Blood Moon Academy

The envelope looked harmless enough. It was made of cream paper, its edges curled from dampness, and sealed with a wax crest I didn’t recognize. When I came home from my shift at the diner, I found it propped against the door, my hands smelling of grease and dish soap and my shoes soaked from the rain. At first, I thought it was another bill. Rent. Gas. Electricity. Those were the only letters that ever found their way to me. But this one—this one was different. The wax seal was pressed with a symbol: a crescent moon with three claw marks tearing through it. My chest tightened. I almost dropped it right there on the stoop. Nobody sends me letters. Nobody except maybe debt collectors, and they don’t dress them up in wax and shadows. I stood in the rain for a long minute, water dripping from my hair, staring at that seal like it might bite. My gut told me what it was before I tore it open. The words swam on the page, black ink sharp as knives. Lena Gray, By the Blood Moon Council decree, you are summoned to Blood Moon Academy to undergo the Trials. Attendance is mandatory. Failure is not an option. Prepare yourself. The carriage will arrive at dawn on the third day. Signed, Headmaster Riven My stomach flipped, a sick lurch that left my knees weak. Blood Moon Academy. The name was legend, whispered in taverns and on lonely roads. A school for wolves, they said. Not the fairytales, not the friendly ones in movies. The real kind. The kind that tore you apart if you looked too long. I shoved the letter back into the envelope with hands that shook harder than they should’ve. It couldn’t be for me. It had to be a mistake. But my name was written there, clear as blood. Lena Gray. No running from that. I didn’t sleep that night. I paced my small one-room flat until the boards creaked in complaint under my weight. Every shadow seemed to move. Every car horn outside felt like a countdown. I told myself not to go. To burn the letter, lock the door, and vanish. I’d done it before. Every time my wolf clawed too close to the surface, every time I almost slipped—I packed up and disappeared. New job, new name, new town. That was how I survived. But this wasn’t a landlord or a suspicious neighbour. This was the Council. You don’t run from the Council and live. By dawn, I’d packed the little I owned into a battered canvas bag. A few clothes. A knife I’d stolen years back. A photograph of my mother, her smile blurred by fingerprints. When the carriage arrived, its wheels whispering on the wet street, I stepped out of the flat without looking back. The journey blurred. Hours bled into miles, trees blurring past the windows in streaks of green and black. My stomach churned with every bump. Across from me sat two others with the same letter clutched in their hands: a boy with eyes too old for his face staring at the floor, and a girl with golden braids wound tight around her head whispering prayers under her breath. None of us spoke. By the time the forest swallowed the last trace of town, silence had rooted itself deep. Then, through the trees, it rose. The Academy. At first, I thought it was a fortress. Black stone towers clawed at the sky, walls jagged like teeth. Torches lined the gates, their flames flickering red, like wounds in the dusk. The crest from my letter loomed above the entrance, carved deep into the stone. My throat closed. The carriage rattled to a stop. The guards wore iron—not uniforms like police or soldiers, but dark and heavy armour, their faces half-hidden by helms. One looked straight at me, and I felt my wolf stir, restless under my skin. “Out,” he said. His voice was gravelly. My legs didn’t want to move, but I forced them to. Sand crunched under my boots as I stepped onto Academy soil. And the air changed. It hit me the second my feet touched the ground. Like the whole forest inhaled at once, and I was trapped in its lungs. Power. That’s what it was. Old, coiled, waiting. My wolf shivered inside me, both drawn and afraid. I swallowed hard, clutching my bag until my knuckles ached. The gates opened, and I walked through. The courtyard boiled with bodies. Dozens of students, maybe more, all new, all summoned. The air buzzed with whispers, curses, and nervous laughter. Wolves—though not shifted yet—pressed in all around, their scents thick and wild. And then I felt it. A gaze. Hot, sharp, digging into me from across the courtyard. I turned, and he was there. Tall, broad shoulders, black hair falling into his eyes. A scar slashed across his jaw like someone had tried to carve the truth out of him and failed. He leaned against the wall like he owned it and the ground we stood on. And he was watching me. Our eyes locked, and for a second, the noise of the courtyard vanished. Something in my chest flickered. I looked away fast, heat crawling up my neck. I didn’t need this. Not now. Not ever. But my wolf was restless, pacing, tail high. The Headmaster’s voice cut through the noise, iron sharp. “Welcome to Blood Moon Academy.” Silence fell. Headmaster Riven stood on the steps, tall, cloaked, every word ringing like a bell. “You are here because you were chosen. Not for what you’ve done, but for what you are. The Trials will strip you bare. Those who fail will not remain. Those who succeed will never be the same.” The crowd shifted, unease rippling like wind in grass. Riven’s eyes swept us, and I felt it like a hand on my throat when they brushed me. The Trials. No escape. No mercy. And somewhere in the crowd, the scarred boy still watched me, unblinking.