All Chapters of Bound by the Moon: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

He watched her run.The corridor was empty and she was already around the corner and he was still standing in the space she had just occupied. Still. Unmoving. As if something in the air had yet to settle.His wolf shifted beneath his skin. Not agitation.But a mild, prickly recognition that made him want to avoid the omega forever.It was doing something he had been telling it firmly not to do for several weeks now.She smelled different.He had noticed it days ago. The dungeon smell – the filth – was gone. He had noticed gradually. Uncontrollable attention has been drawn to her scent over the past few weeks.Whatever had been carved into her there – fear, decay, submission–had worn away.He growled when his wolf leaned in. Like he craved a sniff from her new scent that lingered. He pulled back, with a grunt, and turned away.As he walked she stayed with him.Recently, he had developed a habit he hadn’t asked for and couldn’t seem to stop. It had become… inco

Rosalind glared daggers at me.Of course, it was Rosalind.She stood in the corridor, her hands folded in front of her, her expression reminding me of my foster mother. Disapproval of a woman who had been waiting for an opportunity and had just found one delivered to her door.“Eavesdropping,” she began. Not a question. Just the word, dropped like a stone.“I was walking past—”“You were standing outside the kitchen door listening to pack staff discuss private matters.” She tilted her head slightly. “You will come with me.”It wasn’t a request.Damon was in his study.I knew this because Rosalind walked me there, knocked once, and opened the door before he answered. This told me she was one of perhaps three people in Silvercrest who could do that without consequence.He was at his desk. Papers spread in front of him, a lamp burning at his elbow, the look of a man in the middle of something that required concentration and was not interested in being interrupted.He looked up.First a

Skylar sat cross-legged on my bed like she’d been doing it for years. I wasn’t sure when this had become normal – her appearing off-duty, settling into my space as it fit her, talking about things that weren’t pack business or training reports. It had happened gradually, and it felt good. “Caia was furious,” she said, with so much satisfaction. I grinned, “I noticed.” “Half the pack noticed.” She shook her head. “The other half were too busy trying to figure out what happened.” I pulled my knees up on the bed and thought about that. It didn’t feel like victory exactly. More like a door opening that I hadn’t known was there. Even I was trying to figure out that moment. “And Rosalind?” I asked. Skylar was quiet for a moment. “Rosalind is complicated.” “That’s not an answer.” “It’s the most accurate one I have.” She shrugged. “She's not your enemy, or an ally either. Her sole interest has always been the Alpha.” I thought about Rosalind’s face in the courtyard. “

Border control was not what I expected.When Skylar offered me a job I was excited to do something. It was getting tiring sitting in my room, hearing too many voices or none at all. Silvercrest’s border stretched across seventeen miles of mixed terrain – forest, ridges, river crossings, and a stretch of open trees. I was assigned the morning shift on a rotation that included three senior enforcers. They barely replied when I greeted them—their dislike for me still burned as fiercely as ever. By the end of the second day, I had gotten used to mapping out the best and safest route. Using what I heard and how much I could see, I mapped eleven irregularities in the current patrol rotation. I brought them to Skylar.She looked at my notes for a long time.“You found all of these in two days.”“They were already there. I just followed what my instincts were telling me.”She folded the paper. “I’ll pass these to Ralph for the unit briefing before the eastern patrol tomorrow.”I nodded.

They dressed me like I was something worth presenting.Three pack women arrived at my quarters before dawn with their arms full — a ceremonial dress the colour of moonlight, silver thread worked through the fabric in patterns I didn’t have the knowledge to name, shoes that fit like they’d been made for me specifically.They moved around me with professional efficiency, pinning and adjusting, and occasionally stepping back to assess, with the focused expressions of people who took their work seriously, regardless of their personal opinions about the subject.I stood still and let them work, occasionally looking out the window. Preparing my nerves for what was to come.Full moon tonight. The ceremony elder had explained the significance — the goddess’s eye open fully, witness to the binding. More permanent. More complete.More, I thought. Everything about tonight was going to be more.One of the women — young, with careful hands — reached up to arrange my hair. She met my eyes in the