Chapter Three: The Other Side
1421 Words
The infirmary looked like a war zone.
Lena stopped in the doorway, her breath catching. Shelves she'd organized just yesterday lay on their sides. Glass bottles shattered across the floor, their contents mixing into muddy puddles. Dried herbs scattered everywhere, five years of careful collection ruined in minutes.
And in the center of it all, held between two warriors, was her body.
The disconnect made her stomach lurch. That was her face, twisted in rage. Her brown hair falling loose from its braid. Her small frame thrashing against holds that should have restrained her easily.
But the expression was all wrong. Lena had never looked like that. Feral and furious, lip curled in a snarl that belonged on someone who'd never been told no in their entire life.
"Let me go!" Aria shrieked, and even Lena's rough voice sounded different coming from her. Sharper. Entitled. "Do you have any idea who I am?"
"You're Lena," Marcus said patiently. He was one of the senior warriors, built like a mountain. "You're the healer, and you're having some kind of episode. We're trying to help."
"I'm not Lena!" Aria's eyes swept the gathered crowd, wild and desperate. "I'm Aria Silvermoon! Your Luna! That woman—" Her gaze locked on Lena in the doorway. "That woman is wearing my face!"
The room went silent. A dozen pairs of eyes turned to Lena, standing frozen in Aria's body.
Lena's mind raced. She needed to say something. Do something. But what?
"She's clearly unwell," someone murmured.
"Never seen the healer like this," another added. "She's always so quiet."
Because Lena was quiet. She'd learned young that invisible people survived longer. But Aria had never been invisible a day in her life.
Dr. Chen pushed through the crowd, medical bag in hand. He was in his fifties, efficient and perpetually annoyed. Lena had worked under him for years, though he'd never bothered learning much about her beyond her usefulness.
"What happened?" he asked, kneeling to examine scattered supplies.
"Found her like this about ten minutes ago," Marcus said, still holding Aria's shoulders. "Destroying the place, screaming about body switching."
Chen's eyebrows rose. "Body switching?"
"She thinks she's Luna Aria," the other warrior, James, said carefully. "Keeps saying someone stole her face."
"Delusions." Chen pulled a syringe from his bag. "Possibly a psychotic break. Has she been under unusual stress?"
Lena almost laughed. Aria had no idea what stress was. Try living on scraps and gratitude for five years. Try being so forgettable that people looked through you even when you were treating their wounds.
But she couldn't say that. She had to be Aria now. Composed. Distant. Above it all.
She stepped into the room, glass crunching under her unfamiliar shoes. Everyone straightened slightly. Even in chaos, the Luna's presence commanded respect.
"Luna Aria," Chen said, inclining his head. "I apologize for the disturbance. We'll have this handled shortly."
Lena looked at her own body, still struggling against the warriors' grip. Aria's face was streaked with tears now, makeup Lena never wore smudging down her cheeks.
Their eyes met. Aria's were desperate, pleading, furious all at once.
"You know," Aria whispered, just loud enough for Lena to hear. "You know I'm telling the truth."
And Lena did know. Whatever had happened, they'd switched. Impossible as it was, they'd switched bodies sometime in the night.
But admitting that meant admitting she was the imposter. That she'd woken up in the Luna's bed wearing the Luna's face. They'd assume she'd done it on purpose. Dark magic. A curse. An omega trying to steal what wasn't hers.
They'd kill her for it.
"Luna," Chen said, drawing her attention. "Should we sedate her? She's a danger to herself like this."
Lena's throat went dry. If she said yes, she'd be condemning Aria to unconsciousness. Taking away her voice, her ability to reveal the truth.
But if she said no, Aria would keep screaming. Eventually someone would listen. Eventually someone would start asking questions Lena couldn't answer.
"Please," Aria said, her voice breaking. "Please don't do this. We can fix it. We can figure out what happened and fix it."
Something in Lena's chest twisted. Aria looked terrified. Actually, genuinely terrified in a way Lena recognized because she'd felt it herself every day for years.
Being powerless was new to Aria. Being trapped in a body people dismissed was new to her.
Welcome to my life, Lena thought bitterly.
"Yes," she heard herself say. "Sedate her. Gently. She's clearly unwell."
The words felt like stones in her mouth.
Aria's expression shifted from hope to betrayal to pure rage in the span of a heartbeat.
"You won't get away with this," she snarled as Chen approached with the syringe. "He'll know. Theron will know you're not me. The bond will tell him. He'll feel it and he'll know and then you'll pay for this, you pathetic little nobody—"
The needle slid into her arm. Aria's words slurred, her struggles weakening.
"You're nothing," she whispered as her eyes fluttered closed. "You've always been nothing. And when he finds out, you'll go back to being nothing..."
Her head lolled forward. Marcus caught her easily, lifting Lena's small body like it weighed nothing.
"Take her to the medical wing," Chen instructed. "Keep her sedated until we can determine what's causing this."
The warriors carried her out, and Lena watched her own body disappear through the door. The room felt too quiet after all that chaos.
Chen turned to her, wiping his hands. "I apologize you had to witness that, Luna. The healer has always been stable. This is highly unusual."
"Will she be alright?" The question slipped out before Lena could stop it.
Chen looked surprised. "Eventually, I'm sure. Though this kind of psychotic break can take time to treat."
Psychotic break. That's what they thought this was. Not magic. Not a curse. Just a low-ranking healer losing her mind.
"I've never known the girl to be violent," someone said from the doorway.
Lena turned to find Beta Kyle Merrick leaning against the frame, arms crossed. He was tall, built like all warriors, but with an easier manner than most. Amber eyes that saw too much.
"That was kind of you, Luna," he said, pushing off the doorframe and walking closer. "Showing concern for a lower-rank wolf."
There was something in his tone. Something that made Lena's instincts scream danger.
"She's a member of the pack," Lena said carefully. "Of course I'm concerned."
"Right." Kyle tilted his head, studying her. "It's just, Aria—the healer, I mean—she's usually so quiet. I've worked with her for three years and she barely speaks. Never seen her violent."
He paused, and Lena realized she was holding her breath.
"And I've never seen you show that much concern for a lower-rank wolf before." His eyes narrowed slightly. "You even knew her name."
Lena's heart stopped.
Aria wouldn't have known the healer's name. Aria barely acknowledged people below her station existed. But Lena had responded naturally, called herself by name, shown the kind of concern that came from actually caring about pack members.
She'd made a mistake. Not even an hour into this charade, and she'd already slipped.
"Are you feeling alright, Luna?" Kyle asked, and there was genuine curiosity in his voice now. "You seem different today."
Different. That was one way to put it.
Lena forced herself to meet his eyes, to channel every bit of Aria's cool composure she'd observed over the years.
"I have a headache," she said. "It's been a strange morning."
Strange didn't begin to cover it.
Kyle watched her for another long moment, amber eyes searching. Then he nodded slowly.
"Of course. I'll let you rest." He gestured to the destroyed infirmary. "We'll get this cleaned up. You shouldn't have to see it like this."
He left, but Lena could feel his suspicion lingering in the air like smoke.
She was trapped. Aria was sedated, unable to reveal the truth. But Kyle was already noticing inconsistencies.
And in a few hours, she had to sit through a council meeting and pretend to be Luna in front of the entire pack leadership.
Including Theron, who Aria claimed would somehow sense the truth through their bond.
Lena looked down at the destroyed infirmary, at five years of her life scattered across the floor.
She had no idea what had happened or how to fix it.
But she knew one thing with absolute certainty: she was in way over her head.
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