First Moon Rising

THE POISON SHIPMENT

Black spread fast.

In five seconds it went from my fingertips to my first knuckle. Silver to black, like ink poured into moonlight. Like someone turned off the moon inside my skin.

I watched it happen. I could not stop it. I felt cold, not hot. Cold that started at nail and moved to bone.

Colten grabbed my wrist again, harder this time, ignoring his own black blood dripping onto my cream dress. My dress. The one Rose had thrown in mud, now stained black twice. Once from her throwing it, once from his nose.

He pressed his cold forearm, still laced with black veins, against my turning hand, skin to skin. Vein to line.

He hissed, teeth bared, eyes rolling back, but did not let go.

"If it is wolfsbane, my blood will push it back," he choked out, black blood running from his nose onto our joined hands, mixing with my blackening silver. "Wolfsbane kills me, but it kills slower than whatever this is. It will burn it out. Hold. Do not pull."

"Let go, you are bleeding worse!" I tried to pull away. My other hand pushed at his chest. His grip tightened, nails digging into my wrist, amber eyes fully black again, no amber left, only black veins pulsing to his temples, to his jaw, to his throat.

Nora was already on her knees in mud, ripping my glove off. My work glove, ghost root stained, damp leaf dust still on it. She sniffed it, then sniffed my fingers, then my forearm where silver turned black at steady pace.

"Wolfsbane," she snarled, dropping the glove like it was fire, kicking it away from pups who were gathering at drying racks. "In the white ghost root. Second shipment. Someone dusted it with powdered wolfsbane. Fine powder. Invisible to eye. You touched it bare handed to count damp leaves. You inhaled it? Did you lick your fingers? Tell me truth."

"I count damp leaves for black spots!" I said, panicked, watching black crawl to my second knuckle, over my silver lines, eating light. Cold, not burning, cold like death creeping up finger. "Nora taught me, check for black spots, so you touch bare handed, you feel damp, you feel rot, you count -"

"Black spots from wolfsbane!" Nora shouted at the border pups who were gathering, small faces scared, some coughing. "No one touch the shipment! Seal the drying racks! Burn gloves! Burn all gloves from today! No one breathe near crate two!"

Colten pressed harder, his black veins pushing against my blackening silver lines. Where we touched, strange thing happened. His black receded a millimeter where it met my skin. Mine advanced a millimeter where it met his. We were poisoning each other and saving each other at same time. His curse pulling my poison, my First Moon pulling his curse.

"Where did second shipment come from?" he demanded again, voice raw, black blood on his chin, on his chest, on my dress. "You asked which store this morning when you inventoried. Which store, Izel? East Store? West? Who signed it out? Who had key at five a.m.?"

"East Store. Same as always. Signed by my mother. Janet Stone. High ranked healer. She signed at five a.m. today, before dawn, before normal sign out, special release. White string. White tag in Louis handwriting that said pure. But ribbon at bottom was Rose ribbon. And signature at bottom was mother."

Nora froze, hand on my elbow, mid check of pulse.

"Janet sealed you at fourteen," she said, voice low now, so only we three in mud could hear. "Now Janet signs poison at five a.m. and your silver turns black same day you mark pup graves grey? You see pattern?"

I stared at my hand in Colten's. Black to third knuckle now. Third knuckle is where finger meets hand. Where ring would sit if anyone ever gave me ring. If it hit my heart, First Moon lore said I would die before my wolf fully arrived. Sealed for eleven years, then unsealed three days, then poisoned on day three by my own mother who sealed me to protect me. Or to control me.

"Cut it," I whispered.

Colten's black eyes widened, even fully black you could see shock.

"What?" he said.

"Cut it. Cut my fingers. Before it hits my heart. Like you cut black veins out of your chest last winter. Nora told me you cut them with hunting knife when black reached heart first time. Cut them now. My fingers."

"I cut my own chest because my curse is ten years old and slow!" he shouted, black blood spraying with words onto mud. "Yours is hours old and moving fast! If I cut your hand, wolfsbane goes into blood faster! You will die in minutes not hours!"

"Then do something!" My voice broke. Loud. Raw. Pups heard. Whole border heard. I was twenty five, unshifted for eleven years, sealed by my mother, poisoned by my mother, and the first man who ever looked at my silver lines like they had been waiting for him was bleeding black blood onto my dress trying to save me with his own curse.

He did something I did not expect. Something no Alpha in Obsidian would ever do in front of border crowd.

He pulled me down to the mud, both of us on knees in the grey zone, in front of the border, in front of pups, in front of Nora, in front of seal I hammered into fence post, and pressed his forehead to mine. Skin to skin. Curse to seal. Black to silver.

Cold fire ripped through me, from his black veins into my silver lines. Not burning. Freezing. For one second I saw his ten years like pictures slammed into head.

His mother burying three pups on that ridge in winter twenty fourteen, small graves, snow heavy, no help from Obsidian because tax not paid. His father dying of wolfsbane paste Obsidian sent that was supposed to be ghost root. His own veins turning black at eighteen after he tried to save father by sucking poison from wound with mouth. His pack watching him rot while Obsidian taxed medicine and called it pure. His years alone in healer hut while his own mother, Nora's sister, died telling him not to trust white string.

Then black in my hand stopped advancing. Paused at third knuckle, pulsing, stuck between silver and black, half and half, moon cut in two. Half moon. No longer spreading but not receding either. Grey at edge where silver fought black.

He collapsed backward into mud, unconscious, black blood pooling under him, fast, too fast. His chest not moving right. Black veins that had receded to shoulders after double paste last night now shot to heart, to throat, to jaw, to eyes. All the way back because he pulled mine.

Nora screamed for the healer cot. Two older pups ran with poles.

And from the border road, a van horn honked, cheerful, oblivious, loud. Obsidian Moon van. Second delivery. White ghost root, extra, apology gift from Alpha Lowe for the misunderstanding with Rose, driver shouting through window, waving white paper.

More poison. More white string. More pure tag.

I stood up, black half hand shaking, silver half pulsing, mud on knees, cream dress stained black, bare feet in mud, and walked to the van.

Driver was young, low ranked, chewing gum, smiling. He did not see my hand. He saw pretty girl in stained dress.

"Apology gift from Alpha Lowe, miss Stone. Extra two tons. Your mother signed. Says sorry about Rose. Says come home."

I looked at crates in van. White string. White tag. Same sweet smell from morning. Stronger now because sun up.

I said to driver, loud enough for log, loud enough for Nora to hear and write, loud enough for border pups to remember:

"This shipment is rejected under Clause Nine, Section Seven: Right to reject any inventory showing contamination without inspection. Return to sender. And tell my mother Janet Stone that her daughter in the grey zone is not dead yet. So she will need more than wolfsbane next time. And tell Alpha Lowe his pure tag is poison."

The driver stared at my half black hand, at my silver lines that now showed black roots, at my cream dress with black blood, and reversed fast. Tires spinning mud onto his white van, onto his white tag. He left ruts.

Behind me, Nora was dragging Colten to healer hut, yelling, "His black went to heart! It went to heart because he pulled yours! He pulled your poison into his heart! Help me!"

I turned. Colten on the mud, not breathing, eyes closed, black veins at heart pulsing once, twice, then still.

My hand half black, half silver, cold and hot at same time.

I ran.