The Luna Queen Is Reborn

Mockery

Through the fringe of my bangs, I risked a glance upward.

A boy I had never seen before stepped across the threshold. He was tall, with the heavy, slender build of an alpha-line warrior, but he moved with a terrifying, liquid grace—like a predator navigating deep snow. He wore a dark, casual jacket, but there was nothing casual about the way he carried himself. His features were striking, sharp and aristocratic, but it was his eyes that caught me. They were a piercing, brilliant silver-blue—like they shadowed mine.

What was that just now? How could his eyes shadow mine?

He didn't look at the teacher, Mr. Harrison, who was currently frozen with a piece of chalk halfway to the blackboard. He didn't look at the empty seats in the front rows. His silver-blue eyes swept the room and locked directly onto my corner.

"Ah, you must be Kaelen," Mr. Harrison said, his hands trembling as he tried and failed to contain it.

I felt sorry for him. I watched as the teacher's throat bobbed and he nervously pointed toward an empty seat at the back.

The moment Kaelen moved, an invisible wire seemed to snap taut right in the center of my chest, pulling hard toward him. It was a bizarre, magnetic tug that made my heart hammer violently against my ribs. There was a profound sense of familiarity—a wave of déjà vu that had absolutely nothing to do with us crossing paths earlier. This felt ancient, like I had forgotten something I mustn't.

He walked down the aisle, his gaze never wavering from mine, and slid into a desk exactly two rows away. I looked down, unwilling for him to catch me staring, but as he brushed past, I stiffened. Unlike the suffocating aura he had carried when he first entered, the scent that tickled my nose now was one of pure comfort.

I could still feel his eyes on me as he settled in.

Summer had claimed he was just some warrior, but that could never be further from the truth. With an aura like that, I wouldn't be surprised if he was royalty. He looked eighteen, and an eighteen-year-old heir wouldn't possess this kind of power no matter how much he trained.

Instinctively, I trembled at the discovery. If he was royalty and wielded this kind of presence at eighteen, how would an elder royal feel? I'd better stay far away from him. With a face like his, he would bring nothing but trouble—trouble that I simply couldn't afford.

"You're still shaking," he murmured, his voice low enough that it was impossible for anyone else to catch over the drone of the teacher’s lecture.

I froze, my pen stopping dead on the paper. For a long second, I didn't move. Then, slowly, I tilted my head inside the hood, my gaze rising to meet his.

Was he speaking to me?

I frowned slightly at him, a brief flicker of defiance cutting through the chemical haze—a residual spark of my old self resurfacing. His thin lips curled into an amused smile. Not wanting to accommodate him any further, I tore my eyes away, my gaze immediately colliding with Louisa's sharp glare.

"Alright, let's settle down," Mr. Harrison called out, clearing his throat loudly to break the bizarre tension gripping the room. He tapped his chalk against the board. "Today we are moving past the early border treaties and diving into the internal structure of the Northern factions. Specifically, the strict laws of succession and the mandatory Alignment protocols."

Coincidentally, my first day resuming school happens to be the say we would be analyzing the story of my life. My hands fisted trying to reign in my pain.

At the front of the room, a familiar, mocking scoff echoed.

Louisa leaned back in her chair, turning her head slowly to look back at my corner. Her dark-coated lips twisted into that same wicked, triumphant smile from the parking lot. She looked at me, then looked intentionally at the empty chair on my left where my high-ranking pack circle used to sit, and then brought her eyes back to mine.

"Mr. Harrison," Louisa called out, her voice dripping with artificial innocence. "Speaking of succession, how does the law apply when a bloodline heir... loses the baseline requirements? If an heir suddenly becomes broken, do they still get to sit at the table, or do we just skip straight to the backup?"

The classroom went ice-cold. Several students turned in their seats, their eyes gleaming with malicious curiosity. The vipers were circling, ready to tear at the fresh blood.

Summer stiffened in front of me, her spine snapping completely straight. A low, vicious growl rumbled deep in her throat, her fingernails digging into the edge of her desk until the wood creaked.

I shrank back into my hood, my hands trembling as I tightly clutched my pen. The familiar, suffocating panic began to crawl up my throat, choking out my air. They knew. She was going to say it out loud in front of everyone.

"Louisa, that is not on the syllabus for today," Mr. Harrison warned, though his voice lacked any real bite against an Alpha’s daughter.

"I’m just asking for historical context," Louisa drawled, her eyes locked onto my covered face, her smile widening as she saw me retreat. "I mean, what happens to a pack when the golden girl turns out to be nothing but a wolfless freak?"

Gasps broke out across the room. Whispers exploded like wildfire. Unmindful of my pain, they giggled and took glances that couldn't even be called sneaky.

Wolfless. The word shattered whatever illusion I had left, baring my deepest, most agonizing wound to the entire room.

But before the whispers could crest, a terrifying, suffocating pressure slammed down on the classroom.

The air didn't just turn cold—it froze. The heavy wood of the desks groaned under the sudden, massive spike of dominant power. It wasn't the wild, angry aura of a local Alpha; it was a cold, royal wrath that demanded absolute, unconditional submission.

Everyone collapsed back against their seats, their breath catching in their throats as their survival instincts forced them to cower.

The new boy two rows away slowly leaned back in his chair. His silver-blue eyes were no longer amused; they were like twin shards of ice, locked onto the back of Louisa's head. The sheer force of his aura was centered entirely on her, pinning her to her desk. Louisa’s wicked smile instantly vanished, her face draining of all color as she gasped for air, completely crushed under a power she couldn't even begin to match.

The boy didn't say a word. He didn't have to. He just stared her down until she violently snapped her head forward, trembling, utterly silenced.

The crushing pressure lifted just as quickly as it had appeared, leaving the entire room shivering and breathless.

Slowly, the boy turned his head back toward my corner. The icy wrath in his silver eyes melted away, replaced by that same quiet, steady intensity. He looked at me through the shadows, checking, assessing, making sure I was intact.

My heart was racing, but not from panic. The magnetic pull in my chest was roaring now, a deep, resonant hum that completely drowned out the whispers of the vipers around me.