Chapter 2

Lyra's POV:

The forest was a tapestry of shadows and moonlight. I didn't run. I moved between the trees, my feet barely touching the ground as I used the Moon Shadow Step Silas had taught me. One moment I was in the shadow of an ancient oak, the next I was twenty feet away, appearing in the darkness cast by a cluster of pines. It was an old magic, a gift of the Moon Goddess to her children, and it kept me safe.

My senses were sharp, tasting the scents of damp earth and pine needles on the air. Then, another smell cut through the night, sharp and wrong. Blood. The hot, coppery tang of it. The acrid stench of burnt steel. And beneath it all, the bitter scent of fear.

I paused, my silver eyes turning toward the source of the disturbance.

*Trouble,* my inner wolf whispered, a soft presence in my mind. *Go around.*

*The path is that way,* I answered simply, and continued forward.

I emerged from the dense woods onto a dirt road. A large, black car, grand and old-fashioned, was overturned on its side, smoke billowing from its mangled front end. Several werewolves in fine-looking guard uniforms were frantically trying to pry open the crushed passenger door.

A small crowd of pack members had gathered at a safe distance, their whispers carried on the wind.

"It's a Vance family car!"

"Goddess, that's the Luna's sister!"

"Alpha Gideon will lose his mind!"

My gaze locked onto the bent metal door. I could hear a woman's faint, pained moans from inside.

One of the guards, a big man with desperation on his face, put his shoulder into the door and heaved, but it was jammed tight.

A female attendant beside him was sobbing. "Lady Elara! Are you all right?"

The moans from inside grew weaker. The scent of blood grew stronger.

I stepped out from the treeline. My small form immediately drew their attention.

The big guard, Cody, scowled at me. "Get out of here, kid! It's dangerous!"

I ignored him and walked directly to the overturned car.

I reached out my small hand, placing it on the hot, twisted metal of the door.

"Don't touch that!" the female attendant, Faye, gasped, expecting me to be burned.

But a faint, silvery shimmer coated my skin, insulating me from the heat. I closed my eyes, sensing the life fading within the wreckage.

My voice was quiet, but it carried in the tense silence. "Her left arm is broken. Three of her ribs have pierced her lung. In ten minutes, she will die from the bleeding inside."

Cody and Faye stared at me, then at each other, their faces a mask of shock. They knew she had hurt her arm, but they couldn't possibly know the extent of the internal damage.

"What's this, some kind of little curse-sayer?" a voice scoffed from the crowd.

I paid them no mind. My small hand rested on a join in the door frame. I looked at Cody. "Here. Pull here."

He hesitated, his eyes wide with disbelief. But with the woman inside dying, he was out of options. He placed his large hands over the spot I indicated.

He pulled with all his might. A deafening screech of tearing metal filled the air. The door, which hadn't budged an inch before, ripped away from the frame.

Everyone fell silent, staring in stunned disbelief. Cody looked at his own hands as if they belonged to someone else. He didn't know that my power, a whisper of moonlight, had severed the internal locks he couldn't see.

The opening revealed the woman inside. She was pale, unconscious, and bleeding. And in the stunned silence, all eyes turned to the tiny, silver-haired child who had made it possible.