Chapter 59: Not His Luna, Her Own Alpha

The first official portrait request arrived one week after Rowan became Supreme Alpha.

The photographer's assistant called me.

"We'll need you in the traditional Supreme Luna gown."

"No."

Silence.

"I'm sorry?"

"I'm not Supreme Luna."

"But you're Supreme Alpha Rowan Vale's mate."

"Correct."

"So—"

"I'm Alpha of Lunaris."

Another pause.

Apparently bureaucracy struggled with women having two facts at once.

Eventually, the official portrait showed Rowan alone in Supreme Alpha regalia.

Mine was taken separately in Lunaris.

Then we took one together in ordinary formal clothes.

I liked that one best.

The adjustment wasn't smooth.

At Council dinners, people seated me beside Rowan automatically.

Sometimes I wanted that.

Sometimes Lunaris had its own delegation table.

At one meeting, an official handed Rowan a document requiring "spousal approval."

He passed it to me.

I read it.

"This has nothing to do with me."

The official blinked.

"Traditionally the Supreme Luna signs."

"Why?"

Nobody knew.

We removed the requirement.

Rhea called my new hobby bureaucratic destruction.

She approved.

University became stranger too.

Rowan now had security everywhere.

He tried attending a normal lecture.

Three guards sat in the back.

One student fainted when Rowan asked to borrow a pen.

I teased him for weeks.

My own life stayed busy.

Lunaris opened its first permanent school.

The medical center expanded.

Survivor families returned from overseas.

We established scholarships for wolves displaced by Pack violence.

One scholarship specifically supported students researching ethical mate-bond medicine.

Helena would've hated the oversight rules.

Excellent.

My relationship with my body changed quietly.

I gained eight pounds.

The first time I noticed, I froze on the scale.

Old panic returned instantly.

Eight pounds.

My brain began calculating.

Calories.

Running distance.

Meals to skip.

I stood there longer than I want to admit.

Then I stepped off.

Rowan found me sitting on the bathroom floor.

He didn't ask whether I had gained weight.

He asked, "What's wrong?"

"I gained eight pounds."

"Okay."

I looked at him.

"That's it?"

"What response do you need?"

I hated how good that question was.

"I don't know."

He sat beside me.

"Do you feel unhealthy?"

"No."

"Is training harder?"

"No."

"Are your clothes uncomfortable?"

"Some jeans."

"Tragic."

I laughed despite myself.

He continued.

"Do you want to change anything?"

"Maybe."

"Then we can talk to Garrick or a nutrition specialist."

No panic.

No disgust.

No worship of my thinner body.

Just choice.

I leaned my head on his shoulder.

"I used to think if I gained weight again, everything would reverse."

"What would reverse?"

"People liking me."

His face hardened.

"Nessa."

"I know."

"Do you?"

"Mostly."

He took my hand.

"If you become two hundred pounds again, I'll still love you."

"I know."

"If you stay exactly like this, I'll love you."

"I know."

"If you become a terrifying muscular Alpha who can bench-press me—"

"Goal."

"Please don't."

I smiled.

The next morning, I ate breakfast.

Normal breakfast.

Then trained.

Normal training.

No punishment.

That felt more significant than losing ninety pounds ever had.

At the next Council summit, a reporter asked whether I planned to "settle into my role beside the Supreme Alpha."

I smiled.

"I already settled into my role."

"And what is that?"

"Alpha Lunaris."

Rowan, standing nearby, grinned.

The reporter tried again.

"Will you eventually merge Lunaris with Nightvale?"

"No."

"What about future children?"

My smile disappeared.

"Future hypothetical children are not territorial treaties."

The clip went viral.

Rhea printed the quote and hung it in the archive.

I threatened to remove it.

She framed it.

Life continued.

Not like a fairy tale.

Rowan and I argued about schedules.

I hated his habit of leaving ceremonial jackets on chairs.

He hated my habit of reading Council documents in bed.

Sometimes mate bonds didn't feel mystical.

Sometimes they felt like arguing over who forgot to charge the coffee machine.

I preferred that.

Because ordinary love was harder to manipulate into destiny.

One evening, we stood beneath the cedar after a long Pack meeting.

Rowan asked, "Do you ever wish you'd taken the Supreme Luna title?"

"No."

"Not even a little?"

"No."

"Good."

"Why?"

"Because I fell in love with Nessa."

He touched the Lunaris Alpha crest at my collar.

"Not an accessory to my title."

I kissed him.

"Good answer."

"I practice."

"Still?"

"Being your mate is demanding."

"Supreme Alpha complaining?"

"Constantly."

I laughed.

The moon rose above Lunaris.

I had once changed my entire body because I thought love required becoming someone worthy of being chosen.

Now I knew better.

Love didn't ask me to shrink into another person's role.

The right kind made room for me to remain fully myself.

And for the first time, I wasn't afraid that being loved would cost me who I was.

I eventually stopped checking the scale every morning. Not through one dramatic decision. I simply forgot one day, then another, and noticed a week later. My body still mattered because it carried me through training, work, laughter, exhaustion, and every ordinary part of living. But it no longer felt like a public referendum on whether I deserved affection. Some days insecurity returned. On those days I treated it like weather rather than prophecy. A bad thought could pass through without becoming an order. That was perhaps the quietest freedom I had gained, and one of the hardest earned.