Chapter 48 Mate Bond Rumors
Malia’s POV
The following day, Mooncrest College has become a breathing gossip incubator!
I know it the moment I step outside the dorm. The change is palpable, and sudden — I feel heads turning, mid-conversations stuttering, eyes darting away too fast whenever I catch them. Snippets of conversation swirl around me, like a smoke that follows me: piercing, curling, unavoidable.
“She's got all three of them wrapped around her finger.”
“A hybrid? With Moonfall heirs? That’s not a bond — that’s a scandal.”
“I heard the mate bond rumor is true. A total of three. All three. At once.”
Everything in my stomach drops.The mate bond rumor.
Someone had leaked it. Or someone had watch too closely. The moonfalls behavior around me; the way the air crackles when the brothers are in the same room as me. It doesn’t matter how it started. What matters is it’s everywhere now.
Bets are being placed in the quad. Literal bets, two second-years near the fountain arguing: I hear two second-years near the fountain arguing odds: “Twenty credits says she picks Aiden by the solstice run.”
“Nah, Rowan’s the patient one—she’ll go soft for the quiet type.” “You’re both wrong. She’s playing them all. Hybrid power move.”
I keep my head down and walk faster.
July and Freddy I meet me outside the dining hall before I can disappear inside.
July grabs my arm, leading me toward a bench in the shade beneath one of the gnarled oaks. Freddy falls in on my other side like a bodyguard.
“We’ve got your back,” July says, his voice a whisper. “Ignore them, they’re just bored and jealous.”
Freddy snorts. “Bored? They’re obsessed. There’s a group chat of more than 100 people that includes every time you’re seen with one of the brothers. They have timestamps, photos, theories. It’s deranged.”
I sit down on the bench with my knees bent. “I just wanted to eat lunch.”
July presses my shoulder. “We’ll eat fast and then we'll take you back to your dorm,” she added. “Or suite. Whichever place makes you feel safest.”
Nothing is safe anymore.Still the quad is better than the dining hall.
When I enter, the heat subsides—only to balloon up twice as large. They don’t even pretend to be secretive. Phones are pointed in my direction. Somebody actually points.
I grab a tray, pile it with anything that looks edible, and trail after July and Freddy to a corner table. Halfway there, Professor Hale—my Lunar Physiology instructor—passes me in the aisle.
He pauses, adjusts his glasses, and says with perfect academic dry wit, “Miss Reed maybe you too should think about channelling some of this…attention into the paper you have due on the next resonance. Distractions are the enemy of precision, anyway.”
He nods courteously and strides away, my face is burning.
July mutters something vicious under her breath. Freddy flips the professor off behind his back.
We sit.
I stare at my food—chicken salad — untouched.
On the other side of the room, a table of purebloods in their third year are making too much noise laughter. One of them, a girl with platinum hair and a sneer, raises her glass in a mock salute. “To the hybrid queen and her royal court!”
More laughter.
Freddy starts to stand. July drags him back down.
“Don’t,” she hisses. “That’s what they want.”
I push my tray away. “I can’t do this.”
“You can,” July says fiercely. You’re stronger than their bullshit. They’re just scared of what it means if a hybrid can hold three alpha heirs without breaking. It shatters all they’ve been told about hierarchy and bloodlines.”
Freddy nods. “Exactly. You’re not just drama—you’re a threat to the whole system.”
I manage a weak smile. “Great. So I’m public enemy number one.”
“You’re public everything,” Freddy corrects. “Enemy, icon fantasy, villain. Pick your poison.”
The noise swells again as more students arrive for lunch. Every newcomer begins with what looks like a scan of the room until they find me, then whisper to their friends. It’s like living inside a magnifying glass.
I’m just about to say we should go when a girl comes up to our table. She’s tall and dark-haired, and wearing the crimson-and-silver scarf of the Crimson Fang pack. Bold, confident. She’s probably never been told no in her life.
