Page 21 of Moonlit Desires

With that, she dissolves into a swirl of moonlight, leaving behind only the faint scent of frost and old books.

"Well," Riven drawls into the silence that follows, "that went better than expected. She didn't try to bind you, curse you, or marry you off to one of her countless nephews. I call that a win."

Thorne snorts. "For now. Serilda never shows her full hand on the first meeting."

"She fears you," Ashen says to Lyra, his voice dreamy once more. "Not for what you are, but for what you might become. A queen unlike any the Court has known—born of two worlds, bound by neither."

Kael says nothing, but his hand finds Lyra's shoulder, steadying her. The touch grounds her, a reminder that whatever awaits at the Court, she doesn't face it alone.

The path before them glimmers with renewed purpose, leading away from the clearing and deeper into the realm of the Moon Court. Lyra takes a breath, feeling the last vestiges of her human life fall away with each step. Ahead lies a palace of silver and shadow, a curse waiting to be broken, and a destiny she's only beginning to understand.

"Let's go," she says, and steps forward into her inheritance.

Chapter five

TheTrainingBegins

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Dawn paints the Moon Court in shades of pearl and silver, the stone courtyard emerging from darkness like a secret revealed one breath at a time. Mist clings to the flagstones, curling around the ancient pillars that frame the training ground—twelve sentinels carved with the phases of the moon, their faces worn smooth by centuries of watchful silence. The air is different here, thinner somehow, as if the boundary between breathing and drowning is measured in heartbeats rather than fathoms.

Into this stillness comes Kael, boots striking stone with the precision of a metronome. The sound echoes, bouncing between the courtyard walls like a challenge. He materializes through the mist as if born from it, his tall frame a dark silhouette against the brightening sky. At his side hang two wooden practice swords, their surfaces scarred with the memory of countless battles. They knock against his thigh as he walks, the dull rhythm a counterpoint to his footsteps.

He positions himself at the center of the courtyard, where an intricate pattern of silver inlay traces a perfect circle on the stone. The design mimics the moon's phases—waxing, full, waning, dark—and within its boundary, Court tradition dictates that only truth may be spoken and only honor may guide the hand. Kael stands motionless, facing east, where the first true light of day will soon breach the horizon. His blue eyes sweep the courtyard, assessing, measuring, preparing. The warrior in him never rests, even in this moment of apparent stillness.

Above, in the east tower of the palace, Lyra wakes to unfamiliarity. The chamber assigned to her—her mother's chamber, they told her, as if that should bring comfort rather than unease—is a perfect circle of silver stone. The ceiling arches overhead, painted with constellations that shift and realign themselves while she sleeps, so that each morning brings a different heavenly pattern. Today, it's a formation she doesn't recognize: seven stars arranged like a crown, with an empty space where the central jewel should be.

She rolls to her side, wincing as stiff muscles protest. Sleep has been elusive these past three nights in the Court, her dreams fractured by images of Lythven, of Maya, of storm-eyed hunters tracking her through silver woods. The bed beneath her is not helping—a platform carved from a single piece of moonstone, draped with sheets woven from something the handmaidens call "night silk." The fabric slides against her skin like water, simultaneously too smooth and not substantial enough, as if at any moment she might sink through it into the stone below.

Lyra sits up, pushing aside the gossamer canopy. The chamber is beautiful, certainly—more beautiful than any room she's ever occupied—but alien in its perfection. Every surface gleams with an inner light. The furniture—what little there is—seems to have grown organically from the floor rather than been placed there by hand. The wardrobe stands open, revealing gownsof impossible complexity, their fabrics shifting color with each breath of air. She has refused to wear them, much to the dismay of the silent attendants who materialize each evening to help her dress for dinner.

Instead, she crosses to the simple trunk she brought from Lythven, retrieving a plain shift of undyed linen. The garment is shamefully crude by Court standards, but it feels like honesty against her skin. She pulls it on, letting the familiar texture ground her in the midst of so much strangeness. Her fingers brush the pendant at her throat—her mother's pendant, warm and constant—and the mark between her shoulder blades pulses in response, a reminder of the inheritance she cannot escape.

