The Cursed Luna’s Rise

Chapter 1 Elara might think that her heart was beating wildly, breaking through her chest. The Moonfire Festival was now in full blast on the clearing, and all the wolves were under the moon's silver sunlight. The wolves were running softly through the moss-covered ground with their eyes in the sun shining like glass. The smoke of the ritual fires, which were pine, curled and twisted in her stomach. It was a vibrant electric power, and all the shouts and songs were a melody that made her believe that she was part of something bigger. She gripped her cloak tighter, but this had little or no effect on the chill that was coming over her as she rubbed her own leg against Seris, which was always warm and comforting. She tried to put herself on her feet and stuffed her lungs with the icy cold night air. Focus. Focus. This is the night. This has to be the night. Nevertheless, her mind was deceitful, and they continued to remember the times they had spent together with Kael Draven, the Alpha leader of the pack. And here was the boy who had always been so near and harassed her but made fun of her and kept her under his watch, and she had never commented on it. She remembered all the nights they had been running out in the woods, the glances they had given, and the words they had said no to. She even felt her breast constricting as she thought of him. Something derogatory behind her said, You are staring. Elara scampered around and turned back to face Mira, smiling at her. "I'm... I'm just..." Her voice faltered. "You are hopeless, you are hopeless," cried Mira and laughed sweetly. You have got your fingers in his finger, and you are standing there waiting like a lovesick fool. Not... not like that, I said to myself, but the warmth, which was creeping up the backbone of her neck, was unfaithful to her, Elara. She forced herself to look elsewhere, but her gaze returned to Kael. Up came the moon and shone silver on the vacant space. The elders were murmuring in a low manner, and the sound of their voices, as they continued to run along her chest, was quite enjoyable. The energy was palpable. The acceleration of her heartbeatgave her a pull at the breast, which she could not resist. She stared right into the eyes of Kael, and the world had shrunk, and she was alone, and she was with Kael. She groaned, and her heart started to ache. This had to be it. She has felt it—strong and beyond doubt. Yes... yes, it is... it is him... she said to herself. "It has to be." Their common history influenced her in that she thought of him and how he had saved her during one of their training sessions, how the two of them would laugh at night under the stars, or how the two would spend some time together without uttering a single word. She felt the relation to the incendiary, untamed, and savage. His countenance, however, became cheery. His lips were shut, and his eyes were somewhat narrowed. She was more bewildered and scared. She felt like she knew what he was wrong about, yet she could not know how to say anything. "I reject you, Elara Veyron." Her tongue to her was a knife. All about the clearing fell swallows. There was fidgeting, whispering, laughing, and horror among the wolves. She fell and sank down on the ground and made deep holes in the moss to keep alive. Seris screamed in her head, anguish and terror. Kael, who had begun to approach Lyanna Crestfall, the daughter of the Alpha of the Shadowfang Pack, laid his hand into hers. Lyanna smiled in victory and smugness and was completely merciless. Every heartstroke, every breath was a betrayal of her body. "No... it can't be," she crackled. Can you get out of the way, Veyron?" some voice behind her sneered. Her ears were warm, and all her eyes were on her, accusing, scorning. She wanted to submerge, to be fused out. The fire, which but a moment ago had blazed in her, now apparently had been torn away, and in its place had left behind only cold emptiness. "Is this real?" she thought desperately. "Was I ever...?" And her memories turned out her perfidy and displayed all the laughs and all the glances and all the moments in which she had lived with him. She was surrounded by humiliation, betrayal, and powerlessness that wrapped around her chest, giving her a hard time breathing. "I choose Lyanna. She will be on my side, and you... you will know where to go, Kael, cold-blooded, cold-throated. Elara changed her hands into fists, and her nails punctured her palms. She screamed in her head, and her soul was burning with anger, sadness, and disillusionment. She could hear Seris throbbing and throbbing in her head. You are not broken. You are becoming. Becoming? How was she to rise when everything that she knew had failed? She had a spark within, which was so faint and unfamiliar but not extinct. Kael and Lyanna went off with one another and left her standing in the middle of the clearing. The moonlight was on her unsteady frame; the insults and taunts of the pack were daggers in her head. She leaned her forehead to that ground, and it smelled of pine and smoke. The relationship... the fire... it had been there. She had felt it. It hadn't been a dream. Can they really do this? Is that what we were, or can Kael just rub that out? She stared up at the moon, and the light of the moon was flashing in the running tears down her face. She was humiliated by the pack, but there was always the spark, the fire, the power, and the defiance. "They have not seen the end of me yet..." she whispered. "They will regret this." A wail of a wolf in the distant foreground, acute and penetrating and reverberating in the woods. The black eyes of Elara rose to a winking and replied to the moonlight. The faintest motions of her fire she could just feel, shaking, but still undoubted. Who—who am I to live through this... and receive back what is mine!? Her heart had become faster, her breast sore, and the night itself seemed to be alive for her. Everything in the shadows seemed to be dangerous and to be good, and as both Kael and Lyana fell into the shadows, Elara realized that she was no longer the falling girl. She would rise. And at this moment there was one thing that resounded in her head with icy certainty—how very expensively ought she to pay to have her lot taken back!?