Chapter 5

The box had been scorched five years ago, but Evelyn could almost still smell the blood in that heavy rain.

That year, a hunter ambushed Marcus in the northern timberland and shot him with a silver-laced arrow. Even after the arrow was pulled out, the silver kept burning in the wound. His wolf instinctively rejected every ordinary antidote he was given.

The pack doctor said only a new Moon Eclipse remedy could save him. But no one had tested the new dosage for safety. One mistake, and it would destroy his wolf along with the poison.

Evelyn was an intern at the Academy of Pharmacy then. She took a sample of her father's blood, revised the formula three times, and injected herself with the first dose.

A fierce fever swept over her. Before she collapsed, she gave the finished remedy to her mentor and begged him to take it to the manor. That one shot saved Marcus's life. The silver settled permanently in Evelyn's body and in Lyra's.

Her mentor gave the remedy, a copy of the formula, and Evelyn's bloodstained sleeve to Serena to deliver. At the manor gate, Serena secretly hid the formula, cut her own arm with a knife, and ran into her father's bedroom clutching the vial.

When Marcus opened his eyes, he saw his younger daughter with blood running down her arm.

"She got past the hunters and risked her life to bring the medicine back," Helena told her husband through tears.

Evelyn lay unconscious with fever for a night before she could return to the manor and say she had made the remedy. Serena burst into tears. "Father just got out of danger. Evelyn, do you really have to fight me for the credit?"

It wasn't as if no one had questioned Serena's story. But Serena said through her tears, "Is Evelyn really willing to shame the family just to make herself look good?"

Marcus gave in at once.

At the celebration for Marcus's recovery, he put the family's moon-shell necklace around Serena's neck and publicly thanked his younger daughter for risking her life to save him.

Evelyn pulled out the receipt her mentor had sent back. With guests all around them, Helena gripped her hand and whispered, "Don't cause trouble on your sister's proudest day."

In the end she obeyed.

From then on, Serena was known as the daughter who had saved her father's life. Evelyn was known for trying to steal the credit.

Now Serena reached for the new batch of medicine Evelyn had just finished.

"I'll take it to Dad," she said. "All these years, I've been the one who's sat with him while he takes his medicine."

Evelyn watched Serena casually set the light-sensitive vial on the windowsill. The sun heated the glass and ruined the whole batch.

Evelyn didn't argue. She turned around, spent three hours making a new batch, and took it to her father herself.

But as Marcus closed the box, he said only, "Serena risked her life to save me back then, and you still haven't changed. Stop putting your sister down just to get attention."

Evelyn looked at him quietly.

"Follow the instructions on the label exactly," she said. "From now on, Baker will bring you your medicine."

Her father frowned and called after her. Evelyn didn't look back.