SELENE'S POV
The forest felt colder lately. I didn't find the silence comforting anymore. It felt like someone was watching us in the dark. The wind made dead leaves scatter around the place. It sounded mean. Every shadow twitched. Every little noise I heard made my hair stand on end.
Jasper crouched by the fire, hugging his knees, looking even smaller than usual. His eyes were huge, shining with exhaustion and fear. He finally broke the silence.
"Are we staying here again tonight?" he asked, staring at me.
I paused, not ready to say it out loud. "No," I said, poking at the pot simmering over the coals.
"We can't. It's not safe here anymore." I continued.
"Where will we go?" he asked, staring at me with those scared eyes.
I tried to smile, just a little. "To a pack. Somewhere far off. Somewhere nobody knows us."
It hurt to lie to him, but hope was all I had left to keep him steady. I'd been bracing for this ever since my body started healing too fast, since that faint, familiar glow crept back under my skin, reminding me the wolf inside me wasn't gone after all.
My wolf had spoken my name once. Selene. Only once, but it was enough. Just a whisper, but it made me believe she could come back.
Time was the problem. The fever kept creeping up, hot and wild, burning from the inside out. Not sick. Magic. Alpha magic. His magic.
Micheal.
Since the storm, his eyes chased me through my dreams, silver, endless, slicing the dark like a blade of moonlight. I didn't really know what our bond had done. But it changed me. Sometimes I could feel him, his anger, barely held back.
"Jasper," I said quietly, putting the leftover herbs back into my satchel.
"We're leaving at sunrise. First, I need more feverroot before the rain comes." I continued.
"I'll go with you."
I hesitated. He was so young, but stubborn as anything, just like me. So I nodded. "Stick close. No matter what."
We slipped into the woods, as quietly as we could; the ground was wet as mud, and we had to get up to our feet. The fever made me unable to move efficiently and I almost felt my vision blurring. Leaned against a trunk, trying to catch my breath.
"Mum?" Jasper's voice was tiny. "You're burning up again."
"I'm fine." Total lie. My skin felt stretched too tight, heart hammering like it wanted out. Something was wrong. The air itself seemed to warp.
The smell caught me before any sound did.
Rot. Blood. And that wild, musky stink of rogues.
"Jasper," I hissed, yanking him behind me. "Run."
A snarl ripped through the air. Then another, closer.
Shadows lunged out between the trees... wolves, all bones and foam, eyes burning red with madness. Rogues.
One came for me. I twisted, shoving Jasper into a hollow between some roots. My claws ached to come out, but my wolf stayed silent. Fever chained my limbs and I moved like I was underwater.
I picked up a branch that had fallen earlier and swung, smacking one rogue across the jaw that didn't seem to faze him.
Another slammed into my side and knocked me flat. I felt my breath hitch to a gasp. Its jaws snapped at my throat, close enough to feel the heat. I screamed, shoving back, its spit burning into my skin.
"Mum!" Jasper yelled.
The rogue's head whipped toward him, snarling. I fought to move... I fought but my body refused. The fever roared in my ears, and the world faded at the edges.
Then a howl, deep and sharp, cut through everything. Not a rogue.
The rogues jerked, spines bristling. Then a new scent swept in, strong, sharp, laced with power.
Alphas.
Figures burst from the mist, wolves, black as midnight or pale as ash, eyes bright with intelligence, not madness. They moved together, silent, deadly.
One, bigger than the rest, tore the rogue off me like it weighed nothing. Teeth hit flesh. The forest filled with growls and shrieks.
I tried to sit, but my head spun. Through the blur I caught a flash of silver fur, streaked with black. For a second, I thought it was him.
Micheal.
My heart stuttered.
The wolves drove the rogues away, vanishing into the trees, all motion and shadows. The last thing I saw was the silver one glancing back at me, eyes shining through the mist.
"Selene," a voice whispered, not out loud, but deep inside my head. Clear as anything.
Then darkness swallowed me whole.
Michael's pov.
The dream hit me again, same as always. Firelight, laughter, and that thick, sweet smell of lilacs.
The Bloodfang festival.
Torches everywhere, music rolling through the courtyard under a moon that looked too fragile to last. I remember standing on the edge of it all, already tired, the fake smiles, the clumsy bows, faces painted up for people who'd never look at you twice. And then she showed up.
Selene.
She wasn't the prettiest woman there, at least not by my pack's standards. She obviously wasn't noticed by anyone... or they probably chose not to acknowledge her. But when she smiled at her friend, I found myself staring. She wore a plain dress, simple and soft, and her face made everyone else invisible to me.
The second our eyes met, my wolf went silent. Then it said the word I'd spent years not wanting to hear.
Mate.
I froze right there. My heart racing fast, breath caught in my chest. Did she know I was her mate? Probably... because she was also staring.
When I had walked up to her, she smiled again, this time a little shy, a little nervous. Her scent was all that passed through my nostrils. And when she whispered my name in between thrusts, something inside me knew she was going to be trouble.
The dream always stopped here, the way it did every night. Heat and closeness spun into something sharp and ugly.