His Reluctant Luna

Chapter 17: The Enemy Within

I didn't sleep after the Oracle's visit.

Her words circled in my mind like wolves around a fire. The true enemy is already inside these walls.

Who?

I ran through every face in the keep. The servants who bowed too low. The guards who watched too long. The cooks who never met my eyes. Any of them could be the one.

But the Oracle said the enemy. Singular. One person.

Someone close.

I found Damon in the war room at dawn, still awake, maps spread before him.

"You didn't sleep either," I said.

"Neither did you."

I sat across from him. "The Oracle said the enemy is inside the keep. Who do you trust completely?"

He was quiet for a moment. "I trusted Kael. I trusted Elena. I trusted you."

"And now?"

"Now I trust the same people. But I'm watching everyone else."

"That's not enough."

"I know." He looked up at me. "What do you suggest?"

"Flush them out."

"How?"

"Give them a reason to move."

I spent the next two days playing weak.

I stumbled in the corridors. I let my training sessions end early, claiming exhaustion. I stayed in my room, leaving meals untouched. I made sure the keep saw a Moon-touched who was fading, failing, falling apart.

Elena played along, her visits to my room growing more frantic each day. Even Selene got involved, bringing me broth I never drank, wringing her hands in the doorway.

The performance was flawless.

And on the third night, the trap snapped shut.

I was in my room, the candles low, the curtains drawn, when I heard the door open.

I didn't move.

Soft footsteps crossed the floor. A shadow fell over my bed.

"I know you're awake."

I opened my eyes.

Kael stood above me.

"Did I fool you?" I asked quietly.

"You fooled everyone." He sat on the edge of my bed. "Including the person who's been watching you since you arrived."

"The Oracle said the enemy is inside the keep."

"She's right."

"Is it you?"

"No." He met my eyes. "But I know who it is."

"Tell me."

"The Oracle wasn't talking about a person." He paused. "She was talking about a bloodline."

"Whose?"

"Yours."

The word hung between us.

"You carry Elena's blood," he said. "But you also carry your father's. And your father's family has a history you don't know about."

"My father was a drunk who sold me to wolves."

"Your father was a Blackwood. And the Blackwoods were not always human."

I stared at him. "What are you saying?"

"The Blackwood family was founded by a Moon-touched who betrayed his own kind. He sold the secrets of the lunar bloodline to the ancient ones — the same ones who marked Selene. In exchange, they let him keep his human form. But the deal came with a price."

"What price?"

"The Moon-touched in his bloodline would always be drawn to the ancient ones. Controlled by them. The darker the power grew in you, the easier it would be for them to reach you."

My blood went cold.

"The training," I said slowly. "The bond with Elena. Learning to use the moon's power — it's making me vulnerable to them."

"Not vulnerable." Kael's voice was barely a whisper. "Connected."

"Then how do I stop it?"

"You don't." He stood. "But you can choose whose side you're on when the time comes."

He left.

I sat in the dark, the weight of his words pressing down on me.

The enemy wasn't in the keep.

The enemy was in my blood.

The next morning, I told Elena everything.

She listened in silence. When I finished, she reached across the table and took my hand.

"I knew," she said quietly. "I've always known."

"You knew the Blackwood bloodline was corrupted?"

"I knew that my mother's mother made a deal she shouldn't have. I knew that the moon power in our family came with a shadow." She met my eyes. "I didn't tell you because I wanted you to find your own strength first. To learn who you are before you learned what you come from."

"And now?"

"Now you know both." She squeezed my hand. "And you're still standing. That's more than I ever did."

I looked at my hands — the hands that had drawn moonlight, broken curses, cut dark threads.

The same hands that carried an enemy in their blood.

"I'm not going to let them control me," I said.

"I know."

"I'm going to fight."

"I know."

"And I'm going to win."

Elena smiled — a mother's smile, full of pride and fear.

"I know, Aurora. I've always known."