Friday, November 29th, 8:00 PM
Adam sat on the bench at the edge of the school grounds with his elbows resting against his knees and the full moon hanging directly above the trees.
The sky had cleared completely after the day's snow, leaving the full moon unobstructed against a hard black-blue sky. Powdery snow covered the ground around the bench without a footprint beyond the ones he'd made getting there, and the nearby river moved beneath a thin crust of ice along its edges.
Ahead of him, the school wall cut a straight dark line through the snow, while beyond it the forest waited in layers of black trunks and white ground. Adam wore the tank top and shorts Luna had ordered him to wear, and despite the temperature he wasn't cold.
Not even close.
The warmth was already inside him.
He'd felt it the moment the sun went down.
The last full moon had been something done to him. Chains. Restraints. People watching him. People deciding how much of himself he was allowed to have. Tonight was different because he had made the decision himself.
Luna had told him to stop treating the wolf like something that needed to be locked away and let it participate instead. So he was sitting beneath the full moon with his shoulders loose and his breathing steady, allowing that other presence to press closer without pushing it back.
At eight, the wolf wasn't loud.
It was pressure.
Something warm moved through his blood whenever he looked toward the moon, subtle enough to ignore if he wanted to and persistent enough that ignoring it took effort. His hearing had sharpened more than it usually was.
The forest seemed larger because every distant movement registered. The river smelled colder than it looked. The school grounds behind him felt occupied, and some quiet part of his mind had begun assigning everything around him a simple category of inside or outside.
Mine
No, not mine
He noticed the thought.
Normally, he'd have questioned it.
Tonight, he let it stay.
The wolf wanted space... Territory.
The wolf wanted control.
The wolf wanted Luna.
Adam swallowed.
Okay.
He looked at the empty stretch of snow beside him.
Be a man.
That sounded suspiciously like something his wolf would say.
He rubbed his palms together.
Tonight's the night.
A tap landed against his shoulder.
"Come on, let's go."
Adam turned.
Luna had already walked several steps past him.
She hadn't waited for permission from the universe, apparently.
Adam didn't move.
Luna stopped and looked back.
"What?"
He stared.
She stood barefoot in the snow wearing a black bikini, the thin fabric stark against skin so pale the moonlight seemed to continue across it instead of stopping there. The top straps made an inverted star design between her boobs, the straps rising to either side of her shoulders against an otherwise uninterrupted field of white.
She looked like a Greek sculpture of Aphrodite come to life.
Her build was athletic without looking deliberately displayed, powerful thighs beneath soft lines, round and large glutes below a narrow-toned waist, defined abs, and the kind of balanced physical strength that made it obvious her body had been made for movement and beauty before it had ever been made for anything else.
The black fabric emphasized every contrast, while the moon picked out the smooth planes of her skin with a brightness the school lights never managed. Her new hair framed her face in a shoulder-length cut with soft layers and blunt ends, the side-swept bangs falling over the left side of her forehead while the other side showed the subtle fade she'd decided to keep.
Her grey eyes caught the moon when she turned fully toward him, and her face somehow looked softer than the rest of her, angular and striking at the same time.
Adam's brain stopped cooperating.
There were several thoughts available.
None of them were useful.
The wolf was worse.
It had apparently looked at Luna and decided that every previous human instinct Adam possessed was merely an optional feature.
He stayed sitting.
That took effort.
Luna glanced down at herself, then back at him.
"What the hell is the hold up?"
Adam opened his mouth.
He could have said anything.
He could have complained about the cold.
He could have asked where they were going.
Instead, the wolf got there first.
"Nothing, just that... You're beautiful under the full moon."
Luna froze.
Her mouth opened.
Closed.
The color reached her cheeks before she could stop it.
Adam saw it.
Luna realized he saw it.
Her eyes narrowed immediately.
"You're such a fucking pervert." She turned away. "Get up."
Adam stood. "Okay."
"Now let's get out of here."
He followed.
His operating system was still rebooting.
The school wall barely existed as an obstacle.
Luna approached it at a walking pace, planted one bare foot against the lower stone, and pushed herself upward. Her hands caught the top for less than a second before she swung over and landed on the other side without disturbing more than a little powder from the snow.
Adam followed.
He vaulted the wall in one motion, landing beside her with his knees bent and his hands briefly touching the ground. When he stood, the school was behind them and the forest opened ahead.
Luna started walking.
Adam noticed immediately that she didn't look at the ground.
She didn't need to.
Her bare feet moved through the snow without hesitation as if the cold snow didn't register, stepping around exposed roots and fallen branches without ever seeming to calculate the route. She slowed for no obstacle because the obstacles apparently weren't obstacles to her.
Her head turned occasionally toward sounds Adam could hear but couldn't yet identify, and once she stopped beside a tree long enough to touch the bark with two fingers before continuing.
Adam watched where he stepped.
He checked the snow.
He checked the roots.
He checked the branches.
Luna simply walked.
The difference made the forest feel like her territory and the school feel like his.
They went deeper.
Neither spoke.
The darkness made it easier.
Adam didn't have to watch her face, even though he really wanted to
She didn't have to watch his.
Eventually he broke the silence.
"Where are we going?"
"Far enough away from Rivera and Thorne territory."
Luna stepped over a fallen trunk.
"You're going to be more territorial tonight. So am I and so will they. I'd rather not have either pack decide we're trespassing because you decide to wander or hunt in their turf."
Adam frowned. "I guess thats a logical way to look at it."
"I know."
He shoved his hands into his pockets.
"I do feel extra territorial now that you mention it."
"Me too."
"Like, noticeably."
"I know."
Adam breathed through his nose.
