The Girl Who Ran
1947 Words
Keiran’s POV
I had kissed two girls before midnight and felt absolutely nothing.
That was not their fault.
Both were beautiful.
One had soft brown curls, a laugh that could probably ruin a smarter man, and lips that tasted like cherry liquor. The other was a vampire with silver eyes and a red dress that looked expensive enough to start a small war. She had dragged one sharp nail down my chest and whispered that I looked bored.
She had been right.
I was bored.
Painfully, tragically, embarrassingly bored.
Luna Nocturne pulsed around me like a heartbeat that belonged to someone else. Violet lights swept over the dance floor. Silver smoke curled around bodies pressed too close together. Wolves, witches, fae, vampires, and every rich supernatural brat with too much money and too few consequences crowded beneath the illusionary moons cracking and reforming above us.
Everyone was laughing.
Everyone was drinking.
Everyone was pretending this night was different from the last one.
It wasn’t.
Not for me.
I leaned against the railing of the upper balcony, a glass of moonfire whiskey dangling from my fingers as I watched the dance floor below.
Beside me, my younger brother, Callen, laughed so hard at something one of our cousins said that he nearly spilled his drink down his shirt. Across the private section, my older brother, Dorian, stood with his arms crossed like he was personally disappointed in the concept of fun. He looked every inch the future Alpha our father had trained him to be.
Disciplined.
Controlled.
Responsible.
Miserable.
I lifted my glass toward him.
Dorian narrowed his eyes.
I smiled.
He looked away.
Riven stirred in the back of my mind, silent and unimpressed.
My wolf had been in that mood all night.
Then again, Riven was always in that mood.
He was not like other wolves, though I had learned young not to say that out loud.
Other wolves growled, paced, chased, wanted, fought. They spoke in instinct and heat. They longed for mates, territory, blood, pack, purpose.
Riven watched.
Waited.
Judged everything.
Mostly me.
You are wasting time, he said.
I took another sip of whiskey. “That is the point.”
It is pathetic.
“Careful. You will hurt my feelings.”
You would need to have those first.
I snorted into my glass.
The vampire in the red dress slid back into my space, her cold fingers brushing the collar of my black shirt.
“Talking to your wolf again?” she asked.
“Unfortunately.”
“What does he say about me?”
Riven’s silence was insulting.
I smiled at her anyway. “He says you have excellent taste.”
She laughed, pleased. “And what do you say?”
“That I already knew that.”
Her smile sharpened. She liked that. Most people liked whatever version of me I gave them, as long as it came with a pretty mouth and Blackthorne money behind it.
Keiran Blackthorne.
Second son of Alpha Cassian Blackthorne.
Not the heir.
Not the spare exactly, because Father had four sons and at least two of them were more obedient than me.
I was the fun one.
The careless one.
The one mothers warned daughters about after secretly looking twice.
The one my father dragged to political dinners when he wanted to remind me I was born into duty, then regretted it five minutes later when I smiled at the wrong noblewoman or said the quiet part of pack politics too loudly.
Dorian was the future.
I was the headline waiting to happen.
I had stopped fighting the role years ago.
It was easier to be what everyone expected.
Less disappointing that way.
The vampire leaned closer. “Dance with me.”
I glanced down at the crowded floor. “I don’t dance before one.”
“It’s already past one.”
“Then I must have stopped dancing entirely.”
She pouted.
I smiled.
It worked.
It almost always worked.
And still, something restless scratched beneath my skin.
My pendant lay cold against my chest, hidden beneath my shirt. I touched it without thinking.
A small oval of dark silver and moonstone, old enough that no jeweler in my father’s pack could identify the markings. My mother’s pendant. The only thing of hers I wore every day.
My father had given it to me after her funeral.
I had been seven.
Too young to understand why his hands shook when he fastened it around my neck.
Too young to understand why he gripped my shoulders afterward and made me promise never to take it off.
“Your mother’s bloodline was different,” he had told me, voice rough in a way I had never heard before. “Because you were born of her, you may not be like other wolves.”
I had asked him what he meant.
He had looked toward the closed door as if someone might be listening.
Then he said the thing that had followed me my entire life.
“You will not get a fated mate, Keiran.”
At seven, I had not cared.
At twelve, I had pretended not to.
At sixteen, I had decided mates sounded like another way the Moon Goddess ruined a person’s freedom.
Now, at twenty, I wore my mother’s pendant, kissed girls I did not love, and told myself it was better this way.
No mate meant no weakness.
No bond.
No one soul who could look at me and see past every lie I wore like a second skin.
Riven had never argued with Father’s warning.
That was how I knew it was true.
My wolf did not search.
Did not ache.
Did not whisper mate when strangers passed by.
He remained still inside me, dark and watchful, as if some part of us had been locked away before we were old enough to miss it.
