apple never falls cast

On my eighteenth birthday, the High King summoned the heirs of the four great clans—the Vampires, the Werewolves, the High Serpent Clan, and the Merfolk. He laid their portraits before me and said, "Choose one to be your bondmate." I did not hesitate. I pointed to Damon—the werewolf with no noble bloodline, born in a forgotten corner of the realm. The entire court erupted in disbelief. Everyone knew who I used to love. Alpha Iris—the heir of the most powerful Lycan bloodline. For seven years, I chased him with blind devotion. No matter how harshly he treated me, I never gave up. I confessed to him over and over, sometimes right in the royal court. I even performed a blood-binding ritual—slitting my wrist—to earn the right to marry him. In my previous life, I got what I wanted—I married him and we performed the mate bonding ceremony. With that union, he inherited the High King's resources and rose to become the ruler of all four clans. However, what I did not expect was that after our wedding, he turned around and marked my adoptive sister. My parents were furious and sent her away. From that day on, Iris hated me with a vengeance. He surrounded himself with women who all looked eerily like her. One by one, they came—each more vicious than the last. With his silent approval, they tore me down, piece by piece, until I was nothing more than a joke—no longer the queen I once was. The suffering pushed me into severe depression. Only suppressants keep my wolf form from spiraling out of control. Until one day, my medication was replaced with a slow-acting poison. He was the one who did it. I died alone, locked away in the cold palace, a child still growing inside me. However, fate gave me another chance. In this life, I would not make the same mistake. When the High King once again asked me to choose a partner for the marriage alliance, I chose Damon—the one no one ever noticed—without even blinking.

"The night the blood dyed the bright moon crimson remained an eternal nightmare haunting Elara. She was the most powerful ancient Queen of the wolf clan in ten thousand years, blessed with an unparalleled bloodline that overawed all beasts and ruled the entire nocturnal realm. Yet she fell victim to the one she had trusted above all others. Kane, the elite warrior she had personally promoted, the confidant she had trusted with her back and nurtured with all the clan’s resources, drove his blade straight through her heart at the peak of their clan’s prosperity, when all beings bowed in allegiance. The piercing agony of the blade paled in comparison to the collapse of her heart. She watched the young man who had once knelt before her with utter devotion, his eyes now cold and ruthless. She witnessed him lead the rebel army to massacre the sacred wolf temple, and watch the once glorious wolf clan collapse overnight, its lands drowned in rivers of blood. With her dying breath, she heard his low, indifferent voice, devoid of the slightest affection, carrying only icy command: “Slay the Queen, secure the realm.” Boundless hatred engulfed her soul, burning her to the core, yet her vengeful resolve never wavered. Fate granted her a second chance, reborn from blood and embers. When she opened her eyes again, Elara shed her domineering ancient wolf royal bloodline, suppressing all her sharpness and supreme majesty. She transformed into a frail, humble human girl. Hiding the raging blood feud in her eyes, erasing every trace of her former queenly identity and taming her unyielding pride, she disguised herself as an ordinary, timid mortal, lingering on the fringes of the wolf territory now fully under Kane’s control. The Kane of today was no longer the dependent warrior who had once relied on her. He had seized her throne and risen as the undisputed Alpha Lord of the entire wolf clan, ruling over vast territories with absolute power of life and death over all his kind

I’m a werewolf, eight months pregnant with my vampire mate's hybrid child. When the contractions hit, my vampire mate, Justin, locked me in an ice coffin carved with runes meant to suppress childbirth. I screamed. I begged him. He just said, "Wait." But this was all for his childhood sweetheart. Isolde. The pureblood vampire had used dark blood magic to carry his pure-blood heir without having sex. The first vampire child born in a millennium would receive the Progenitor's ultimate blessing. It would purify the bloodline. It would break a curse generations in the making. "That honor belongs to Isolde's child," Justin said, his voice pure ice. "You already have my love, Gracie. This coffin just ensures you give birth after her." The pain of the contractions tore through me. I begged him to take me to the Bloodspring Sanctuary. He leaned in, his cold fingers gripping my chin. "Stop the act. I should have seen it sooner. You never loved me. You were an outcast in the werewolf world. You only wanted my power and my title." "You're so desperate you'd risk our child with your savage wolf tricks, just to ruin a pureblood's blessing... You're poison." Tears streamed down my face. I trembled, my voice shattering. "The baby's coming—I can't stop it. Please, I'll make a blood oath. I don't care about the blessing. I just want you!" He scoffed, a hint of pained betrayal in his eyes. "If you loved me, you wouldn't have run to my mother. You wouldn't have poisoned her mind against Isolde." "I'll be back after she receives the blessing. After all, the child you're carrying is mine, too." He stood guard outside the sanctuary where Isolde's ritual was taking place. He didn't give me another thought. Not until he saw the halo of the blessing crown Isolde. He ordered his blood thrall to release me. But the thrall's voice trembled with terror. "My lord… Lady Gracie and the child… their life signs… they're gone." In that instant, Justin’s world shattered.