"So how do you feel? You know... Besides territorial?"
"Chill."
The answer came too quickly.
Adam glanced sideways.
Luna kept walking.
He looked forward again."You're lying."
"Didn't realize you were a lie detector."
A branch brushed Adam's shoulder.
Luna didn't react.
"I guess... I feel angry," she said. "More than usual. And possessive. Everything inside a certain range feels like it's mine to account for. I want to know where everything is. I want it where I decided it should be. I'm running hot, too. Not temperature. Something else. It's just there, and it doesn't really go away. And I keep feeling like I need to do something, but I can't put a name to what. I just know it involves moving fast, being somewhere specific, and being with someone specific. That's about as precise as I can get."
Adam stared ahead.
That sounded less like a list of symptoms than a confession somebody had taken apart and filed under the wrong category.
He looked at his own hands.
"I think i can relate, sort of."
"Can you?" Luna asked pausing with her head half turned back.
"I think." Adam muttered.
"Well, I guess we'll find out tonight." she said as she stepped across a narrow stream without breaking stride.
We'll find out tonight? What does she mean?
Adam felt the warmth under his skin deepen.
He didn't fight it.
For once, he didn't want to.
They eventually reached another river farther into the forest.
It was wider than the one bordering the school grounds, moving quickly through the dark because the center hadn't frozen. Thin sheets of ice clung to the rocks along the banks, breaking whenever the current pushed them loose. Moonlight stretched across the water in broken silver fragments, each one vanishing beneath the next ripple.
Luna looked across.
"About twenty-four feet."
Adam measured the distance with his eyes.
"That's a little far, don't you think?."
She shrugged.
Then she jumped.
Her powerful legs propelling her body across the gap in one clean arc.
She launched from the snowy bank, cleared the water with room beneath her feet, and landed on the opposite side without even bending enough to suggest she'd needed the landing. Her bare feet settled into the cold snow.
She didn't look back.
She didn't need to.
Adam stared at the gap.
"Okay."
He backed up.
"Okay."
The wolf inside him seemed to consider the distance.
Adam ran.
He planted his foot.
Jumped.
For one glorious fraction of a second, he thought he had it.
Then his toes missed the far bank and the river swallowed him.
The cold hit like a physical blow.
It seized his chest before he could breathe, drove through his tank top and shorts, and turned every muscle in his body rigid at once. His fingers went numb almost immediately. Water flooded over his shoulders and down his back while the current caught his legs and tried to pull them beneath him.
Adam surfaced with a violent gasp.
"Oh, shit!"
He clawed toward the bank.
His hands found ice.
It cracked.
He grabbed again.
This time his fingers dug into frozen mud beneath the snow, and he hauled himself upward until his chest hit the bank. He dragged one knee onto solid ground, then the other, collapsing onto his side while freezing water streamed from his clothes.
His whole body shook.
The wolf immediately began forcing heat through him.
His metabolism surged as he began to subtly steam.
It wasn't enough to make the experience pleasant.
Across the river, Luna stared.
Then she laughed.
Not a snort. Not a smirk.
Not the little breath she sometimes used when Adam said something stupid.
She actually laughed.
The sound escaped her before she could catch it, sharp at first and then opening into something warmer, freer, almost disbelieving. Her shoulders shook. She bent forward with one hand against her stomach, trying and failing to regain control while Adam sat on the bank looking like he'd just lost a fight with a river.
"Jesus Christ, that's cold!" Adam managed through his shivering.
She laughed harder.
Adam stared at her.
Luna wiped beneath one eye.
There was an actual tear on her fingertip.
That did something strange to him.
He was soaked.
He was freezing.
His shorts were dripping onto the snow.
His pride had been left somewhere in the middle of the river.
He didn't care.
Because Luna was laughing.
Really laughing.
And Adam couldn't remember the last time he'd heard her sound like that.
He smiled.
"Glad you're having fun."
That only made it worse.
Luna covered her mouth. "You're an idiot."
"Yeah."
She laughed again.
Worth it.
Adam shook his head.
Her laughter finally faded.
She straightened and wiped the last trace of moisture from beneath her eye.
"Okay."
Her voice returned to normal.
"Alright, that's enough."
Adam looked across the river.
"Enough what?"
"Enough you embarrassing yourself."
She stepped closer to the edge.
"It's time to really go."
Adam's smile disappeared.
Luna's eyes caught the moonlight.
Then the Lumen came.
Light surged beneath her skin in a sudden white-blue pulse that illuminated the trees around her. The air rippled outward from her body as heat rolled across the river, and steam rose from the snow beneath her feet.
Her silhouette contracted and expanded through a practiced sequence of motion, limbs lengthening, shoulders broadening, hands becoming claws as white fur erupted across her body in seconds.
When the light vanished, the forest seemed smaller.
A massive white wolf stood where Luna had been.
She was enormous, easily the size of a small SUV, with shoulders high enough to make the nearby trees look thinner by comparison. Dense snow-white fur covered the heavy frame from neck to tail, catching silver along the edges beneath the moon. Her paws sank into the snow. Her breath emerged in thick clouds.
Her amber eyes fixed on Adam.
For one breath, he didn't recognize Luna.
The eyes were different.
There was nothing sarcastic in them.
Nothing practiced.
The creature looking at him didn't seem interested in pretending not to want anything. It simply looked at him with the direct, uncomplicated attention of something older than language and less interested in hiding what it felt.
Adam stopped breathing.
Then the wolf blinked.
Her ears shifted.
The tension in her face changed.
Luna came back.
She lowered her enormous head slightly, amber eyes still fixed on him.
"What are you waiting for?"