Tortured Souls

The Full Moon Knows

The moon was full again.

Luna watched it rise through her bedroom window, round and silver like the eye of a ghost. It flooded her room with pale light, casting long shadows across the wooden floor. She hadn't slept. Not really. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw ink splattering across Jenny’s shirt, heard the sizzle of lights flickering, and felt the smoke curling from her own skin.

And her dad’s voice haunted her.

Some doors, Luna… once opened, never shut.

She sat up, pulled on a hoodie, and crept down the hallway. The house creaked beneath her feet, old and warm and familiar. But something in it felt off now. Like it had been pretending all this time.

She passed her sisters' room, the door cracked just enough to hear their soft, even breathing.

Then she saw it.

The attic door.

It was slightly ajar.

That door had never been open before. In all the years she’d lived here.

Luna stared at it for a moment, heart thudding. She felt her feet moving before her brain caught up.

Up the ladder. Into the dark.

Dust danced in the sliver of moonlight that slipped through the attic vent.

Luna pulled the chain for the single bulb. It flickered to life with a dull hum, casting the cluttered space in a sickly yellow glow.

Old boxes. Forgotten furniture. A broken rocking horse. Nothing unusual at first.

Then she saw it.

Tucked behind a stack of photo albums and a rusted fan: a black trunk. Thick iron latches. No lock, just a carved symbol she didn’t recognize, a crescent moon with a vertical line running through it, like a scar.

She touched it.

The metal was warm.

Her fingers trembled as she opened the lid.

Inside, wrapped in faded cloth and dried lavender, lay a small bundle of items. A book with a leather cover, no title, just that same moon-scar symbol. A glass vial filled with thick, dark liquid. A charred, broken pendant that shimmered slightly under the bulb.

At the bottom, a letter.

Yellowed. Unsealed.

She unfolded it slowly. Her name was written across the top in a rushed, almost desperate scrawl:

Luna, if you’re reading this, then it’s already begun.

Luna’s hands were ice. The attic seemed to hold its breath.

She turned the page and began to read.

Luna

If you’re reading this, then it’s already begun.

We wanted to keep you safe. We swore we would never tell you unless we had no choice. But if the signs are surfacing… it means the blood has awakened.

You were born during a full moon, in a place touched by ancient power. Your birth was not ordinary, nor was the fire that followed.

Your parents were not very innocent.

They were sorcerers, Luna. They belonged to a bloodline feared for centuries. They were powerful. Too powerful. Magic like that can not be erased… only hidden.

You were just a baby when the fire came. We found you in the ashes, crying but unharmed. The town wanted you gone too, but we couldn’t do it. We took you instead.

We raised you as our own, hoping that love would be enough to stop the darkness from finding you.

But blood remembers. Magic remembers. And it seems… so do you.

M.

Luna stared at the letter for a long time, her breath shallow.

A thousand thoughts screamed in her mind, but one thing cut through them all:

They lied to me.

Her hands clenched around the page. Her heart thundered.

The pendant on the floor flickered with faint light, like a heartbeat.

And somewhere in the attic, from behind the walls, something whispered her name.