From His Luna to His Rival's Mate

Chapter 20

SELENE

The break-in still bothered me. I kept coming back to it no matter how hard I tried to push it aside.

I had checked everything twice before getting into bed, running my hands over every surface, opening every drawer and closing it again.

It hadn't helped, sleep had come in pieces and left just as quickly, and I woke up early the next morning with a heavy, unsettled feeling sitting in my chest like something I had swallowed wrong.

I sat on the edge of my bed for a long time and stared at the floor, the room felt different now, not in any way I could point to clearly, but the feeling was there. The sense that the one space that had been fully mine no longer felt entirely safe.

Everything else was starting to pile on top of that feeling too, being caught in the middle of so much was weighing on me in a way I hadn't expected. Calder's anger, which was growing faster than I could keep track of.

Kael's constant warnings and the distance he kept placing between us no matter how many walls came down when we were alone.

The strange rushes of emotion that hit me without warning and left me shaken in ways I couldn't explain to anyone. I felt like I was walking a thin line stretched tight over something deep, and every step I took had to be careful or everything would come down at once.

I changed into simple clothes and left the dorm before most other students were moving. The morning air outside was cool and fresh and it helped a little, the way open space always did.

But my mind stayed heavy as I walked the path toward the cafeteria, hands tucked into my pockets, eyes on the ground ahead of me. A few students passed me going the other direction and gave me quick looks. I kept my head up and kept walking.

The cafeteria was still quiet when I got there. I picked up a tray, got a cup of coffee, and found a table near the window where the morning light came in warm and unhurried.

I wrapped both hands around the cup and took a slow sip. Outside, the green fields of the academy stretched out calm and empty and for a few minutes I just sat there and let myself breathe.

Then Kael walked in, he came through the far entrance and paused to scan the room the way he always did, taking everything in before committing to a direction, his eyes found me quickly. We looked at each other for a second, just long enough for me to see something move behind his expression, something that looked like it was deciding.

Then he turned and crossed to a table on the other side of the room where a few other students were already sitting and he didn't look back. His shoulders stayed tight the whole time, and I watched them for a moment before I made myself look back down at my coffee.

The distance hurt more than I wanted to admit. I had sat with him on that stone wall the night before and listened to him share something real, something he clearly didn't give out easily, and now he was on the other side of the room pretending I was just another student he had no reason to speak to. I understood it. I had told myself I understood it but that didn't make it easier to sit with.

I finished my drink slowly and stood up to leave and just then a younger student appeared beside me before I made it two steps. He looked nervous, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, and held out a small folded note with careful hands. "This is for you," he said quietly. "From Alpha Calder."

I took it from him and he left without waiting for a response.

I sat back down and opened the note slowly. The handwriting looked urgent, each word pressed hard into the paper.

*Selene. I cannot stop thinking about you. Every moment, every breath. You are driving me to the edge. Meet me tonight at the old oak tree. We need to talk. Alone. Please do not make me beg. — Calder.*

I read it twice, then I folded it and held it in my hands and stared out the window at the green fields that had looked peaceful five minutes ago.

The message felt intense in a way that made my skin feel tight. Possessive in a way that didn't leave much room for anything else.

I put the note in my pocket and stood up for the second time. I was not going to meet him. Not tonight, not if I could find a way to avoid it.

The sun was warmer when I stepped back outside, but it didn't reach the cold, quiet place that had settled somewhere in the middle of my chest. I started walking, not toward anything specific, just moving.

I took the quieter paths that wound around the back of the academy grounds, away from the areas where students clustered and noise gathered. I needed to think without anyone watching my face while I did it.

Because there was something else sitting underneath all of it, something I had been circling around for days without letting myself look at it directly.

The strange feelings, the rushes of emotion that hit me without warning when certain people got too close, like something beneath the surface was starting to stretch and press against its own edges. Something was waking up inside me, and I could not keep treating it like background noise. If I didn't start trying to understand it now, on my own terms, it was going to get ahead of me.

I spent the rest of the morning on the quieter paths, turning every strange moment over in my mind one by one, trying to remember exactly what they had felt like, not just the emotion itself but the texture of it, like a door being pushed open from the other side without anyone asking first.

By the time afternoon arrived, something in me had settled into something firmer. Not answers but direction. I stopped at a bench under a large tree and sat down. The leaves above me shifted gently in the breeze and dappled the light across my hands in my lap.

I closed my eyes and tried to hold the feeling still in my mind, tried to examine it the way I would examine anything I was trying to understand. I thought about every moment it had come. I thought about what had been different each time.

I opened my eyes and looked at my hands, they looked the same as they always had. But I knew now, more clearly than I had the day before, that something in me had changed. My rebirth had not only given me a second chance. It had brought something new with it, something that was still finding its shape.

I stood up and kept walking. Kael's distance hurt. Calder's note sat in my pocket like a small, burning thing. I was caught between two forces that were both growing stronger and moving faster than I could comfortably keep up with.

But I was done waiting for someone else to hand me understanding, done waiting to be explained to or warned or protected.

I returned to the dorm in the late afternoon and checked the room carefully out of habit. Nothing disturbed, no signs of anyone entering. I sat on the edge of my bed and took a long, slow breath.

I was going to figure this out. On my own terms, at my own pace, with my own hands. Whatever was waking up inside me was mine, and I was going to learn to carry it before it learned to carry me.

This was my life now, my fight, and I was not going to face it waiting for someone else to show up first.