Page 28 of Moonlit Fate

The night was cool, the air rich. I melded with the darkness, moving with purpose, a protector forged from flesh and spirit, ready to safeguard what was ours.

In the distance, the Silver Claw Manor loomed, its silhouette a stark reminder of what was at stake. Aria’s face flashed through my mind. This wasn’t just about land or power, but a future that belonged to us all. I would fight relentlessly to guarantee a secure future for her, for the rogues, for every individual who craved liberation. I would not back down.

8

ARIA

Dawn crept through the forest, disturbing the serenity of the night. Ilaric was waiting for me at the border of our territory, exactly where I hoped he’d be. He always knew when I needed him.

“Morning,” I greeted. The night before, I’d decided to talk to him and get his perspective on all this.

“Good morning,” Ilaric replied. We began our walk, treading lightly on the mossy path that wound through the woods.

Just knowing I had someone to share my troubles with eased the knot of worry in my belly and left me feeling lighter. “I’ve been thinking a lot lately.”

“About?” he asked, patient as time itself.

“Responsibilities.” The word rolled off my tongue. “Being the future alpha, the struggles and hardships in our pack, and...”

My throat tightened around the name I hesitated to speak, but it pushed past my lips, regardless. “Atticus.”

“Ah,” Ilaric said.

“And there’s a prophecy.” The confession was a release of pent-up steam, and I told him what Atticus had said. “Since Atticus told me about it, it’s become this imposing force thatseems to be tracking me, whispering about enigmatic concepts just beyond my reach.” I shook my head, trying to dispel the uncertainty.

“Talking about it helps, doesn’t it?” he inquired, his quiet demeanor offering no judgment.

“More than you know,” I said with a small smile. Shared burdens and all that. Voicing my fears made them less monstrous, more like phantoms that might vanish at the touch of daylight.

As the sun rose, nature came alive around us. Ilaric and I followed the meandering path, the joyful chirping of birds serenading us. Even with his advanced age, his tall frame moved with an easy grace beside me.

“You must clear your mind.” His soft whisper hung between us. “Prophecies are only threads of possibility. They feed on the energy you give them, fear, belief, doubt.”

“Then do you believe it’s real?” My question hung between us like mist above the forest floor.

He paused and looked at me. The nod that came was subtle but certain. The simple gesture sent ripples through the still waters of my thoughts. “Clarity. It is both your shield and your guide.”

The sun painted the sky with strokes of lavender and rose as Ilaric and I reached the fork in the trail.

“Trust yourself,” he said. “Your power is vast, but it’s your heart that will steer you.”

I turned to him, the echo of our earlier conversation lingering between us. “And if my heart leads me astray?” My fingers fidgeted with the hem of my cloak.

“Our instincts have a voice that fear can never mimic.” He looked at me intently. “Wisdom, compassion… those are the markers of true leadership. Learn to discern them from the whispers of doubt.”

With a nod, I stepped away, leaving Ilaric at the crossroads. The stillness of the morning enveloped me once more, granting me privacy to process his counsel.

I wandered toward the garden. There, under the protective boughs of an old oak, lay my mother’s resting place. Kneeling before her gravestone, I traced the name engraved onto the weathered surface. Mona.

“Your wisdom runs through my veins, yet I find myself adrift,” I said to the silence. My fingertips lingered on the stone, seeking a connection to the woman who had once been my anchor.

I closed my eyes as a tear fell, its warmth contrasting with the coolness of the air, followed by another and another, each one tracing a path down my cheek until I was sobbing. Here, in this sacred space, I could lower my defenses. The presence of the pack, most notably my father, always forced me to conceal my vulnerabilities, but in this space, I could finally be myself and grieve for my mother.

She had been the heart of our pack. But her own heart had faltered, succumbing to a rare and cruel illness. It began with a fatigue that none could explain, a gradual wane of vitality that no shifter should have suffered.

“Unexplainable,” they had said, the healers with their perplexed expressions and exotic tinctures. All of them had been summoned in desperation to thwart an unseen foe. Yet, despite their wisdom, their magic, their potions brewed from the rarest herbs, they’d found nothing. No cure. And so she faded, our luna, my mother, leaving behind a void that could never be filled again.

Shifters were known for resilience, for bodies hewn from raw strength. To witness one of our own—a luna, no less—wither away was a portent that unsettled the deepest foundations of our beliefs. We’d watched in dismay as the once-vibrant, magicalforest slowly deteriorated around us, its life force diminishing. The spirits, who had always been so generous in granting the gift of new life, now seemed unwilling to bestow their blessings. The declining birth rates among shifters and the growing absence of the spirits perplexed the elders. It hinted at a discordance in the world, a thread fraying in the tapestry of our magic.

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