All Chapters of Moonbound At Sliver Ridge: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

The blare of my alarm had no business being that aggressive. I groaned, smacking at the screen until it shut up. Since when did I even set it? Great. I was officially losing my damn mind.I sat up, rubbing my eyes, and last night came crashing back like a freight train. Me standing toe-to-toe with the quads. Me snapping back, walking out on four of the most dangerous, emotionally constipated Alphas in Lycandra. Bold move? Definitely. Stupid? …Probably.Did I regret it? Sort of.They were my future alphas—possibly my mates. Disrespecting them wasn’t exactly on the safe choices list. But I wasn’t going to stand there like some trembling she-wolf while they threw accusations around like confetti at a pack wedding. Mate bond or not, there’s no future without trust. They needed to hear it, and I was the only one with enough spine to say it.Still, my head throbbed—a mix of crying, screaming into a pillow, and emotionally combusting in record time. But skipping class? Not happening. Potenti

The ride to Silver Ridge Academy felt like being chauffeured by a pack of bodyguards who couldn’t agree on how much space to give me.Callum drove, steady hands on the wheel, shoulders tense like he was holding back a lecture. Rory lounged in the backseat beside me, his thigh pressed casually against mine as if the entire car belonged to him—maybe it did. Seth kept humming some obscene little tune under his breath, tapping out a rhythm on his knee, his eyes flicking to me every few seconds like I was his favourite kind of entertainment. Jaxon? He just stared. Quiet, unrelenting, storm-grey gaze locked on me like I’d vanish if he blinked.I hated the way my stomach flipped under it. Hated it more because part of me liked it.The moment we pulled into the academy lot, everything went to hell.Four towering Alphas and one very reluctant Luna stepped out of a black SUV, and the world noticed. Students froze mid-step. Conversations died. Whispers rose like smoke.And then came the pet name

The oak doors groaned as they shut behind me, locking with a metallic snap. The sound sent a shiver racing down my spine.Dean Aldara’s office wasn’t cozy like some of the professors’ rooms. It was sharp edges and cold power. Silver wards crawled across the walls in looping runes, their glow steady, predatory. Bookshelves towered high, packed with grimoires bound in leather so old the spines cracked like brittle bones. And behind the desk, carved into the wall itself, floated the academy’s crest: a crescent moon split by four interlocking sigils, each representing a realm.It pulsed faintly. Alive. Watching.The dean herself sat perfectly still, tall and commanding. Her silver hair was braided back tight, the ends tipped in faintly glowing runes. Her eyes—gold, too bright to be real—fixed on me without blinking.“Sit.”My legs obeyed before my brain caught up.For a moment, she said nothing. Just studied me like I was a specimen under glass. My wolf shifted uneasily, ears flat, but I

The forest was too damn quiet.Not the peaceful kind of quiet, either—the heavy, pressing kind that made every heartbeat echo too loud in my chest. Ethan hadn’t said anything for a while, and neither had I. But I didn’t need words to know he was watching me, weighing the things I wasn’t saying out loud.The longer we sat there, the more guilt prickled at the edges of my calm. Classes were still running. I’d ditched my last one, and if I’d been in the mood to care about my academic record, that would’ve sent me into a full-blown panic. But right now? Sitting here, breathing through everything with Ethan by my side, I couldn’t bring myself to regret it.Still… I wasn’t going to get away with this. Not forever.The wards overhead shifted, their silver runes flickering faintly as if they were tired of holding secrets.Ethan cleared his throat softly, finally breaking the silence. “You realize we’ve probably missed half the day by now, right?”I snorted, tipping my head back to stare at th

The room had gone quiet in that careful way the Packhouse does—like the stone itself is holding its breath so you can find yours. Out beyond the mullioned windows, the last of the afternoon light smeared silver across the pines. The wards in the paneling hummed low and tender, threads of moon-sigil and ember-sigil braided together—Ridge Storm’s way of saying: you’re inside, you’re safe, breathe.I lay on my back across the ridiculous bed—silk coverlet, too many pillows, the whole “Alpha heirloom suite” production—counting the faint prickle of magic where the headboard’s inlays met my scalp. At the academy, the sigils flare like sirens if you so much as clench your jaw too hard. Here, they’re softer, more… polite. They glow when the room likes you. They dim when it doesn’t. Right now, the silver filigree at the ceiling’s edge pulsed a quiet, steady light.“I’m fine,” I told the ceiling. It didn’t argue. Rude.The day unspooled behind my eyes in a too-fast montage: my shift faltering un