Chapter 2 Bloody Moonlit

I didn't sleep.

How could I? Every time I closed my eyes I tasted her again: blood and lavender, moonlight and ruin. My lips still tingled where she'd bitten me, not hard enough to break skin, but hard enough to brand. My wolf wouldn't settle. She paced behind my ribs like a caged thing, whining, clawing, begging for something I refused to name.

By the time the pale grey of pre-dawn crept through the cracks in the omega barracks wall, I was already dressed. Black leggings, oversized hoodie stolen from the lost-and-found years ago, boots laced tight. I looked like any other exhausted pack member after a night of tragedy.

No one would guess I was the only witness to a nightmare wearing Selene Blackthorn's face.

The pack was in chaos.

Warriors milled outside the infirmary, eyes red, fists clenched. Mothers clutched pups close. The air stank of grief and rage and too much silver being cleaned from blades. Three dead. Hearts taken. No scent trail. No tracks. Nothing but the message burned into the mill beam and the bloody apology left for me.

I kept my head down and slipped through the crowd toward the Alpha's lodge. Someone had to report what I'd seen. Someone had to tell them their precious princess was-

"Elara!"

The voice cracked like a whip. Beta Rowan, Marcus's father. His eyes were wild, bloodshot, the grief so raw it looked like it might tear him apart from the inside.

He grabbed my arm hard enough to bruise. "You were first on scene. You will tell me everything. Now."

I opened my mouth. I closed it. The words stuck behind my teeth like shards of glass.

I saw Selene eating his son's heart.

I saw her eyes turn black.

She kissed me and I let her.

"I... found them like that," I lied. The lie tasted like ash. "There was no one else there when I arrived."

Rowan's grip tightened until bones ground together. "You're lying."

A growl rolled through the crowd. Heads turned. Too many eyes on me. Too many wolves scenting the fear-sweat pouring off my skin.

"Let her go, Rowan." Alpha Caelan's voice cut through the morning like a blade.

He stood on the lodge steps, tall and terrible in the half-light. Silver streaked his black hair, but his eyes were the same violet as his daughter's. The resemblance punched the air from my lungs.

Rowan released me so fast I stumbled. The Alpha's gaze pinned me in place.

"Inside," he said. Just that. One word, and my feet moved before my brain caught up.

The lodge smelled of cedar and old blood. Portraits of past Alphas glared down from the walls. Caelan didn't sit behind the massive oak desk. He prowled, a caged storm, until we were alone.

Then he turned on me.

"Speak, omega."

I swallowed. My throat clicked.

"I-"

Pain exploded across my collarbone.

Not from him. From inside me. Fire. Acid. A white-hot brand searing straight through hoodie and skin. I screamed, dropping to my knees, clawing at the fabric. The smell of burning flesh filled the room.

Caelan's eyes widened. He lunged, ripping my hoodie down my shoulder before I could stop him.

There, glowing like molten silver, was a mark.

A crescent moon cradling a drop of blood.

The Blackthorn family crest, but wrong. Twisted. The moon was broken, cracked down the middle, and the blood drop pulsed like a living heartbeat.

"What is this?" Caelan's voice shook. Actually, I was shaking.

"I don't know," I gasped. Tears streamed down my face. The pain was receding, but the mark stayed, raised and angry and beautiful. "It wasn't there yesterday."

He stared at it like it had personally offended him. Then his gaze snapped to my throat. I hadn't even noticed the second burn.

Lower. Just above my left breast. Smaller. A circle of tiny teeth marks surrounding a single word written in a language I didn't know. The letters shimmered, shifting like liquid mercury.

Caelan went pale beneath his tan.

"No," he whispered. "Not possible."

He backed away until his shoulders hit the wall.

"Alpha?"

He didn't answer. Just stared at the mark like it was a death sentence.

The door burst open. Luna Isolde, Selene's mother, swept in wrapped in a robe the color of fresh snow. Her beauty was legendary, but right now she looked like she'd aged a decade overnight.

"Caelan, the council demands-" She saw me on my knees, hoodie half torn, the mark blazing on my skin.

Her scream shattered glass in the windows.

I was dragged out of the lodge minutes later, wrists bound with silver cuffs that burned like acid. The entire pack watched as I was thrown into the detention cells beneath the infirmary. No trial. No explanation.

Just the mark.

And the whispers that followed me like wolves:

Moon-Cursed.

Blood-bound.

The Alpha's daughter's mate.

Mate.

The word rattled around my skull as I curled on the cold stone floor, cheek pressed to the ground, trying not to vomit from the silver poisoning.

Selene had kissed me.

Selene had marked me.

Selene had vanished.

Hours bled into each other. The pain in my collarbone settled into a dull throb, but the smaller mark over my heart kept pulsing, slow and deliberate, like it was counting down to something.

Footsteps eventually echoed down the corridor. I expected guards. Or Rowan came to finish what grief started.

Instead, the cell door opened and Selene walked in.

She looked untouched. White dress replaced with jeans and a soft grey sweater, hair braided neatly down one shoulder. No blood. No black eyes. Just the girl I'd loved in silence for five years.

The door locked behind her.

"How did you-" I started.

She knelt in front of me, cupped my face with gentle fingers, and kissed my forehead like a mother soothing a child.

