THE WOLF WHO REMEMBERED MY NAME

Chapter 4: Moonborn

"Your mother didn't abandon you," he said. "She bled to keep you."

The thing beneath the floor howled again and the dust on my bedroom floor jumped.

Kieran moved before I could scream. He was at the window in two steps, looking down at the tree line. His shoulders were up to his ears, every muscle locked.

"They're early," he muttered to himself. "They were supposed to be early."

"Who's early?" I was still on the floor, photo clutched to my chest, the iron wolf-head key cutting into my palm.

"The scouts." He turned. His eyes weren't silver anymore. They were catching light. Literally. Like a dog's in headlights. "We have to go. Now."

"The letter said not to trust you."

"The letter was written by a human who thought he could bargain with wolves," he snapped. "He was wrong."

The howl came again, closer this time, and it wasn't one. It was three, overlapping, and not from beneath the floor anymore. From outside. From the forest that was supposed to be a hundred yards away.

I scrambled up. "What is Moonborn? The letter said—"

"Later."

"No. Now. You touch me and show me burning forests and dead men and you say later? I'm not a child you can lock in a closet anymore!"

That stopped him. He stared at me. Something in his face cracked.

"No," he said quietly. "You're not."

He grabbed the rusted tin box and threw the photograph and letter back inside, shoved it into my hands. "If we die, you take this. You remember."

He pulled me out of the closet, out of the bedroom, down the stairs that creaked under both of us. The house was colder now. The clock that struck thirteen was ticking backwards. I could hear it.

He dragged me into Jonah's old study — the one room I hadn't gone into — and slammed the door. It was the only room with no windows.

Maps on the walls. Not maps of places. Maps of territories, circled in red, marked with claw. And in the center, a word written over and over in different handwritings, in ink, in blood, in charcoal:

MOONBORN MOONBORN MOONBORN

"Listen," Kieran said, pressing his back to the door. The howls outside were circling the house now. I could see shadows passing the cracks under the door. "Your mother is Moonborn. We are not werewolves like your father's stories. We don't change because the moon tells us to. We change because we choose to. And we remember. Every tooth, every kill, every oath. We stay human inside the wolf."

"And the other wolves?" My voice was a whisper.

"The others? The Red Eyes? They are turned. Bitten. Cursed. They lose themselves. They are animals who think they're men. We are men who choose to be animals. That's why the council hates us. We can't be controlled."

"And me?"

He looked at me then, and his silver eyes softened for half a second.

"You shouldn't exist, Elena. A Moonborn and a human — or a Moonborn and an Alpha — it never happened before your mother and Silas. The council said a child of two worlds would be either the strongest creature ever born, or the one that ends us. So they came to end you first."

The door shuddered. Something heavy hit it from the other side. Kieran didn't flinch, but sweat broke on his forehead.

"My father — Jonah — helped them?"

"Jonah made a deal with the devil because he loved you. He told them where Luna hid you. He told them Silas would come through the east ridge. He watched them take his brother's mate and his brother's child and he told himself it was mercy because they let you live. He raised you with lies because the truth would have called them back."

"And you?" I stepped closer. I could smell pine and snow on him, even though he was dry. "What did you do that night?"

His hand flexed. The nails were black now. Longer.

"I was ordered to kill you."

The house went silent. Even the things outside stopped howling to listen.

"I was eighteen. Beta to Silas. His brother in everything but blood. The High Alpha said, 'Kill the abomination and her mother, bring me the Alpha's head.' I tracked you to this house. Luna was bleeding on the floor. Silas was already dead on the ridge. And you..."

He swallowed.

"You were in that closet. You heard me come in. You opened the door yourself. You were six. Yellow coat. No shoes. And you held out that stupid one-eyed wolf and said, 'Are you here to play?'"

My knees almost gave again.

"I couldn't," he whispered. "I picked you up and you put your hand on my face and you weren't afraid. No child should look at a wolf like that and not be afraid. I knew then. You weren't half. You were more."

The door behind him bucked. Wood splintered. A red eye appeared in the crack, blinking.

Kieran snarled — actually snarled, lips back, teeth too sharp — and slammed his back into it, crushing the eye. A yelp from outside.

"We have to go," he hissed. "They're not here for me. They're here to see if you still smell human. If you do, they'll leave. If you don't—"

"I don't understand."

"You will."

He grabbed my wrist again, and this time I didn't fight. He pulled me to the back wall of the study, where the maps overlapped. He tore one down. Behind it, a handle made of bone.

"The key," he said, looking at my fist.

I opened my hand. The iron wolf-head key with blue glass eyes.

He took it, pressed it into the bone handle. It fit with a click that sounded like a jaw closing.

The stone wall moved.

Cold air, older than the house, poured out, smelling of earth and wet fur and blue fire.

A passage. Steps going down into black that had no end.

From above, the bedroom ceiling cracked. Something was in my room now. In the closet. Scratching to get out.

Kieran pushed me toward the steps. "Go. Don't stop until you see the door that doesn't want to open."

"What about you?"

His nails were claws now. His scar was stretching as his face changed. Bones cracking under skin.

"I'm right behind you, little moon."

He wasn't Kieran anymore as he turned to the study door that was splintering open. His spine arched. His coat ripped.

The massive black wolf with the silver spine from my vision stood in Jonah's study, and it roared at the red eyes pouring through the door.

And I ran down into the earth, into the dark, holding a tin box of lies, while the house I had just inherited burned behind me for the second time in eighteen years.