He Marked My Sister. I Died That Night

Lyra Vale had always known she was not an ordinary wolf .

She was Death’s attendant—on her eighteenth birthday, she would be recalled to the Underworld, returned to the Reaper’s side.

Yet her entire pack believed it was her twin sister, Serena, who was “destined not to live past eighteen.”

So the finest gowns, the richest meals, the gentlest embraces—were all given to Serena.

Even Lyra's and Cassian Ashford's intimacy ceremony was stolen and given to Serena.

On the thirteenth night before her eighteenth birthday, Lyra intercepted Cassian in the long hall of the Vale estate—the nineteenth time he had dodged the subject of their Mate Oath .

“Cassian,” her voice was soft, but edged like a blade under the tongue, “do you no longer wish to bond with me?”

Cassian wore a dark wool coat, the silver wolf-crest of House Ashford pinned over his heart. Those eyes, cold as deep winter, avoided hers for the first time.

“Lyra…” he began, the words sounding like swallowed glass, “Serena said—she must be the first female I ever Claim-Mark .”

“She won’t see her nineteenth year.”

His throat worked, his voice lowering. “Her only wish before the end is to become my Luna-to-be .”

In that instant, Lyra’s heart clenched as if seized by an invisible hand, the pain stealing her breath.

“And you?” She held his gaze. “What do you want?”

Cassian looked away, unable to meet her eyes.

“Lyra, we have a lifetime ahead of us.”

“But Serena… has less than two weeks.”

Lyra felt as if plunged into a frozen grave.

She should have completed her Coming-of-Age at fifteen and sworn the Mate Oath soon after. Yet the ceremony had been delayed again and again. Over two years had passed; she was nearly eighteen, and Cassian had grown only more silent.

Until this moment, she finally understood—

he had chosen Serena, but had been making excuses to appease her all along.

They had been born on the same storm-lashed night, when the Blood Moon rose like a wound over the ridge. The Seer had proclaimed:

"One is about to die and be summoned back to the underworld; the other will live forever."

The wolf pack concluded—Serena would be the one to die.

Because Serena was frail, plagued by nightmares, often claiming to hear “a voice calling her name from behind a black gate.” Everyone believed she fit the cursed profile better.

“Lyra.” Cassian’s voice was hushed, as if reasoning with someone who should not make a scene. “You’ve always doted on Serena… You wouldn’t want her to leave with regrets, would you?”

He reached out, his hand almost closing over hers.

“Promise me. Please.”

Lyra stared at him as if staring at a door that once offered warmth but now let in only cold wind.

Her throat tightened painfully. It took a long moment before she forced out a single word:

“Fine.”

Cassian seemed to exhale in relief, his expression softening. He took her hand again, his tone sweetly persuasive.

“I swear, once her final wish is fulfilled, you and I will be together for a lifetime.”

Lyra’s knuckles turned white. She said nothing.

They had no lifetime.

Because she was the one who would not live past eighteen.

Since her earliest memories at age three, Lyra had recurrently dreamt of a man: shrouded in black, his presence cold as frost, standing before a throne in the Underworld.

She could never see his face, but she knew—he was the Reaper.

And she was Death’s attendant.

She had told her family. She had told Cassian.

They said she was “seeking attention,” jealous of Serena, weaving stories.

Now, Cassian was using “Serena is Death’s attendant” as the very reason to take her, to Claim-Mark her, to make her Luna.

Lyra no longer wished to explain, nor to plead.

On the night of the Crimson Eclipse—her eighteenth birthday—she would return to the Underworld.

To the place that belonged to her.

After parting from Cassian, Lyra returned to the Vale ancestral manor.

The moment she entered, her mother summoned her to the Moon Chapel—stone-walled, cold with damp, candles burning like labored breaths beneath the carved Moon Sigil.

“Lyra, I know this is unfair to you,” Lady Vivienne Vale’s voice was gentle, yet it felt like the blunt edge of a knife. “But Serena truly has so little time left.”

“Be patient a while longer. I beg you as your mother.”

Lyra looked into her mother’s loving face and found she could not refuse. She merely nodded.

“Very well.”

To “prolong Serena’s life,” her mother subjected Lyra to a monthly “Penance Rite.”

On the new moon, she was scourged with silverthorn whips braided with wolf-silver barbs —said to “cleanse the taint of birth” for Serena.

On the full moon, she knelt on cold stone, striking her forehead until it bled—pleading with the Moon Mother to protect Serena.

Tonight was the new moon.

Lyra lay prone on the wooden platform at the back of the chapel, allowing attendants to raise the barbed silverthorn lash and bring it down upon her back.

Agony lanced through her with each strike. Sweat beaded on her brow, her back soon a ruin of torn flesh.

Two hours later, the scourging ended.

Gritting her teeth, she pushed herself up and limped from the chapel. The night outside was dense, mist clinging to her skin like a damp shroud.

Passing the rose garden, she saw—

Serena sat upon a wrought-iron swing twined with white roses, Cassian standing behind her, pushing gently.

The look in his eyes as he gazed down at her was a tenderness Lyra had never witnessed.

Then she heard Serena look up and ask:

“Cassian… has sister agreed to let you Claim-Mark me?”

“Yes,” he murmured.

Serena pressed on, “If I die after my eighteenth… will you then bond with her?”

Lyra’s heart tightened.

Cassian was silent for a beat, then spoke each word with deliberate clarity:

“Whether in life or death, you shall be my only Luna.”