CHAPTER 58: CHAPTER 58: WE DON’T DESERVE HER

Author’s POV~

A month.

Thirty days.

And still... no sign of her.

No scent. No trail. Not a drop of blood or a torn scrap of clothing. There was nothing to prove she had even existed down there at all. It was like the earth had swallowed her whole and refused to give her back. Like Selene had vanished into the abyss and taken a part of them with her.

The office was quiet.

Aeron sat behind the large obsidian desk, fingers steepled, elbows resting on wood that had begun to splinter beneath his grip. The air inside was heavy—thick with something that wasn’t just grief. It was a loss. Madness. A slow-burning, unending ache that had no name.

Lucian sat to his right, the chair beneath him creaking every time his leg moved restlessly. His injuries had healed weeks ago, but not really. The scars were beneath the skin—inside where no healer could reach.

Kael stood near the window, arms folded, eyes locked on the forest line like he was waiting for her shadow to reappear among the trees.

Luca paced. Back and forth. Back and forth. Like a caged beast. His shirt was wrinkled. His hair hung in tangled waves around his jaw, his nails clawed into his palms.

None of them looked like the Alphas they once were.

They looked like ghosts wearing crowns made of guilt.

No one spoke for a long time.

Because what was there to say?

Until finally, it was Luca’s hoarse voice that broke the silence.

"We searched every inch," he muttered. "We went deeper than any patrol ever dared. We marked the paths. We howled until our throats bled."

He stopped pacing.

His eyes met Aeron’s, and for a moment, the fury simmering behind them cracked.

"She’s not there."

Aeron didn’t blink or flinch. He just whispered, "She has to be."

"She’s not," Kael said softly, still watching the trees. "We would’ve felt her."

Lucian let out a bitter laugh, dry and broken. "Maybe she was there... and didn’t want to be found."

That shut them all up.

The silence after that wasn’t peaceful. It was sharp and jagged, like teeth pressing into an already open wound.

Lucian rubbed a hand down his face and leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. His voice was shaking now—barely audible.

"She looked at me before she fell," he said. "Do you remember?"

None of them answered.

"Her eyes," Lucian continued. "God, her fucking eyes. They were red. Not from rage but from crying. And when she looked at me... I swear I saw hate."

Luca turned away.

Kael’s jaw tightened.

And Aeron... he closed his eyes.

Because they all remembered.

Because that look...that moment was carved into their souls like a brand that would never fade. The way her lips trembled. The way her broken, bloodied body curled in on itself like she wanted to disappear. The way she looked at them like they were monsters.

Because they were.

"Why would she not hate me?" Luca whispered, and this time, his voice broke. "I didn’t just humiliate her... I hurt her. Gods, I laid my hands on her like she wasn’t even human."

His breath hitched, and he dragged a trembling hand through his hair, eyes glassy and unfocused.

"I hit her. Over and over. Not in anger, not even in punishment... just because I could. I watched her bleed, and I didn’t stop. I looked her in the eyes as she begged me, and I still—" His voice cracked, shattering the silence. "I still hit her."

"How I was so blinded with revenge that I forgot that she was just a weak girl."

The room went still. Even the wind outside seemed to hush, as if it couldn’t bear to carry the weight of his words.

"I didn’t just act like a monster," he said hoarsely. "I was one. And she looked at me like I was the worst thing that had ever happened to her." A sob pushed past his lips. "Because I was."

Kael looked away, jaw clenched, as if shutting his eyes might somehow erase the image seared into his mind...the moment he gave the order. The moment his voice, calm and cruel, had commanded his warriors to drag her.

His mate.

A muscle ticked in his jaw. His fists curled.

He had looked her in the eye when it happened. He remembered that too—how her gaze didn’t even flinch anymore. How she just stared at him, silent and cold and empty, like she had finally accepted that there was no mercy left in him.

And maybe she was right.

Lucian didn’t speak. He didn’t have to.

The memory of his cruelty was written across his face—etched in the tremble of his hands and the wet gleam in his eyes. Because of what he did to her, he could not even bear to tell anyone just how ashamed he was of himself.

And Aeron... Aeron still hadn’t moved.

Because for all of their sins, he had been the one she trusted. The one she looked to for a sliver of mercy. And when the moment came, when he could’ve protected her...

He turned his back.

"I told them to do whatever they wanted," Aeron whispered finally, his voice low and cold, like it was coming from the pit of a man already dead. "I watched her fall to her knees. I saw the hope leave her eyes. And I walked away."

A long pause.

Then a whisper, Lucian again.

"We don’t deserve her."

None of them argued because it was the truth.

Because how could they? How could they defend what they had done?

Selene had come into their lives like wildfire—fierce, wounded, and defiant. And they had tried to tame her. Break her and destroy her.

And when she finally fell... she fell alone.

There were no arms to catch her. And no words to hold her soul together.

Only that cursed cliff swallowing her whole.