale Pack and Damon were nothing in the grand scheme of it. Celestine's struggles had never been about family or love. Her battleground had always been the stage. I understood this. Celestine understood this. To destroy a wolf, to cast her into true hell, has never required stripping away love or kinship. No. You crush her by taking the one thing she relies on-her dignity, her pride, the talent that lets her rise again from any abyss. Affection can be stolen. Love can be manipulated. Pack politics can be maneuvered. But a wolf's innate gift-her prowess-never lies. Years ago, when I collapsed under the weight of everything, the stage was the only place I could breathe. I poured every wounded piece of myself into dance, blooming like a flower in barren frost-so radiant that even Celestine, who already possessed so much, burned with envy. Outside the suffocating territories of the Moonvale Pack, I was reborn. No longer the caged little girl they kept smothered under guilt. No longer the child drowning in inherited sin. Before audiences and master choreographers, I became untouchable. Claws sheathed, head high, I dazzled anyone who dared to watch. In those moments, the favoritism of my kin, the betrayals of childhood bonds-none of it mattered.And Celestine realized something terrifying. The girl she had bound-like a butterfly trapped beneath debts of blood and gratitude-was about to break free. The fatal blow came when Giovanna, the idol Celestine had worshiped for years yet barely dared approach, extended an olive branch- not to her, but to me. Celestine had begged her parents, forced them to pull strings, and even then, she only received an audition because she was known as "Aysel Vale's sister." She fought so hard for that opportunity. But she never dared to take it. Because to stand on the same stage as me- me, the once-in-a-generation phenomenon- was like entering a sprint where I was the eternal 0.01 seconds she could never outrun. A nightmare. So Celestine struck first. Unlike me, she had nothing binding her paws. No ancestral debts. No burden of guilt. Yuna Ward died when I was still young, and everyone fed me the same poison: Your aunt died because of you. Your sister lost her mother because of your impulsiveness. So when I looked at Celestine-Yuna's daughter, the girl I believed I owed everything-I always felt lesser. Even when I lost parents, status, identity- even then, they called it atonement.I believed I could only work harder. Jump higher. Endure longer. If I could secure a master's tutelage, I could justify leaving Moonvale behind. I was seventeen, and I was trying to save myself. A good, gentle wolf only thinks of one solution- becoming stronger, sharper, unbreakable. But Celestine, whose eyes had been opened to the ways of adults long before mine, was crueler. And so she won. When the healers told me that my body would never again withstand the brutal demands of professional dance, all hope collapsed in a single breath. Celestine had never seen me so shattered. Not even when the Moonvale elders locked me for nights in the dark isolation chamber. That night, she stood outside my door. Inside, my sobs were muffled and strangled-sounds scraped raw from the heart. They mingled, she once told me, with memories from her childhood: the helpless cries of a little girl trapped beneath her father's fists. Together, they formed the most beautiful music she had ever heard. In the silent corridor, she had smiled-gentle, serene. Pirouetted lightly. Returned to her room and slept the best sleep of her life. Now, years later, I sat in the private rest chamber Julia had arranged for the performers, my eyes fixed on the screen showing Celestine Ward-her turns, her arches, the full display of what she had become. I knew what it meant to fall. To be severed from the stage.To bleed your heart dry for a dream only to watch it die. Time had passed, but Celestine had invested even more than before. She had become exactly what the packs whispered- the perfect villainess. I inhaled slowly. Celestine Ward... this time, can you still stand back up?