Chapter Five
849 Words
Luana stood near the back of the training range, adjusting her grip on the bowstring when a voice interrupted her.
“You think you’re untouchable, don’t you?”
She turned, already knowing who it was.
Elizabeth.
A proud Alpha’s daughter. Golden-haired, sharp-tongued, and obsessed with the triplets since they first took their thrones at Valen. She had been watching Luana from a distance for weeks, her jealousy simmering with every stolen glance. She had been trying to get with them since Jessica died.
They had entertained her for a while but they didn't after Luana came. She felt discarded and felt that Luana had something to do with the brothers suddenly ignoring her.
Her anger finally simmered to the surface, it boiled over.
“You think you can just show up out of nowhere and steal them away?” Elizabeth spat, marching toward her, voice carrying loud enough for half the class to hear. “They were mine. And now they’re crawling after you like mutts.”
Luana didn’t blink. “I didn’t steal anyone. Maybe you just never had them.”
Elizabeth snarled. “I don’t care who you think you are. You’re going to pay for embarrassing me.”
“And how exactly do you plan to do that?” Luana’s voice remained calm, but the edge was there—quiet, cold, and final.
Elizabeth leaned in. “By the next moon, you’ll be crawling back to wherever you came from.”
---
That night, Luana didn’t sleep well.
Her dreams were strange—fragmented shadows of red eyes and snarling jaws, tangled with the sound of Elizabeth screaming. She tossed and turned in her bed, drenched in sweat, haunted by something she couldn’t name.
When morning came, she woke to something far worse.
Blood.
Thick, sticky, and fresh.
Her hands were coated in it. So were her sheets. Her nails.
She sat up abruptly, heart thundering in her chest. The scent of blood filled her nostrils. It wasn’t hers.
She stumbled out of bed and into the bathroom, scrubbing frantically at her skin. The blood came off, but the panic didn’t. She didn’t remember anything. She didn’t even feel tired. It was as if… she hadn’t gone to sleep at all.
By the time she returned to her room, the academy was already buzzing.
Someone had been murdered.
---
Whispers floated through the halls like poison.
“Did you hear?”
“Elizabeth’s dead. Found behind the north greenhouse.”
“They said it was a wolf attack.”
“But no one shifts during school hours. Not without permission. Not without being tracked.”
“They’re saying it wasn’t a normal wolf. Something... older.”
Luana moved through the crowds like a ghost, her heart pounding in her ears. She caught flashes of teachers huddled in corners, faculty murmuring urgently, guards being deployed.
Then she heard it.
“The bite marks,” someone said. “They match something from the archive. A rogue species. One that’s supposed to be extinct.”
---
She was halfway to the library when someone grabbed her arm.
“Miss Luana.”
She turned to find Principal Sanders standing there in his usual gray suit, expression unreadable. He was an old wolf—older than most at Valen—and known for his unsettling calm. He never raised his voice. Never lost his temper.
That’s what made him terrifying.
“Come with me.”
She obeyed without question, her legs moving on autopilot.
---
His office was colder than usual. The curtains were drawn, the fire unlit. On the desk sat a single tablet screen, paused on a frame of black and white security footage.
Sanders folded his hands over the desk.
“Do you know why you’re here?”
Luana hesitated. “Because Elizabeth is dead?”
“Yes,” he said flatly. “And because you were the last person to have a public altercation with her. Witnesses. Raised voices. Threats.”
“I didn’t threaten her,” Luana said tightly. “She threatened me.”
“I believe you,” he replied. “But this—” he tapped the screen— “says otherwise.”
He pressed play.
The footage showed the north greenhouse entrance. It was night. The angle was distant, grainy, but visible.
At exactly 3:14 a.m., a figure stepped into frame.
Luana’s blood ran cold.
It was her.
Barefoot. In a nightgown. Walking like she was sleepwalking. Her eyes glowed faintly, unnaturally. Her hair floated behind her like it was moving in water.
And behind her… followed a wolf.
But not a regular wolf.
It was massive. At least twice the size of a normal shifter. Its fur shimmered black and silver, its eyes glowing red. It looked ancient. Wrong. Powerful.
The two—girl and beast—disappeared off-screen.
At 3:18, the camera caught a flash of movement.
The wolf again.
Its muzzle was stained red.
Then nothing.
The screen went black.
Luana’s breath hitched.
“I didn’t…” she whispered. “I didn’t do that. I don’t even remember—”
- Writer
