The Cursed Luna and Her Fated Mate

Chapter 2: School Days

The students at Blood Moon high school were cruel to the Earthfire students. Celeste took the lead, her pack mates following behind her as they did every morning.

“Ew, Earthfire showed up. Again,” remarked Marissa, the most popular girl in school. Several others laughed at the clothes the Earthfire pack was wearing. One of Celeste’s classmates, Rick, stuck gum into her hair. She kept her head high and led each of her pack mates to their classes before heading into her own, with a quick stop to ice the gum out of her beautiful blonde locks.

The bullying usually brought Celeste close to tears, which she hid to remain strong. If she showed weakness she knew the bullying would just get worse. Today, however, she was on a high. She was hoping to find her mate as soon as she possibly could now that she was 18. She hoped that her mate might have connections, perhaps he might be able to help the pack into a better situation.

She daydreamed about her mate. He must be special, she thought. Astrid was constantly lusting after the wolves at Blood Moon; powerful, strong wolves with sharp jawlines, their scents were strong and masculine. Too strong for Celeste’s taste, these men repulsed her. Celeste hoped that whoever her mate was, that he was sensitive, smaller, kind, but mentally strong enough to help her lead.

Celeste’s daydreaming was abruptly ended by the bell ringing; time for lunch. She headed out to the cafeteria and met back up with her pack mates. Rhiannon was looking at Seth with concern; Celeste spotted a bruise on Seth’s left cheek that wasn’t there that morning.

“Are you okay, Seth?”, Celeste asked. She didn’t even need to ask what happened, this was undoubtedly another instance of bullying.

“Yeah, Joe Portage got me good after class. He thought I was looking at his girlfriend,” said Seth, turning his injured cheek away and rubbing it slightly. Celeste looked at him with sympathy. Seth was another year away from getting his wolf, so the healing would take longer.

The group sat at their usual lunch table and ate their packed lunches. Bean soup and a small roll of bread. Our hunters were rarely able to find meat, and Celeste believed that they were skimming some off the top when they were able to hunt down a deer or wild boar. Fortunately, the small farm operated by Earthfire grew beans, which at least gave the wolves some protein. The group ate their food quickly before chatting about Celeste’s birthday and the upcoming full moon.

When lunch was over, Celeste walked her pack back to their respective classes again. She sat through the rest of the day, scribbling more ideas into her notebook about how to save the pack, too excited about the upcoming days to think of much. Once the day ended, Celeste met back up with her classmates, and piled back onto the bus to head home. The group made jokes and relaxed together. After a draining day of school, the kids of Earthfire always tried to cheer each other up before heading back to the pack.

The bus was a couple miles away from the pack house when Celeste noticed a plume of smoke rising above the trees. Mild forest fires were not particularly uncommon, but the fire would need to be put out to prevent damage to the pack property. She kept an eye on the smoke as the bus grew closer. Once the bus was about a mile away, it became more obvious that the fire was coming from the pack house, not from the surrounding wilderness.

“Stop the bus,” Celeste commanded.