Chapter Two: Blood In Moonlight
2204 Words
The pack mourned.
Not with howls or roars, but with an eerie stillness.
Rochelle’s body lay draped in white silk on the stone altar in the inner sanctum of the Moonclaw temple. Her hands were folded over her chest, her Luna mark faintly glowing in silver along her collarbone. Unmoving. Unanswered. The ritual chamber, where she had once stood radiant and strong, now held only death and silence.
The scent of lavender still clung to her skin.
Outside the temple, the rest of the pack had been barred entry. Only Elders and ranking wolves were allowed to view her now, per protocol. They claimed the poison had been divine punishment. A rejection from the Moon. They said her death was an unfortunate tragedy. An accident. A sorrowful omen.
But behind the closed doors of the Council chamber, Elder Thane had already crafted the story.
“Poison,” said Pearce, his voice flat. “In the ceremonial chalice?”
Thane stood with his arms folded behind his back. “We cannot be sure. There are whispers it was the Moon’s will. No visible wound, no trace of toxin strong enough to leave evidence. It may have been spiritual.”
Pearce narrowed his eyes. “Don’t insult my intelligence. She didn’t just collapse. Someone did this.”
“Perhaps,” Thane said, shrugging. “But perhaps not. And if word of assassination spreads, it will destabilize the entire pack. Is that what you want as Alpha?”
Pearce said nothing.
He wasn’t crying. He hadn’t cried since he was twelve. But something throbbed behind his ribs now. A feeling he didn’t recognize. Guilt? Regret?
No. Too late for that.
“She deserved better,” he said, almost to himself.
Thane turned toward him, voice low and sharp. “You married her to fulfill prophecy, not to fall in love. Do not lose yourself now. The pack needs strength. They need a leader.”
Pearce looked up. “And a Luna?”
The Elder smiled thinly. “Not yet. But eventually, yes. One who understands her place.”
He didn’t say Morgana’s name. He didn’t have to.
In the sanctum, Morgana stood over Rochelle’s body.
Alone.
She pressed her fingertips against the edge of the altar, her manicured nails biting into the cold stone. Her eyes shimmered with unshed tears but there was no one around to see if they were real.
“You always were too soft,” she murmured. “Too trusting.”
She glanced down at Rochelle’s face. Even in death, she looked calm. Almost beautiful.
“You had everything,” Morgana whispered. “The title. The mate. The prophecy. And you never even fought for it.”
A shadow stirred behind her.
“You weren’t supposed to die,” Morgana muttered, backing away from the altar. “Just… weaken. Fade. Leave room for someone who was willing to lead.”
The moonlight filtered through the stained-glass dome above them, casting fractured silver over the altar. Rochelle’s form glowed faintly under the light.
Morgana stepped back quickly.
Something about the room felt heavy now. Watching. Judging.
“Do not look at me like that,” Morgana hissed, her eyes suddenly wild. “You’re gone. You lost.”
She spun on her heel and stormed out of the chamber.
The funeral pyre was arranged for the following night.
Pack law dictated that fallen Lunas be returned to the moonlight through fire and ash, their spirits sent upward under the Moon’s gaze. But Pearce broke tradition.
He ordered a closed ritual.
He told the pack it was for their safety. That the Moon had not yet spoken. That they needed time.
But in truth, he didn’t want anyone else to see her. Not like that. Not so still.
He stood beside the pyre that evening, alone beneath the trees. The fire crackled softly, casting sparks into the night sky. Rochelle’s body lay within the logs, surrounded by white lilies.
He stared for a long time, hands clenched into fists.
“I never gave you what you deserved,” he murmured.
The wind whispered through the forest. A wolf howled far off in the distance.
Pearce closed his eyes.
When he opened them, the fire was lit.
And she was gone.
Miles away, in a dense forest far beyond Moonclaw territory, the rogue camp stirred.
A battle had broken out just hours before the rogues against bounty hunters. A mess of fur, claws, and blood. Now the survivors limped back to their dens, wounded and restless.
But in one tent, something stranger was happening.
A young rogue woman, dark-haired and dust-covered, had been found half-dead beneath a fallen tree. No one knew who she was or where she came from. She wasn’t bleeding, but her pulse had nearly vanished. Her skin burned with fever. Her body convulsed under the blanket where they’d laid her.
Then, suddenly, she stilled.
Her eyes flew open.
Silver.
Rochelle gasped as the world came back in pieces.
Pain, heat, confusion. Her limbs felt unfamiliar. Stronger. Denser.
She tried to sit up but collapsed, breath ragged.
A man stormed into the tent—tall, lean, his jaw bruised from the earlier fight. Cassian, leader of the rogue outpost.
“You’re awake?” he said, stunned. “You were nearly dead an hour ago.”
Rochelle blinked at him. Her mouth was dry. “Where… am I?”
“Safe. For now.”
He eyed her warily. “Who are you?”
She tried to answer. Her throat worked but no name came.
Not Rochelle. Not anymore.
She looked down at her hands. They were rough. Calloused. Covered in scars that weren’t hers.
And yet… she knew they were now.
“Martha,” she whispered. “My name is Martha.”
Cassian raised an eyebrow. “Well, Martha. You just survived a battle and woke up like someone lit your soul on fire. What else should I know about you?”
Rochelle—Martha—met his gaze.
“I’m not who I used to be.”
Back in Moonclaw, Morgana sat at Pearce’s side during the post-funeral council meeting.
She wore black, but her lips curled with satisfaction beneath the veil.
The Council had agreed to give her temporary Luna status. She would “guide” the pack through its grief. She would offer comfort to Pearce.
In time, she would be his mate. She believed this with all her heart.
Pearce, however, said little. He drank slowly from a steel goblet, his mind drifting elsewhere.
A memory returned to him unbidden: Rochelle singing softly by the windowsill. A melody about stars and wolves. A song she claimed she learned from her mother.
He hadn’t listened to the words then.
Now, he wished he had.
That night, as the pack slept, a tremor passed through the moonlight itself.
The Moon Goddess stirred in her realm.
The prophecy, once stagnant, now pulsed with life.
She lives, the Goddess whispered into the wind. She returns.
The wolves did not hear.
But something in the forest did.
A howl cut through the trees—sharp and unfamiliar.
The howl of someone reborn.
- Writer
