The days blurred together, each one marked by the same suffocating ritual—pairing, marking, transformation.
Ember had learned to count the passage of time by the shifting numbers. Thousands had stood in the ceremony chamber at the start. Now, only 153 remained.
The thinning crowd made it harder to hide, harder to pretend she was just another face in the line.
She witnessed everything.
The stripping of names.
The slow removal of the silver headpieces—the final barrier between human and wolf.
And the transformation of hundreds, including the three girls who had made her life miserable.
Names Mean Nothing Here
Ember had thought that the change would affect only those who had resisted. That punishment would come for those who fought back, for those who screamed, begged, or refused their wolves.
She had been wrong.
Every human was stripped bare, forced to forget who they were.
One by one, those chosen were led forward, their names spoken one last time before they were erased.
They were reborn in submission.
The werewolves insisted it was a sign of honor—a rebirth into a life greater than what they once knew.
But Ember only saw control.
Once marked, a human ceased to exist as themselves.
Their old identity was abandoned. Their new name chosen not by them, but by the one who claimed them.
Selene. Lilith. Vera.
The three girls who had tormented her—mocked her, sneered at her, whispered cruel insults whenever she had tried to escape—stood before the Warlock, their faces shining with something she couldn't understand.
They had welcomed this fate.
And yet—even they were not spared.
Selene Rook. Lilith Vale. Vera Thorn.
Their new names echoed through the chamber like a death sentence.
Ember memorized them, carved them into her mind.
She needed to remember.
Would they still be trouble? Would they use their new power to make her life worse? Or had they simply fallen into the same oblivion as everyone else?
She didn't know.
And that terrified her.
The End of Silver
The first time she saw the silver removed, she thought it would be clean—a simple lifting of the circlet, a quiet transition into a world where the headpiece was no longer needed.
She was wrong.
The silver never came off gently.
It hissed.
Darkened.
The moment a transformation completed, the silver began to burn, peeling away in thick, blackened threads as if it was alive.
It curled, writhed, smoked—turning to an oily mess before disintegrating entirely.
It was never discarded as an artifact, never stored away for another ceremony.
It was destroyed.
No human left the ceremony wearing silver.
Because once marked, the need for it ceased to exist.
It wasn't just for control.
It was a barrier, a magical seal keeping humans from truly becoming mates.
And once that seal was broken—once a mate shifted—the silver rejected them, leaving only their new name, their new identity, their new role as property of the wolf that claimed them.
It made Ember's skin crawl.
Because it meant something far worse than she had realized.
She wasn't meant to be human forever.
None of them were.
The Witnessing
As the days passed, Ember watched the transformations unfold.
One after another.
Selene's body convulsed first, twisting unnaturally as her mate—a tall, cruel wolf named Darian—pressed his fangs deep into her neck.
She screamed.
But not in fear.
She welcomed the pain.
She had been waiting for it. Begging for it.
Her eyes, dark and sharp, turned empty as the magic surged through her.
An orange thread bound her and Darian together, pulsing with unnatural energy as her bones snapped.
Her form twisted, reshaped, reduced to something less than what it had been.
And when the transformation was complete, Ember saw her.
The wolf that had once been Selene collapsed, her slender body shaking as she struggled to breathe through her new lungs.
Her fur was a pale gray, her eyes retaining that cruel gleam—but she was no longer human.
She had submitted.
Lilith came next.
Her mate, Adrian, whispered something in her ear before sinking his teeth into her.
The marking took longer.
She resisted.
Her body fought the shift.
The magic punished her for it.
Her screams lasted longer than the others, stretching the ceremony into something unbearable.
Her mate-thread pulsed red, flickering weakly, as if struggling to hold its bond.
But the magic did not fail.
No human was allowed to remain unchanged.
In the end, she collapsed, her body reforming into something small, weak.
A rust-colored wolf, barely able to lift her head.
And then Vera.
Her mate did not bother with whispered words.
He bit.
Hard.
She fought.
Harder.
Her screams turned into something else, something not entirely human but not yet wolf.
The transformation was cruel—her body twisting violently, as though the magic struggled to force her into submission.
It won.
Her mate-thread green, sickly bright in the air.
Her wolf form hit the ground, motionless, breathing shallow.
But alive.
Every mate collapsed after shifting.
Every mate lost themselves.
The silver hissed away.
And their names—Selene, Lilith, Vera—were all that remained.
The Shrinking Numbers
30 days passed.
Hundreds had been claimed, marked, transformed.
The humans who remained, untouched, unchosen, grew restless.
They were placed closer together, merged into one group instead of several scattered lines.
Their numbers shrunk—153 left.
The odds were tightening.
Each day that passed meant fewer choices, fewer possibilities.
The ceremony would not last much longer.
Those who remained would be sorted soon.
Either claimed.
Or discarded.
The thought sent cold dread through Ember's veins.
Because now—there was nowhere left to hide.