The Unforgiving Moon

4.

I stumbled through the city streets, the white lights illuminating the cobblestones on my path. It was raining, it had been for a few nights straight. The skies were weeping with us, grieving the lives lost.

Or it was simply raining, and our Moon did not care for us, for the lives that were sacrificed in the name of this war. Or the many, many more to come.

Beckett was still coming. By the Moons—he was probably relishing in the fact that he knew that I knew he was coming. And he knew I feared that moment.

He also knew that he could come at any time and he would win. He had taken out our Alpha, he had butchered Aven. And without him, or Lotta, or Jerr, this pack was nothing. We were nothing, and he knew it.

Perhaps that was why he was waiting so long to strike at us—he wanted to prolong our agony, so our bleed would taste more sweetly, so it would glitter on his hands, covered in months and months of grown fear.

He probably did it to torment me. Maybe he knew about this pack's ritual of mourning—and what would happen to me after. Maybe he was just waiting for this hunt, patiently holding off on his fatal hit so he could join this hunt.

For that brief night—if I would even last that long, I would be his only enemy. He'd make me bleed and he'd do it by Death Moon's side if he had to.

But I wouldn't let him. No matter what it would take of me, Beckett would never do as much as point a finger at me again.

I passed a small puddle, and in the ripples of the falling rain I could hardly see my reflection. But I saw enough to know that Mallee's rationing wasn't working in my favor—my cheeks had sunken, my eyes were glassy and my bones were more apparent. I could see it clearly enough, even though my wet hair was sticking to my face, in a desperate attempt to hide the weakness I had become. The weakness I had always been.

I was no longer the girl who had been rescued from Spitta; I resembled the girl who needed rescuing again.

I had strayed far from the Mansion tonight—though by now, most of the city's streets were familiar. But the further I went, the less people knew my face and the more I could be not me. Nights like these were the only moments I had were I could play pretend, where I could shy away from all the glares, all the hateful words, all the unpleasant gestures.

Wolves rarely came to the human parts of the city. Feytan and Lotta had both been surprised I'd ended up here a few months ago, but where else could I go when the pack rejected me?

Now was the same. Though I wasn't allocated to the city's slums, it was the parts without wolves that gave me the most comfort. Maybe I was unfit to be a wolf—maybe I should have refused the Bite all those Moons ago.

If I'd stayed human, I would have been stuck in Spitta, but I'd still have Benjamin. And Vince, Lotta, Feytan and Aven maybe wouldn't be dead.

I wouldn't have lost my mate, because I wouldn't have met my mate.

The Bite had brought me nothing but misery, even if it hadn't come from Beckett. What I had thought to be a rescue, turned out to be a cruel joke by our Moons, tormenting my life and making the curse even stronger.

Though, if I had stayed, Benjamin would be dead. Vi, Laura and Sam would be dead, too.

No matter what path I'd have chosen, the people close to me would die. What a horrible play of our Moons—to make my life such a malediction, that anyone around me would suffer and die. There was no escaping it; how could you ever escape yourself? It couldn't be done, and that was the cruelest part of it all. Nothing could be done at all. Only now, I could prevent this curse from spreading. Now that I knew, now that I felt it, I could rid the world of this curse.