Interlude Chapter – Shadows Beneath Silverfang
The Moonwatch Hall, Silverfang Citadel
Five years later.
The hall was quiet, it was too quiet for the Alpha's wing of Silverfang.
The ancient stone walls of Moonwatch Hall, etched with the names of every Alpha since the founding of the pack, pulsed faintly with moonlight. Once a sanctuary of wisdom and strategy, the chamber now felt like a mausoleum.
Lucien Blackthorn, Alpha of Silverfang, sat at the long crescent-shaped table, his hands stained with parchment ink and dried blood. Reports lay scattered before him, reports of rogue sightings, scouts that had gone missing, and now, there were whispers of the Moonrot.
He pressed his fingers into his temples.
The bond had broken five years ago, and yet he still felt it, the phantom ache, especially when the moon was full.
Selene.
The name was a ghost on his tongue.
He looked up as the heavy doors creaked open.
Lady Morwen, his mother, entered in flowing midnight robes, her crescent-tipped staff clicking softly on the stone floor.
She had not aged a day.
But there was something in her eyes which had darkened.
Lady Morwen
(softly)
You did not sleep again.
Lucien
Sleep is for wolves who don't have blood on their hands.
Lady Morwen
Or properly put, the wolves that have guilt in their spines.
(She moves closer to him, at the same time touching a glyph on the wall, the ancestral line of Alphas. Lucien's name glows faintly at the end.)
Lady Morwen
I warned you. The girl was a danger to your bloodline.
Lucien
(sharply)
It is now clear that you lied.
(She stops short in her track, slowly turns. Did he know anything, she thought?
Lucien
You said if I claimed her, our line would die. That she would bring ruin. But now, our line is dying anyway.
(He slams down a parchment.)
Lucien
Four more warriors were found severed from their mates. Their bondscars turned black when they were found, while their wolves were already mad.
Lady Morwen
(quiet)
The Moonrot is spreading so fast.
Lucien
And you said rejecting her would save us, but ever since that night, the land rejects us back.
(Pause.)
Lucien
Tell me the truth. I deserve to know all of it.
Lady Morwen
(coldly)
Some truths were not yours to bear.
Lucien
I am the Alpha now. I bear all of them.
(Silence. Then… she lowers herself into the chair across from him.)
Lady Morwen
You were born beneath a split moon, Lucien. Not a full one. You were never meant to be a single-bond wolf.
Lucien
What do you mean by that?
(touching her temple)
Do you think that I see only what I choose? I also see things which are not good. I saw your birth, as well as I saw the two women your soul would tether to.
Selene… and another, but the goddess changed the lines. She shifted paths.
(Lucien, whispering):
Then she was meant for me.
Lady Morwen
No. She was meant for something greater, and you were a piece of it. Still, I feared what that meant. Feared that she would awaken in you.
Lucien
(rising to his feet)
What you did was to use me as a wall. You made me reject her, not to protect me, but to control the prophecy.
Lady Morwen
(bitter)
I saw Silverfang burning, Lucien! I saw you dead. I saw her standing above your grave with two sons at her side. One of the sons had eyes of mercy… and the other one was made of shadow.
Lucien
(frozen)
Do you mean twins as in twin sons?
Lady Morwen
(softly)
Yes i mean twins. One is of your blood, while the other one is not. I tried to stop it. I thought that if I broke the bond early enough, it would not take root.
Lucien
And yet here we are.
(Beat.)
Lucien
She is alive, isn't she?
(Silence.)
Lucien
Mother.
Lucien
(looking away)
I... had a vision last moon. The Moonstone flickered. Only one bloodline can wake it.
Lucien
Then she lived.
Lady Morwen
And she bore the prophecy into the world.
Scene 2– The Collapse Beneath the Temple
Lucien stood at the old stained-glass window that overlooked the Stone Hollow, the oldest part of Silverfang where the Temple of the First Luna was located, buried in frost and memory.
Lucien
Do you still dream of her?
Lady Morwen
I still do, every time the moon turns red.
Lucien
And whenever you dream of her, what do you see?
Lady Morwen
(quietly)
I see a child with silver eyes and a wolf of starlight, then there is another one with black flame in his veins.
Lucien
(turns to her)
And do you still believe that killing her was the right thing to do?
Lady Morwen
I believed that killing the wrong twin would save the world.
(A long, heavy silence.)
Lucien
And what if your choice is the wrong one?
Lady Morwen
Then the curse has already begun.
The Sigil in the Stones
That night, after Lady Morwen left him to her chamber. Lucien descended alone into the crypt of the Old Luna, which was beneath the Moonwatch Hall.
Torchlight danced along cracked stone and runes that had been worn out by time.
But one sigil glowed newly; it was the mark of the Moonchild Oath, pulsing violet.
He reached out to it. At that moment there was a whisper which stirred the chamber air.
"Blood has returned to the stone. One child shall bind the world. The other shall break it."
Lucien staggered back as the wall shifted, revealing an alcove that had been long sealed.
Inside of it sat an ancient scroll that was sealed with Selene's birthmark.
His hands trembled as he touched them. Immediately, the seal uncurled.
Inside it was a prophecy that was scrawled in starlight.
"To reject the bond is to break the chain.
To break the chain is to awaken the dark.
One son for peace. One for fire.
And the Alpha who severed fate… will be their first ruin.
Lucien's pulse roared in his ears.
The torch that was behind him flickered and went out.