Bound By The Moon: The Eternal Bond - Chapter 38: Chapter 38

Aiden had never known the sound of a mother’s lullaby. Not the sharp edge of a father’s scolding, either. Only the crackle of fire—and the silence that followed when it turned to ash.
He was nine when the Order came, cloaked in silver and fire, their eyes cold as judgment. They called his great-grandfather a threat. A sorcerer. A relic of magic too old to trust. The villagers didn’t protest. They just watched the hut burn. With it went everything Aiden knew of home. No one looked back. No one cared.
But he’d been forgotten long before that day.
He lived in a worn-out hut tucked just outside the village, deep in the forest’s edge. The villagers never welcomed him. To them, he was nothing more than the cursed grandchild of a man too feared to challenge.
His great-grandfather never spoke of his parents. Never gave him a surname. Only grunted commands, fed him scraps, and practiced his magic in tense, silent rituals. Sometimes Aiden would watch through the cracks in the wooden walls, catching glimpses of glowing runes drawn on the floor, words whispered in a language he couldn’t understand. But he didn’t try to. Magic wasn’t warmth. It wasn’t love. It was survival—and it wasn’t his.
When the fire took everything, Aiden didn’t look back. He fled the village, walking alone through miles of dangerous wilderness, keeping to the shadows. He avoided humans at all costs. The stories he’d heard back in the pack village painted them as cruel, merciless creatures with weapons powerful enough to fell even the strongest wolves. No one trusted them. The safest path was to stay far away.
He wandered for months, moving from pack to pack. No shoes. No name. No place to call his own. He stole food from bins, fought over scraps with other abandoned cubs in narrow alleys and crowded markets. Most times, he lost. They beat him, mocked him, dragged him through mud until his silver hair clumped with blood and dirt.
“Look at the silver rat,” they would laugh.
He didn’t cry. Pain had become routine.
One evening, limping past a butcher’s stall, a group of older boys surrounded him.
“You think you're one of us, silver freak?” one hissed.
“You’re just some backward little rogue from the woods,” another sneered.
A third boy grinned. “Let’s throw him into the human towns. See if they skin him alive.”
They grabbed him by the collar. Raised fists. He didn’t fight back—he didn’t have the strength.
Then came a growl. Deep. Low. Dangerous.
A wolf stepped from the shadows—medium brown, likely a teen—baring its fangs. The boys froze. Then ran, pale and panicked.
Aiden stood frozen, staring. He didn’t run. Something about the wolf’s calm, steady presence made him stay.
The wolf turned and walked away. Aiden followed without thinking.
After a few minutes, the wolf stopped, then glanced back. It shifted. Fur melted away, replaced by skin and bone. A tall, muscular teen with dark curls and sharp eyes now stood where the wolf had been.
“You weakling,” the boy muttered. “Why are you following me?”
Aiden hesitated. “I don’t have anywhere else to go.”
Before the boy could reply, another teenager appeared, who he later learned was Valen, taller, blond, spiky-haired, with a cocky grin. He tossed a bundle of clothes to the first boy, who began dressing.
“Ryker, where’d you disappear to?” he asked, then gave Aiden a quick once-over. “Where’d you find this cub?”
He sniffed the air and wrinkled his nose. “He smells like garbage.”
Ryker didn’t answer right away.
The blond boy sniffed again. “He’s not from here.” He looked directly at Aiden. “What’s your name?”
“Aiden.”
Valen whistled. “No pack. No scent. You’re a ghost.”
Aiden’s eyes stung, but he looked down before the tears could fall.
“Wolves don’t cry, kid,” Valen added. His voice was sharp, but not cruel.
Ryker stepped forward, now fully dressed. “Stop scaring him. I'm the one who found him.”
Valen raised a brow, crossing his arms“What, you planning to keep him? In my pack?”
“I am keeping him,” Ryker said flatly. “And your pack? Please. You’re not even Alpha yet.”
Valen smirked. “I’m the prince of the South. I can sneak someone in without my father noticing.”
That night, Ryker and Valen smuggled Aiden into the Southern Manor through a side window. Ryker moved through the hallways like he’d been born to them. Aiden followed in silence.
For the first time in years, Aiden slept in a real bed. It was soft. Warm. Almost too much. He fell asleep the moment his head hit the pillow. He stayed there for days and found himself feeling that it was his home.
Days turned into weeks. He trained, ate, studied. Laughed—quietly at first. Ryker was always there. Silent, but solid. At his side during combat drills. Beside him during meals. Behind him when others looked twice.
Even Valen, cold and blunt, eventually tolerated him. But Aiden never stopped fearing him a little.
When Aiden’s first shift came, it was Ryker who stayed with him. Through the agony. The screaming. The bone-snapping pain. Ryker never left. When the pain became too much and Aiden wept silently into Ryker’s shirt, Ryker only held him tighter.
After that, he grew stronger—and undeniably more handsome. He trained with a ferocity unmatched, fought with precision, and carried himself with the pride of a true werewolf. Eventually, he earned a place in one of the region’s most prestigious academies, where wolves and humans studied side by side in a rare era of peace.
He never imagined having a mate. He spent his time casually flirting, never letting anyone too close. Until the day he discovered the most irritating she-wolf in class—Jessy—was his destined mate.
But even then, something inside him still smoldered. Not anger. Not fear.
Something older. Ancient. Restless.
He remembered the runes. The symbols. The quiet rhythm of the old magic. One day, out of boredom or instinct, he drew one—and it responded. Energy flickered through the lines.
He never told anyone, He just kept it as his weapon.
Because peace never lasted. And something dark was stirring again.