THE LOST PRINCESS OF THE WOLVES.

CHAPTER 4

ARIA POV

It was Hanna's idea to go shopping. It was always Hanna's idea when she needed to reset, a bad lecture, a stressful week, a boy who didn't text back, her solution was always the same.

"I need new clothes," she announced on Saturday morning, standing in the middle of our dorm room holding a jacket she'd already owned for two years as she was seeing it for the first time.

"You have clothes," I said without looking up from my book.

"I have old clothes, there's a difference."

"You wore that jacket last Tuesday."

"Exactly, people have seen it, it's compromised."

I looked up at her, "compromised."

"Aria, I cannot keep rotating the same outfits in front of these people, first impressions last longer in college, everyone is always watching."

"Nobody is watching your jacket, Hanna."

"You don't know that," she threw it on her bed and turned to me, "Come with me, please, you need to get out of this room anyway, you've been in here since Thursday."

"I've been working."

"You've been hiding."

"From what?"

"I don't know, that's what's concerning me," she grabbed her bag from the chair. "Come on, two hours, we go, we shop, we eat something that isn't from the campus canteen, we come back."

I looked at my book. I looked at her. I looked at my book again.

"One hour," I said.

"Two."

"Hanna."

"Two hours Aria, I'm not negotiating on this."

I closed my book.

I called home while Hanna was getting ready because I hadn't spoken to my parents in five days and my mother had sent three texts that were progressively more dramatic in tone.

She picked up before the second ring.

"Aria."

"Hi mum."

"Five days," she said immediately, "five days, not a word, I had to find out you were alive from your i********: story."

"I posted that story for everyone."

"I am not everyone, I am your mother, do you know what I've been thinking?"

"Mum, you're fine."

"I am not fine, I've been telling your father something was wrong."

In the background, I heard my dad's voice, "Is that her? Tell her I said she needs to call more."

"Dad says call more," my mum said.

"I heard him."

"He's been worried too."

"Dad, have you been worried," I called out, knowing he could hear me.

A pause.

"I've been mildly concerned," he said in the background.

"He's been a wreck," my mum said.

"I have not been a wreck, Carol, don't tell her that."

"You checked her university's website twice yesterday."

"I was doing research."

"Into what."

"The campus safety ratings."

I started laughing, and my mum made that sound she always made when she was trying not to laugh at herself, that short exhale through her nose.

"I'm fine," I said, "I promise, it's just been a busy week."

"Are you eating properly?"

"Yes."

"Are you sleeping?"

"Yes."

"Are the girls in your dorm nice?"

"Hanna is the only girl in my dorm, and you already know Hanna."

"I mean the other ones on your floor."

"They're fine, mum."

"Fine, like actually fine or fine like you don't want to talk about it."

"Fine like actually fine."

Hanna appeared from the bathroom fully ready, pointing aggressively at her wrist where a watch would be if she wore one.

"I have to go," I said, "we're going shopping."

"With who."

"Hanna."

"Okay good, stay together, don't walk back after dark, text me when you're back."

"I'm in college, not a foreign country."

"Same thing," she said, "I love you."

"Love you too, say bye to dad."

"She says bye," my mum called out.

"Tell her to call more," my dad called back.

I hung up smiling.

"Okay, let's go before you find another reason to stay in," Hanna said, already halfway out the door.

The shopping area was about a fifteen-minute walk from campus, a stretch of stores that ranged from affordable to why would anyone pay that much for a plain white shirt? Hanna had a specific energy when she shopped, focused, decisive, moving through rails like she had a list in her head that nobody else could see.

I was mostly there for the company and the food after.

"What about this," she held up a top.

"It's nice."

"Nice like you mean it or nice like you're not paying attention."

"Nice, like it's nice, Hanna, I don't know what you want me to say."

"I want you to have an opinion."

"My opinion is that it's nice."

She put it back, "You're useless at this."

"I told you that before we left."

"I thought you were being modest."

"I was being honest."

She moved further down the rail and I followed, checking my phone, responding to a message from my course group chat about the reading for Monday. The store was warm and busy, music low in the background, a Saturday crowd moving around us in every direction.

"Okay, what about this one," Hanna held up a different top.

I opened my mouth.

Then I heard her.

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me."

I knew that voice before I even turned around, Celeste, standing at the entrance of the store with Lena and two other girls behind her, shopping bags already in her arms, looking at me and Hanna like we'd personally arranged to ruin her afternoon.

People in the store paused briefly as she entered.

Nothing obvious or loud.

Authority without effort.

I felt it, even without knowing why.

And right behind her, walking in with that same unbothered energy he carried everywhere, was Alexei. His two friends beside him, all of them looking like they'd been dragged here and had made peace with it.

Alexei saw me.

I saw him.

Neither of us said anything.

Celeste didn't have that problem.

"Why are you everywhere," she said, walking toward us, her girls moving with her.

"We're shopping," I said, "same as you."

"This is our store."

I didn't flinch. But something about her words made my skin crawl, it wasn't just attitude. It was her power she was flaunting.

"It's a*****e," I said, "it belongs to whoever owns it."

"You know what I mean."

"I really don't, Celeste."

Her eyes went sharp. "You think you're so clever."

"I think I'm trying to help my friend pick a top. Can you let us do that?"

Lena leaned over and said something in Celeste's ear, quiet enough that I couldn't hear it, and whatever it was made Celeste straighten up with a small smile that I didn't like at all.

She turned and walked toward the store owner, a middle-aged woman near the counter who had been folding scarves and very deliberately not looking at any of us.

"Excuse me," Celeste said sweetly, "I'm Celeste Varon, my father is Chief Advisor Varon, we're regulars here, these two girls have been making other customers uncomfortable. I'd really appreciate it if you could ask them to leave."

The woman looked at me and Hanna.

I looked back at her.

Hanna was gripping the top she'd been holding so tight her knuckles had gone pale.

The whole store had gone quiet.

And Alexei, standing near the entrance with his arms crossed, was watching all of it with an expression I couldn't read from here.