The Brave Sister Swap

while Penelope collapsed against the wooden dresser, drowning in her own suffocating rage, the quiet Shenon didn't make a sound.

She slowly knelt on the dusty floorboards, her silver-rimmed glasses slipping slightly down her nose as she reached beneath the dining table. Her fingers brushed against the cool, fractured silver chain Penelope had violently ripped off. She picked up the moonstone pendant, turning it over to reveal the elegant, intertwined PT engraving.

A deep, protective sorrow settled into Shenon’s chest. She didn't believe Travis’s words. She had seen the way the future Alpha King looked at her sister—it wasn't the gaze of a man playing a game. But looking at Penelope’s hysterical, trembling form, Shenon knew there was no time to argue. To keep the precious token of her sister’s fated love safe from the panic, Shenon lifted the chain and fastened it securely around her own neck, tucking the pendant safely beneath her collar.

"Penelope, look at me," Shenon said softly, her voice steady despite the thunder shaking the tin roof. "You are hyperventilating. You're shaking. If you walk out into that freezing downpour right now, you will lose the baby before you even reach the border."

"I have to leave, Shenon," Penelope choked out, clutching her stomach. "I can't stay here another hour."

"I know," Shenon murmured, walking over to the closet. "But we are poor orphans. We only own three sets of heavy winter clothes, and you left our thick woolen coats and spare shirts inside the packhouse laundry room after your shift yesterday. If we cross into the human world with nothing but a light duffel bag, we won't survive the winter."

Penelope reached for her keys, her eyes wild. "I'll go get them—"

"No, look at you. You can barely stand," Shenon said firmly. She reached over and grabbed Penelope’s signature dark gray hooded jacket from the hook, pulling the heavy, damp fabric over her own shoulders. She pulled the deep hood over her silver hair, instantly masking her face. "Stay here and finish packing the food. I will walk to the packhouse laundry room and grab our clothes. We are identical twins, Penelope. In this blinding storm, with this hood pulled low, the border guards will just think I'm you returning for another kitchen shift. No one will stop me."

Before Penelope could protest, the quiet bookworm stepped out into the dark, freezing rainstorm, the wooden door clicking shut behind her.

Meanwhile, miles away from the cozy cottage, a luxury black sedan sat idling in a secluded, muddy clearing just outside the Eclipsed Haven border lines. The wipers swished aggressively against the windshield, trying to clear the sheets of torrential rain.

Inside the heated car, Alishia sat in the back seat, her manicured fingers tightly gripping a burner phone. Her face was twisted into a mask of pure, ugly jealousy. She could still hear Travis's voice echoing in her ears from earlier: “The moment I become the Alpha King today, I will have absolute control. You will be my only Luna.”

He was going to discard her. The moment his father stepped down, Travis was going to throw Alishia away like trash and put that filthy, penniless orphan girl on the throne.

Alishia rolled down the tinted window just an inch. The freezing rain splattered against her expensive diamond earrings. Standing outside in the mud, drenched to the bone, were two massive, scar-faced rogue werewolf mercenaries. Their eyes flashed an unnatural, predatory yellow through the darkness.

"You understand the assignment?" Alishia hissed, her voice dripping with venom as she tossed a heavy leather pouch through the window gap. It landed in the mud with a wet thud, overflowing with solid pack gold coins.

The lead rogue picked up the pouch, a disgusting, jagged smile spreading across his face. "The orphan girl. Penelope. She dies tonight, Luna."

"Make it look like an accident," Alishia commanded, her eyes narrowing into cold slits. "She usually walks the path near the deep ravine to get to the packhouse kitchens. Snap her neck and throw her into the flooded mud. Let Travis think his precious fated mate slipped and fell in the storm. If she breathing by tomorrow morning, I will hunt you both down myself."

"Consider it done," the rogue growled, pocketing the gold.

Alishia rolled the window back up, turning up the car’s heater as a dark, victorious smile settled onto her lips. She watched the two killers melt into the shadows of the forest, heading straight toward the ravine path.

She had no idea that Penelope was sitting safely inside the cottage, and that the quiet, innocent Shenon was currently walking straight into the trap, wearing her sister's jacket and the fated promise necklace around her neck.