The evening air was crisp, carrying the faint scent of pine and earth as Selene slipped out of the house. She had told Celeste she was going to “clear her head,” a phrase vague enough to avoid suspicion but truthful enough to keep the stepmother’s probing questions at bay.
It was rare for Celeste to let Selene out without a fight, but tonight, her stepmother had been unusually preoccupied. Whatever spell or ritual Celeste had been researching earlier had taken over her evening. Jakob, Lucian, and Eli were nowhere to be found, leaving the house oddly silent.
The silence felt too heavy to stay in, and Selene welcomed the pull of the woods.
As she stepped deeper into the trees, the moonlight illuminated her path, soft silver beams dancing across the forest floor. Her wolf stirred inside he
