Chapter Eleven — Echoes Beneath the Moon
1057 Words
Selene’s POV
The fever faded by morning, leaving me hollow and restless. I sat propped against the pillows, tracing the seam of the blanket between my fingers while my mind circled one thought over and over.
He remembered my name.
Not the name the world used, not the one that had been carved into treaties and marriage contracts. The one buried in my first life. Selena.
It could have been coincidence. A mistake. But deep down, I knew it wasn’t.
The witch stood near the table, murmuring soft words over his crystal, the smoke inside shifting in slow, lazy spirals. The early light spilled through the windows, cutting across his features. He looked unchanged from my memories of him—the calm eyes, the steady hands. But beneath that calm, I saw something new. Wariness. A tension that hadn’t existed before.
And something else: understanding.
I needed to be sure.
“You’ve been with the Ravaryn Pack for many years, haven’t you?” I asked softly.
He didn’t look up. “Long enough to watch men rise and fall.”
“Do you ever feel,” I said, choosing each word carefully, “that time doesn’t move forward the way it should? That it bends back… that things you thought finished find their way again?”
He stilled. His hands hovered over the crystal, fingers tightening slightly.
“I’ve learned,” he said slowly, “that some stories refuse to end until the right person rewrites them.”
My pulse quickened. “And if the wrong person tries?”
“Then the story repeats,” he murmured, lifting his gaze at last. “And the ending doesn’t change.”
The room felt too small, too full of the unsaid.
I swallowed. “Do you believe in second chances, then?”
A shadow of a smile touched his lips. “I’m standing here, am I not?”
Our eyes met. In that quiet, I had my answer. He knew.
I felt the tension in my shoulders ease, just a little. Relief, warm and terrifying. Because now, the truth wasn’t mine alone to carry.
Still, I couldn’t reveal everything yet. Not when Malrik’s spies crept through every corridor, not when one misplaced word could cost both of us our lives.
So I said only, “Thank you… for saving me. Again.”
The corner of his mouth lifted slightly. “You’ve always been hard to kill, my lady.”
I almost laughed, but the sound caught in my throat. “Let’s hope I stay that way.”
His expression sobered. “You will, if you stop drinking what your enemies offer.”
“I’ll try,” I murmured. “But it’s so hard to resist generosity.”
He chuckled softly. “Clever as ever. I’ll keep watch for a while longer.”
When he turned back to his crystal, I exhaled, sinking deeper into the pillows. My thoughts were a storm, but beneath the swirl of fear and uncertainty was a steady, dangerous calm.
The witch was alive. And he remembered.
This time, fate had given me an ally.
---
Kael’s POV
The fortress stank of secrets.
By mid-morning, I had already broken two meetings, thrown one knife into a map table, and sent my father’s spies scurrying. The news of the Luna’s “sickness” had spread faster than wildfire—everyone whispering, speculating, wondering if the goddess had cursed her.
I let them whisper. It distracted them from the truth.
My boots echoed against the flagstones as I strode through the east wing, anger and unease twining tight inside me. I hadn’t slept. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Selene’s body going limp, her skin pale, her lips parted in a silent gasp.
She wasn’t supposed to matter this much.
When I reached the council chamber, Jarek—my second-in-command—was waiting, a grim look on his face.
“You wanted an update,” he said. “We caught one of your father’s merchants trying to slip letters across the border. The seal wasn’t his.”
“Rival pack?” I asked.
Jarek nodded. “The northern one. He’s been feeding them information.”
My hand curled into a fist. The old fool’s paranoia was eating his own empire alive, and the rest of us were choking on the smoke.
I turned toward the window, watching the frost melting on the glass. “He’s tightening the leash again. Too many eyes in too many corners.”
Jarek hesitated. “And the Luna?”
My jaw clenched before I could stop it. “She’ll live.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I shot him a look sharp enough to cut, but he didn’t flinch. “You’ve been different since she arrived,” he said. “You’re guarding her like she’s part of your campaign.”
“She’s my father’s Luna,” I said flatly. “If she dies, it gives him an excuse to call me weak. I can’t afford that.”
It was a good lie. Almost convincing.
But even as I said it, I felt the bond pulse faintly, an invisible thread tugging just under my ribs, reminding me of the warmth of her against my arms. The scent of her hair. The fear in her eyes that had mirrored my own.
Jarek sighed. “You’re building an empire of excuses, Kael.”
“Better that than an empire of corpses,” I muttered.
---
By the time I left the council chamber, dusk was bleeding into the halls. I paused at the corridor that led toward Selene’s quarters, my feet moving before my mind could stop them.
I shouldn’t go. I told myself that again and again. But the bond had other ideas.
I stopped just short of her door, hearing the low murmur of voices within—hers, faint but clear, and the witch’s deep reply. Something in the tone—gentle, too familiar—made my stomach twist.
I turned away, forcing my hands to still.
Let her rest. Let her heal.
And yet, as I walked down the corridor, the truth gnawed at me with every step.
She wasn’t my father’s Luna to me.
She was the one thing in this fortress that still felt alive.
And that made her the most dangerous thing of all.
---
- Writer