The vampire’s fingers slid lower on my chest.
“You really are bored,” she murmured.
“Tragic, isn’t it?”
“I could fix that.”
I was about to say something stupid.
Something easy.
Something that would make her laugh and keep the night moving.
Then Riven went still.
Not his usual stillness.
Not bored.
Not judging.
Still like a predator who had heard a twig snap in the dark.
I straightened before I knew why.
The vampire frowned. “Keiran?”
I did not answer.
My gaze dropped to the main floor.
At first, I saw nothing unusual.
Dancers moving under violet light.
Smoke rolling across black marble.
A witch laughing at the bar.
A fae boy balancing a glowing drink on two fingers.
Then I saw her.
Gray cloak.
Too big for her shoulders.
Hood half-shadowing her face.
Standing near the edge of the room with a moonberry cream puff in her hand, she had just discovered religion, and it was made of sugar.
I stared.
She took a bite and closed her eyes.
Actually closed them.
Like the entire world had narrowed to pastry cream and happiness.
A laugh moved through me before I could stop it.
The vampire followed my gaze. “Who are you looking at?”
“No one.”
That was a lie.
The girl in the gray cloak was definitely someone.
I just did not know why yet.
She looked out of place in a way that should have made her disappear.
Luna Nocturne was full of people trying to be seen. Girls in dresses made of glitter and intention. Boys with rings on every finger and smiles too practiced to be honest. Wolves showing off teeth. Vampires showing off money. Fae showing off everything.
But she stood there with sticky fingers and wide eyes, staring at the room like the lights were stars and the music was magic.
Not performing.
Not hunting.
Not trying to be desired.
Experiencing.
That was the word.
She was experiencing everything.
And for some reason, I could not look away.
Riven moved inside me, slow and sharp.
Her.
The word scraped through my mind.
I frowned.
“What about her?”
The vampire blinked. “What?”
I realized I had spoken out loud.
“Nothing.”
But it was not nothing.
My pendant warmed against my chest.
I dropped my hand to it.
That had never happened before.
Not once.
Below, the girl in the gray cloak bought another pastry from a passing server.
Then another.
Then another.
I watched her eat the second one like she was trying not to smile too hard.
Something in my chest pulled.
Lightly.
Almost nothing.
Almost.
Dorian appeared beside me, following my line of sight. “Do not.”
I gave him a lazy look. “Do not what?”
“Whatever you are about to do.”
“I am standing here.”
“You are never just standing anywhere.”
“Your faith in me is touching.”
“My lack of faith in you is based on evidence.”
I grinned, but my attention kept drifting back to the girl.
She had moved closer to the dance floor now, still looking at everything like every bad idea in the room had been painted gold.
Then a male wolf approached her.
I recognized his type immediately.
Too much liquor.
Too much ego.
Too used to girls being polite when they wanted to be left alone.
He leaned in.
She stepped back.
My jaw tightened.
The wolf moved with her.
Riven’s growl rolled low through my chest.
Dorian heard it.
His eyes cut to me. “Keiran.”
I ignored him.
The girl looked up at the wolf.
Something changed.
Even from the balcony, I felt it.
Her shoulders squared. Her chin lifted. The softness did not leave her face exactly, but something ancient moved underneath it. For one second, the air around her sharpened.
The male wolf stepped back.
Interesting.
Very interesting.
A smile tugged at my mouth.
The little moonbeam had teeth.
The moment passed. She slipped into the crowd, moving too quickly now, nervous, clutching her last cream puff like it was a sacred artifact.
I should have stayed where I was.
I should have let the strange girl vanish into the night.
Instead, I pushed away from the railing.
Dorian sighed. “Keiran.”
“What?”
“Don’t make me explain common sense to you in public.”
“I would never ask you to do something so painful.”
I set my glass down and started for the stairs.
The vampire grabbed my wrist. “Where are you going?”
“To make a terrible choice.”
“At least you’re honest.”
“Rarely.”
I left before she could decide if that amused her.
The main floor was hotter than the balcony. Louder. Smoke curled around my legs. Lights flashed across faces. Bodies pressed in close, parting for me only because they recognized the Blackthorne name or the Alpha blood in my scent.
I did not look for that reaction.
I did not need to.
It had followed me my entire life.
People made room for sons of powerful Alphas, even second sons.
Especially reckless ones.
I searched the crowd for gray fabric and wide eyes.
For a moment, I lost her.
Then I saw her near the center of the room just as someone slammed into her shoulder.
The cream puff flew from her hand.
“No!” she gasped, sounding so genuinely devastated that I almost laughed.
Then her slipper slid.
She fell backward.
I moved before I thought.
One second, she was tipping into the crowd.
The next, my hand was on her waist.
Warmth exploded beneath my palm.
I froze.
- Writer