"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I never wanted this for you."

Her thumb brushed the crescent mark. Where she touched, the burn cooled instantly.

"What did you do to me?" My voice cracked.

"I saved your life." Her smile was sad. "And damned us both."

She reached into her pocket and pulled out a small silver dagger. Before I could react, she sliced her own palm. Blood welled, dark and fragrant.

"Drink," she said, pressing it to my lips.

I jerked away. "Are you insane?"

"Elara." Her eyes flickered, just for a second, black bleeding into violet. "The cuffs are killing you. My blood counters silver. Drink, or you die before moonrise."

I wanted to refuse. Wanted to spit in her face and demand answers.

But the pain was creeping back, fire licking up my arms, and her blood smelled like lavender and home.

I drank.

Three drops. No more. The relief was instant, silver burns fading to dull aches.

She rocked back on her heels, watching me with something like wonder.

"You're stronger than I thought," she murmured.

"Start talking, Selene."

She glanced at the door, then leaned close.

"Three hundred years ago, my ancestor made a bargain with something older than the Goddess. Power in exchange for a vessel. Every generation, the curse chooses a Blackthorn daughter on her twentieth birthday. It wakes me up hungry."

Her fingers found the smaller mark over my heart.

"I turned twenty yesterday."

My stomach dropped.

"The hearts," I whispered.

"Fuel," she said simply. "It needs life to stay quiet. Three hearts every new moon, or it takes whatever's closest." Her hand pressed harder against my chest. "It wanted you, Elara. Has wanted you since we were fourteen and you smiled at me across the training field. I felt it stir that day."

I laughed. It came out broken. "You're saying some ancient curse is... what? In love with me?"

"Obsessed," she corrected. "It thinks if it marks you, binds you, you'll keep it fed willingly. Forever."

Horror coiled cold in my gut.

"That's why you kissed me."

"That's why I ran," she said. "I thought if I stayed away-"

The lights flickered. A low growl rumbled through the stone, not from any wolf throat. From the walls themselves.

Selene went rigid.

"It knows I'm here."

She stood so fast she blurred. The dagger flashed in her hand again.

"Listen carefully," she said, voice urgent. "Tonight is the new moon. It will force me to hunt again. Three more hearts, or it starts with the pack. Starting with the weakest."

Omegas.

Me.

"I can't fight it much longer," she continued. "But you-your blood sings to it. If I complete the bond-"

"No." I surged to my feet, chains rattling. "You don't get to decide that for me."

"I'm trying to save you!"

"You ate Marcus's heart!" I screamed. "You murdered them!"

Tears filled her eyes. "I know."

The growl grew louder. The temperature plummeted. Frost crawled across the cell bars.

Selene's face twisted in agony. Black bled fully into her eyes now, swallowing violet entirely.

"Time's up," the thing inside her said, voice like grinding ice. "Pretty wolf. Mine."

She lunged.

I threw myself sideways, chains snapping taut. The dagger sliced air where my throat had been.

"Selene, fight it!"

"I'm trying!" she snarled through clenched teeth. Blood, her own this time, trickled from her nose. "But it's stronger when you're close. You smell like salvation."

Another swipe. This one caught my forearm, four shallow lines burning open.

The thing smiled with her mouth.

"Bleed for me, Elara."

The cell door exploded inward.

Alpha Caelan stood there, flanked by six warriors, all shifted, eyes glowing gold.

"Selene," he said, voice breaking. "Step away from the girl."

The thing wearing Selene's face laughed. "Hello, Father. Did you bring me dinner?"

Caelan's gaze locked on the mark blazing on my collarbone.

Then he did the last thing I expected.

He dropped to one knee.

And bared his throat.

"Take me," he said. "I'm stronger. My heart will quiet it longer. Let the girl live."

Selene's body jerked like a puppet with cut strings.

"No," she gasped, fighting through. "Daddy, no-"

But the curse was done asking.

Black veins crawled up her arms. Her mouth opened impossibly wide.

Caelan closed his eyes.

I didn't think so. I just moved.

Silver cuffs be damned, I threw myself between them, wrapping my arms around Selene's waist and slamming us both to the ground. My blood, still on her lips from earlier, smeared across her mouth as I kissed her.

Not soft. Not sweet.

I kissed her like I was drowning and she was air.

The curse screamed.

Power exploded outward, shattering stone, flinging warriors like dolls. The mark over my heart ignited, white-hot, and I felt it, felt the bond snap into place like teeth closing on bone.

MINE, the curse roared inside my skull.

And then, softer, Selene's real voice, broken and wondering:

Elara?

The blackness receded from her eyes.

She stared up at me, violet again, tears streaming.

"What did you do?" she whispered.

I looked down. The crescent mark on my collarbone had changed. Now it cradled two drops of blood.

One silver.

One black.

Footsteps pounded closer. More warriors. The council. Chains. Someone shouting for silver nets.

Selene touched my cheek.

"Run," she said. "Please. Before they-"

Too late.

The cell is filled with wolves.

And the last thing I saw before darkness swallowed me was Selene mouthing two words I would carry like a death sentence:

Find Nyx.

Then cold silver closed around my throat, and the world went black.