Chapter 2 Lost in Moonshroud

I woke up to morning fog's stillness and a bird song that appeared to hail from another world.

The fire had burned to smoldering coals, and the moss beneath me was damp but warm. Above, there was the creak of forest leaves, letting through fingers of golden light like blessings. I sat up stiffly, muscles protesting, head full of half-forgotten dreams.

Had it really happened? Had I really seen them-five wolves that weren't wolves at all? Or had the whole ordeal spawned from a delirious brain too curious for its own sake?

I looked around. The forest was still. Empty.

No violet-eyed woman, no silver-haired child. No ring of fire, no hoods. Just me, among trees and quiet. My heart fell. Maybe I had imagined it. Maybe I had dreamed the whole thing.

Until I saw the mark.

It was etched lightly on the inside of my wrist-a pale crescent moon surrounded by five stars. It wasn't there yesterday.

A breeze stirred leaves, and that hum returned-lower now, like a lullaby behind the wind. I stood up slow, scanning the underbrush for any sign of where they'd vanished. Nothing but dew, roots, and night. But I couldn't shake the feeling that I was still being watched.

Not hunted. Not threatened. Just. watched.

Like I counted.

I tried to retrace my steps. North, I thought. Towards the sunrise. But the woods shifted about me, quietly but irresistibly. Trees which I had thought I knew had twisted themselves into new shapes. The thread of a path which yesterday I had followed had been obliterated completely, swallowed up by the moss and the fog.

The woods were not a place that I walked through any longer. It was a living thing that breathed.

I trudged for hours. Soft ground pulled at my feet. My breathing hung in mid-air. The deeper I went, the quieter everything grew. No crickets. No birds. Only wind and the beat of my heart echoing in my head.

And then the whispers began.

Softly. Not words. Just sounds. Like leaves shuffling together in a language I almost knew.

And then the pictures. Not in front of me, but inside my head.

A splurge of golden fur. A howl of a wolf on moonlit cliffs. A woman kneeling at a stone altar, her eyes full of tears and stars.

I stumbled, grabbing hold of a nearby tree.

"You shouldn't be alone," a voice spoke to me from behind.

I turned.

Raynor.

He was human once more-or nearly so. The clothing clung to him as if it had been woven from sap and mist. His silver hair fell over his brow. His pale, calculating eyes flashed with a warmth at me.

"You're real," I breathed.

He nodded. "As real as you are. Which, given what you are, is saying quite a lot."

I opened my eyes wide. "What does that even mean?"

He approached closer. "You ought to have stayed by the fire. The forest... tests people who stray away."

"I woke up without anyone."

He tilted his head, and for a moment I could see the wolf in him again-vigilant, questioning.

"You weren't abandoned. We were watching. We needed to find out what you would do."

My heart leapt. "So it was a test?

Raynor hesitated. "A beginning. The Moonheart doesn't awaken completely. The forest reveals to you what you are ready to see."

I looked at the mark on my wrist. "This. what is it?"

He touched me, fingers tracing the mark. I could feel the hum grow stronger, like electricity crackling beneath my skin.

"It marks you as being bound now," he said quietly. "To us. To the land. You can't go back.".

I wished to protest, to tell him he was wrong, that all of it was madness. But the truth descended upon me like twilight.

I didn't want to go back.

He gestured for me to follow, and I did. We walked in silence for a while, the woods parting before him like they knew him. Paths emerged where there had been none. Birds landed on perches. The air grew thinner.

"Where are we?" I asked.

"To get the rest of the pack to look at you," he said. "They need to see you again. Especially Thorne.".

I blushed. I hadn't forgotten that Thorne's gold eyes had lingered on mine.

"You said the forest tested people. Did I. pass?"

Raynor's eyes looked up, and he smiled, a rare, thin smile. "You didn't run. That means something.".

We emerged into a clearing of birch trees, their trunks glowing bone-white in the sunlight. There was a small cottage nestled into a hill, its chimney exhaling a wisp of sedate smoke. It looked like a fairy tale. Too perfect. Too quiet.

Thorne sat on a stump at the clearing's edge, honing a dagger on a riverrock. He looked up when we arrived, a grin spreading across his face like sunrise.

"See what the trees brought in," he said.

I didn't dare glance, but it was hard not to. He was shirtless, sun-kissed hair wind-tousled and disheveled, a scar down his collarbone. Mischief appeared to radiate from him.

"Morning, sunshine," he added, flashing teeth that were just a little too sharp.

"She wandered," Raynor said simply.

"Did she?" Thorne tilted his head at me. "Well, that makes two of us. I've been wandering your thoughts since last night."

I blinked. "Excuse me?"

"Ignore him," Raynor muttered.

Thorne laughed. "What? I'm just saying what we're all thinking."

Seraphine appeared in the doorway thereafter, poised as ever. She smiled at me and invited me inside. "Come. You must be hungry."

I was.

The cottage within was filled with strange herbs, bound charms, and maps scrawled in marks that were unfamiliar to me. It was warm. Safe. Homely.

Seraphine presented me with a bowl of stew. It tasted of wild mushrooms and something smoky and sweet.

"Where is Marek?" Raynor inquired.

"Hunting," Seraphine answered. "And Lazaro is. guarding the perimeter."

"Watching me," I reminded her.

She stared at me. "Not watching. Guarding."

I drank a sip of the stew. It was amazing. But even as I ate, questions were plaguing my mind.

"What now?" I asked.

Raynor sat across from me. "Now, we see how human you still are."

The room fell silent.

I looked down at the mark on my wrist.

Somehow, I already knew the answer.

But how did it feel to become less than human? I didn't have claws, didn't have fur, didn't have teeth sharp behind my lips. But there was something else-something buried deep beneath the bones and blood, something ancient stirring.

Seraphine's firm hand on my shoulder brought me back to the here and now. "The Moonheart isn't a symbol. It's a gateway. You're not transforming in body, Tabitha. You're waking in soul."

Thorne leaned against the wall, looking at me with the kind of respectful amusement. "Don't worry. We'll keep you from beast mode. Probably."

Raynor didn't smile this time. "It won't be simple. The more time you spend here, the more the forest mark you. Choices you make here will echo for eternity."

The words felt heavy in the pit of my stomach like a stone. I felt strangely small in a way I never had before-not because I was weak, but because something gigantic was about to yawn open in front of me. I stood on the edge of a story much older than I'd ever imagined.

Seraphine spoke again, gently. "Tonight, the moon will be full. That is when it will begin. Your first trial."

I didn't demand to know what that was.

Deep within, I knew already.

The forest had brought me here for a reason.

And I was no longer just a visitor.

I belonged to it now.

Moonshroud had accepted me.

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