Chapter 2 Bloodlines and Buried Truths.

Weeks before the chimney climb

Wolfsbane oil burns like liquid fire under my sleeves.

It clings to my skin in invisible streaks, stinging every shallow cut I've earned from the thorns on the forest path. A price worth paying. It masks my scent-for now. Later, it will be a beacon when the sweat thins it out.

I adjust the scratchy wool scarf around my neck-too heavy for early autumn, but necessary to hide the scars. The fabric rubs against my throat like judgment. The gates loom ahead, black marble threaded with veins of silver that catch the moonlight just right to make the snarling wolf carvings seem alive.

They aren't just warning signs. They're promises.

"Remember," Nana Fiona's voice whispers in my memory as I take the first step forward. Her calloused fingers had gripped my chin that final morning, her breath smelling of bitter tea and fear. "You are Mira now. Close enough to answer without hesitation. Different enough to keep breathing."

I can still feel the ghost of her touch, but it's not enough to keep my hands from curling into fists as the first guard steps into my path.

His teeth are yellowed and cracked, fingers clicking lazily against the hilt of his sword as he circles me like I'm already halfway to dead.

"Halt."

He doesn't ask for papers. Doesn't ask who I am. He just sniffs. Long and slow.

"You stink of wolfsbane, girl."

I tilt my head down further, eyes hooded, expression schooled into wide-eyed obedience.

"Rat infestation in my village," I say smoothly. The lie rolls off my tongue like poisoned honey. "My grandmother-"

"Spare me the peasant excuses."

His hand snaps out and grabs my chin, tilting my face up so fast I taste blood where my teeth catch the inside of my cheek. His claws prick skin, sharp enough to hurt, shallow enough to leave a message: I could take more if I wanted.

His breath reeks of rotting meat and stale wine. His eyes flick over mine and narrow.

"These eyes..." he mutters. "You're either very brave or very stupid to walk into the Alpha's den looking like that."

I want to kill him. I should kill him.

The thought is sharp and sudden, bright as steel under moonlight. It unfurls in my mind with startling clarity-my hand on his hilt, driving the blade up through his ribs into his lung. Watching his mouth work around the last breath he'll never take. Kicking his twitching body aside and stepping over the mess like the predator I was raised to be.

I could. Easily.

He's slow. Drunk. Overconfident.

But it's broad daylight. The gates are open. The courtyard is full of guards. And nothing screams "I am not a threat" like slitting a Captain's throat where everyone can see.

So I don't move. Don't flinch. Let the rage curl in my stomach like a coiled serpent and smile with my eyes instead of my mouth.

Not yet.

"Captain Dain!"

The voice slices through the moment like a thrown blade. Female. Firm. Young.

His grip tightens for a heartbeat-calculating. I see the war flicker behind his eyes. Then he releases me with a shove, sending me staggering back.

The girl who steps between us is all sharp edges and coiled tension, her red braid swinging like a pendulum. She's barely older than me, but she walks like she's already survived ten lifetimes. The leather of her boots is scuffed, not from wear but from fights.

"Head Cook Marga's new scullery maid," she says, thrusting a scroll at the captain. Her green eyes glint like broken glass. "Transferred from the border villages. Unless you'd like to explain to the Alpha why his dinner service is short-staffed again?"

Captain Dain's lip curls, but he stamps the parchment with unnecessary force. The paper nearly tears beneath the seal.

"Get her out of my sight."

As we walk, I study her from beneath my lashes. The way she moves-light but deliberate. The twitch of her fingers toward her hip, like she's reaching for a knife that isn't there.

She catches me looking. "Lesson one," she murmurs, steering me past a group of black-clad guards. "Eyes down, mouth shut. The wolves here don't just bite-they play with their food first."

The Outer Ward swallows us whole.

The air is thick with roasting meat and something darker underneath-iron, sweat, and the sickly-sweet reek of desperation. Statues of twisted, half-human figures leer from alcoves. A fountain bubbles with wine dark as blood.

Julise stops before a moonstone altar. "Palm here."

The stone is icy against my skin. The oath she feeds me is razor-edged:

"I am less than shadow. I speak only when spoken to. My life belongs to Narcolantis."

White-hot pain lances through my hand like lightning through bone. I bite my tongue until copper floods my mouth, but I don't make a sound. Not for them. Not ever again.

When I look down, the mark glows faintly-a crescent moon split by three claw marks. A brand. A warning. A leash.

Julise watches me with something almost like respect. "Break the rules, and it burns. Try to run, and it sears straight to the bone." She leans in. "They say the last girl who tried screamed for three days before the Beta slit her throat."

My new quarters are a coffin beneath the kitchen stairs. The pallet is thin. The bucket is rancid. The candle stub flickers like it's ashamed to still be alive.

Julise lingers in the doorway. "Marga works servants until they drop. Keep up or get out." A beat.

"Well... you can't leave. So I guess just... don't die before breakfast."

When she's gone, I press my burning palm to my chest and exhale for the first time in hours. The ache in my bones is deep, but it's the fury that keeps me warm.

That Captain had no idea how close he came.

Killing him would've been easy.

Keeping this face on-this mask of fear, obedience, smallness-that's what's hard.

That's the real war.

As I lie back, I see them-words carved into the wooden slats above my pallet, jagged and desperate:

Gold-eyed girls don't last the winter.

Outside, the castle groans like a living thing. Somewhere deep in its belly, a man screams. The sound cuts off abruptly.

I blow out the candle and let the dark swallow me whole.