A pitcher of water sits on a table by the window. She splashes her face, the liquid unnaturally cool and leaving her skin tingling with subtle magic. Even the most mundane elements of this place are infused with power. She runs a hand through her deep auburn hair, not bothering with the ornate brushes and combs laid out for her use. In the polished silver mirror, her reflection stares back with eyes too bright, too green—more fae with each passing day, though the freckles scattered across her nose remain a stubborn reminder of her mortal heritage.

The attendants will arrive soon, eager to dress her in Court finery and guide her through the labyrinthine protocols of breakfast. But first, she has another appointment—one arranged in whispers last night, as Kael escorted her back to her chambers after yet another interminable dinner of introductions and veiled political maneuvering.

"Dawn," he had said, voice low enough that only she could hear. "The east courtyard. Before the Court wakes." When she'd asked why, his only response was a grim: "Because a queen who cannot defend herself is merely decorative. And decorations are easily broken."

Lyra moves to the window, where the first hint of sunrise limns the horizon in pale gold. Below, she can just make out Kael's solitary figure in the courtyard, waiting with characteristic stillness. The sight of him—so certain, so immovable—makes her stomach knot with a complex emotion she doesn't care to name. Is it resentment that he expects her to become something she's never been? Or gratitude that someone believes she can?

She turns from the window and crosses to the chamber door, easing it open. The corridor beyond is silent, the Court still wrapped in slumber after a night of revels she'd excused herself from early. The walls here are the same silver stone as her chamber, but inlaid with veins of luminescent crystal that provide gentle, unwavering light. Portraits line the hall—her ancestors, she assumes, though none bear plaques to identify them. Their eyes seem to follow her as she passes, judging her inadequacy with every step.

The spiral staircase at the corridor's end descends in a tight coil, each step slightly higher than human standard, designed for the longer limbs of full-blooded fae. Lyra navigates them carefully, her bare feet whispering against the cold stone. The sound echoes in the stairwell, amplified by the unusual acoustics of the palace. Everything here seems designed to remind her that she doesn't quite fit—not human enough for Lythven, not fae enough for the Court.

She emerges into a secondary corridor, this one wider and lined with arched windows that overlook the inner gardens. The plants there are unlike any she's seen in the mortal world—flowers that bloom only in darkness, trees with silver leaves that chime like bells when the wind passes through them. A fountain at the garden's center bubbles with liquid that isn't quite water, its surface catching the predawn light and fracturing it into impossible colors.

Two more turns, another staircase, and she finds herself at the east entrance to the courtyard. Stone doors carved with the phases of the moon stand open, inviting or threatening, depending on how she chooses to interpret them. Beyond, Kael waits, his back straight as a blade, hands clasped behind him as he contemplates the lightening sky.

Lyra pauses at the threshold, suddenly conscious of her simple attire, her bare feet, her unbound hair. In Lythven, she'd have been perfectly presentable for an early morning training session. Here, among the perpetual splendor of the Court, she looks like a servant who's lost her way. But there's defiance in her choice, too—a statement that she will not be remade in the Court's image without resistance.

She steps into the courtyard, the cold of the flagstones seeping into her feet. The sensation is grounding, a reminder that even in this place of ancient magic and shifting loyalties, physical reality still exists. Her steps make almost no sound, but Kael turns anyway, his warrior's instincts alerting him to her presence.

"You're on time," he says, the observation carrying approval despite his neutral tone. "Most newly arrived at Court struggle to rise before noon."

"I've been tending bar since I was eighteen," Lyra replies. "Early mornings aren't new to me."

A fleeting smile touches his severe features, there and gone so quickly she might have imagined it. "No, I suppose not." He studies her, blue eyes taking in her simple shift, her bare feet, her unadorned appearance. Something in his gaze softens, though his posture remains formal. "The Court would have you believe that every appearance is a performance, every garment a statement of alliance. There is wisdom in that, but also..." He pauses, selecting his words with care. "Also a kind of suffocation."

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