She stops right in front of me, hands on her hips.
“Hey, Malia,” she says, voice carrying. Several nearby tables go silent. “I have a question that everyone's dying to know.”
July tenses. Freddy squints.
I make myself look at her. “What?”
She smiles—slow, sweet, venomous.
“Three alphas are competing for you. How does it feel to have three alphas battling for your attentions? Three Moonfalls are on their knees for one little hybrid. I bet it’s a rush.”
The dining room suddenly goes silent as the grave.
All eyes are on me, my pulse is ringing in my ears. I can’t speak—too much emotion, anger, shame, exhaustion all tied up into one.
Before I can make myself say anything, I feel a familiar arm wrap around my shoulders.
Aiden.
There he is all of a sudden—warm and solid and radiating his quiet fury. His hand comes to rest on my shoulder, his thumb lightly stroking the side of my neck with a touch that’s protective and possessive.
He gazes down at the girl with eyes that are now flat blue.
“It feels,” he says, in a voice that could freeze windows, “like she’s mine.”
The words fall like stones into still pools. The girl blinks and her smile wavers.
Aiden doesn’t raise his voice. He doesn’t have to.
“Any other questions?” he inquires coated deceptively peaceful.
The girl opens her mouth, closes it, and takes a step back.
The silence lasts for a while. Aiden’s arm tightens ever so slightly around me—not possessive, simply grounding.
He bends down, and his lips brush past my ear. “You okay?”
I nod once. It’s a lie, but it’s the only answer I have right now. He straightens his posture, surveying the room slowly, methodically.
Nobody looks him in the eye.
That’s the message: look at her again, talk about her again, bet on her again and I’ll see you at the poker table.
Gradually, dialogue resumes. Heads snapaway. Phones lower. Aiden doesn’t move his arm.
July exhales. “Well. That was… exciting.”
Freddy grins despite himself. “Alpha energy: activated.”
I lean into Aiden’s side, just a little. The heat of him radiates through the henley, calming the racing pulse in my chest.
He leans in to place a soft kiss to my temples—right there, in front of everyone.
“Let them talk,” he murmurs, low enough for only me to hear. “They’ll get bored eventually. And when they don’t… I’ll remind them who you belong to.”
I swallow hard.
‘Belong to.’ The word should frighten me. So should the word.
But in this moment – with the whole dining hall watching and Aiden’s arm around me like armor – it’s making me feel like the one thing keeping me from drowning.
July stands. “Come on. Let’s get you out of here before someone else gets brave.”
Aiden helps me up, his hand sliding from my shoulder to the small of my back. Freddy grabs my untouched tray. July leads the way. As we pass the Crimson Fang table, the platinum-haired girl mutters something under her breath.
Aiden doesn’t hesitate in his steps, but I can hear his growl—low, warning and very alpha.
The girl shuts up.
Outside, too bright afternoon sun. The quad still hums, but now the vibe’s changed. Less stares. More caution.
Until we get to the path back to the res halls, the way is cool and shaded by trees and Aiden doesn’t let go of me.
He stops then, and slowly turns me so that I'm facing him.
"You don't have to go through this by yourself," he tells me softly. “Not the rumors, not the stares. Not any of that.”
I look up at him—really look. He really looks at me.
His eyes had softened yet again in a way that made the blue in his eyes go lighter. The alpha is still very much there, but under that mask lies the boy who watched me sleep this morning. Who promised to be careful. Who chose me over everything.
“I know,” I say softly.
He cups my face with his hands, his thumbs brushing my cheeks.
“They can all talk. They can bet and they can hate. But none of it affects what’s real.”
He leans in and gives me a kiss on my lips—slow, deep, relaxed—right there on the trail where anybody could look.
His forehead rests against mine when he pulls away.
"You’re not a scandal, Malia. You’re the future they’re to
o scared to accept," he said with certainty.
I close my eyes and I believe it for almost the first time all day: I am the future they're too scared to accept.