Chapter 4 Awakening in Shadows

I woke to pain and darkness and the smell of old blood.

For a long moment, I couldn't remember anything. Where I was. Who I was. Why every breath felt like swallowing glass. Then the memories came rushing back, and I wished desperately for the emptiness again.

The rejection. The hunters. The arrows. I should be dead.

But I was breathing. Thinking. Existing in some form that didn't make sense.

I opened my eyes slowly. I was lying in a cave, wrapped in furs that smelled like earth and magic. Firelight flickered from somewhere nearby, casting dancing shadows on stone walls covered in ancient symbols. The markings glowed faintly, pulsing with power that made my skin tingle.

"You're awake." The voice came from the shadows, female and old and amused. "I wasn't certain you would be. You were more dead than alive when I found you."

A figure emerged from the darkness. She was ancient, her face lined with a thousand wrinkles, her eyes milky white with blindness. But she moved with certainty, as if she could see better than anyone with working eyes. Power rolled off her in waves.

"Who are you?" I managed to croak.

"I am Morganna. Witch. Seer. Keeper of forgotten things." She settled beside me, her crooked fingers reaching out to touch my forehead. "And you, little wolf, are supposed to be dead. Shot full of arrows and left to bleed out under a cursed moon. But death didn't want you. Not yet."

I tried to sit up, but pain lanced through my body. Looking down, I saw bandages covering my shoulder, my side, my leg. Everywhere the arrows had struck.

"Why did you save me?" I asked.

"Because I saw your future in the smoke and stars. Because you have a destiny that goes beyond this death." Morganna tilted her head, those blind eyes somehow staring straight into my soul. "Tell me, child. Do you know what happens to a wolf whose mate bond is severed violently? Whose heart is broken beyond healing? Who dies calling for a love that was stolen?"

I shook my head.

"Their soul becomes unmoored. Untethered to the living world. And if that death happens under a blood moon, when the veil between worlds is thinnest, something interesting occurs." She smiled, showing teeth too sharp to be human. "The soul doesn't move on. It waits. It grows. It feeds on pain and rage and betrayal until it becomes something new. Something powerful. Something that can cross back."

My breath caught. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying you didn't just survive those arrows, little wolf. You died. Your heart stopped. Your blood turned cold. But your soul refused to leave. It clung to this world with such fury that the Moon Goddess herself took notice." Morganna leaned closer. "She offered you a choice. Rest in eternal peace, or return with power enough to claim your revenge. What do you think you chose?"

The words didn't make sense. I was alive. I was breathing. But as I focused on my body, I realized something was wrong. My heartbeat was too slow. My breath too shallow. And beneath my skin, I felt something foreign. Something dark and hungry and ancient.

"What did she do to me?" I whispered.

"She made you a bridge between life and death. Gave you centuries to grow strong, to learn magic, to become something the Wolf King would fear." Morganna stood, moving to a shelf filled with bottles and bones. "But there's a price. There's always a price. You'll live, but not as you were. You'll have power, but it will hunger for destruction. And when you finally face him again, when you stand before the man who rejected you, your very existence will fulfill the prophecy he tried so hard to avoid."

She turned back, holding a mirror. "Look at yourself, child. See what vengeance has made you."

I took the mirror with shaking hands. The face staring back wasn't entirely mine. My features were sharper. My eyes darker. My skin had a strange pallor, like I was carved from moonlight. I looked dead and alive all at once. Beautiful and terrible.

"How long?" I asked. "How long have I been here?"

"In this cave? Three days. In this world? That's the interesting part." Morganna's smile widened. "Time works differently when you're caught between life and death. For you, it's been days. For the rest of the world, centuries have passed. Your Wolf King is still alive, still cursed by his guilt, still ruling a dying kingdom. But everyone else you knew is dust."

Centuries. The word echoed in my mind. Everyone I'd known, even the few who'd shown me kindness, were gone. The world I'd left was history. Only Alaric remained, trapped in the same hell I was.

"Why would the Moon Goddess do this?" I asked. "Why not just let me die?"

"Because she's not as benevolent as the wolves believe. She's ancient and cruel and loves her games." Morganna sat back down, her expression serious now. "The prophecy was always going to come true, one way or another. He could have chosen love and faced destruction with you at his side, or choose fear and face destruction at your hands. He made his choice. Now you get to make yours."

"What choice?"

"Whether to become the doom he feared, or something else entirely. The power is yours now. The magic, the time, the opportunity for revenge." She gestured to the cave entrance where I could see night sky through the opening. "Out there, the Silvercrown Kingdom rots. Alaric's rejection brought divine punishment. Crops fail. Children die. The pack grows weaker with each generation. He lives on, ageless and guilty, watching everything he tried to save crumble anyway. Some say it's justice. Others say it's tragedy."

I thought about that. About Alaric suffering for centuries, alone and haunted. Part of me felt satisfaction. Let him hurt the way he'd hurt me. But another part, the part that remembered loving him for those brief hours we were bonded, felt something else. Something uncomfortably like pity.

"What happens now?" I asked.

"Now you train. I'll teach you to control the magic burning in your veins. You'll learn to command shadows, to walk between worlds, to hide your true nature. And when you're ready, when you're powerful enough that even kings kneel before you, you'll return to Silvercrown. You'll stand before him and decide whether to be his doom or his salvation."

She stood, offering me her hand. "But first, you need a new name. Eira died in that forest. What rises from her ashes must be something different."

I took her hand and pulled myself up, ignoring the pain. My body felt strange, like wearing clothes that didn't quite fit. But there was power humming beneath my skin, dark and intoxicating.

"Lyra," I said, remembering a constellation my mother had supposedly loved. "Call me Lyra."

"Lyra." Morganna tested the name and nodded. "Yes. That will do. Come then, Lyra who was Eira. Let me teach you how to become a nightmare."