The True Luna They Tried To Kill

(Vaelith's POV)

I stuck the final stem of silverbloom into the vase and then took a step back to see if the arrangement was standing nicely. There were hundreds of candles in the ceremonial hall and all the servants around me were like they were wound up too tight and they were afraid they were going to be the one thing that didn't go right tonight.

Mira hissed at me across the room, holding the white ribbon in her arms, "Vaelith, hurry up. The elders will be here in no time at all!"

"Almost done," I said, tucking a petal back into the flower. 

"They're here!" She screamed and  I picked up my bundle of snipped stems and stealthed my way to the corner of the hall, where no one would see me standing.

Nobles started to trickle in, wearing silks that I'm sure cost more than I make in ten years. I saw a young lord readjust his cloak clasp, a lady laugh too loud at what her companion said, two warriors nod at each other in pride. None of them looked at me, None of them ever have.

'Eyes down,' one of the guards said, without even giving a glance to who he was talking to. He didn't have to. Breeders always knew who orders like that was meant for.

I looked down and held it down.

The doors at the end of the hall opened up and the energy of the room changed instantly. The elders went first, their robes falling like silken streamers on the marble, followed by the High Seer, his silver eyes already half-gone in some vision that he alone could see. Then came the oldest wolf in the land, Elder Tomasin they called him, but I never heard it said to his face. He had officiated at more weddings than any person living.

The hall was silent.

"Tonight the Moon Goddess blesses her chosen pairs," Elder Tomasin said, his voice resonating easily, despite his age. "Let no one break her will."

One by one, he called names. They took the initiative and came in pairs, holding hands, and knelt down before him and as he spoke the old words over their heads. I saw a young warrior beaming at his mate when the blessing came down, I saw a noble woman crying quiet, happy tears. It was beautiful. 

Then came the moment everyone was waiting for.

"Alpha Kaedric Voss."

The entire hall appeared to be bending over in unison. Kaedric stood tall and composed in the middle of the room, his golden eyes fixed on nothing as if they were at ease with the weight of all gazes in the room. I only had a few encounters with him, always from a distance, always with my head down. He looked just like he was supposed to look - even from across the hall! An Alpha.

Elder Tomasin held up his hands, as if to start blessing, but he didn't.

Be froze in place, his hands lifted, his brow furrowed, looking at the High Seer.

The High Seer said quietly but the hall was silent, so it reached everyone else, "Something is wrong. His lips moved in some private calculation, he studied the moon through the great glass dome above us. "The alignment doesn't match, there's no woman in this hall tonight whose stars align."

Rumors started to spread right away.

"That can't be done," someone whispered.

"Why did he have to choose the Luna," another voice asked, "Is the Luna not already chosen?

"Silence!" Elder Tomasin commanded, and the hall instantly went silent. "He looked to Kaedric. Alpha, give your essence to her the Moon Goddess will guide it."

Kaedric's jaw clenched and he nodded. "As you say."

He closed his eyes, and a moment later a thread of glowing silver light rose up from him out of his chest, as smoke in the wind. All the noble ladies in the hall straightened up, as though they had been given a chance to see who was best, and their eyes were hopeful.

It didn't.

The essence passed the front rows of noble ladies. Beyond the warriors standing at attention around the walls. Outside the healers were standing around the altar. It was a slow, deliberate motion, darting between each of the unattached women in the room without stopping.

I didn't even see it coming towards my corner until it was just about to run into me.

I began to say, "What-", but it never came out.

For one beat, I felt it, like a second heart beating in me, a warmness I had never felt before. After that there was a lot of noise.

"Guards!" someone shouted.

"What is the meaning of this?!" a noblewoman shrieked.

Before I could even process what had happened, my hands were grabbed by his arms. I looked down and saw four guards standing around me, and there were elders standing up from their seats and nobles standing up from their seats, and everyone was shouting over everyone else.

"I didn't do anything," I said, my voice shaking. "I don't know what has gone wrong-"

Elder Tomasin commanded, "Take her to the council chamber! "Now."

"But the ceremony-" someone protested.

"Is over," he said. "Until the reason for what just happened is known."

I wasn't able to argue. The guards dragged me forward and my wreath of flower stems fell to the ground scattering all over the marble as we marched me out of the hall. I saw Kaedric's face, but I didn't see an angry or confused look, just a look I couldn't read as the doors closed behind us.

---

The council chamber was colder than the hall, all stone and shadow; and I stood in the midst of it, and a dozen elders looked on me as a thing of danger.

One of them demanded: "Explain yourself."

I said, "I have no explanation to give. I don't know what happened, I was just setting up flowers, I never came anywhere near the Alpha."

Another elder, leaning forward, asked, "Have you practiced magic? Forbidden rituals? Spoken to a witch?"

"No," I said. "No, I tell you, I swear it on my late parents grave."

So the third one asked, "Have you and the Alpha been alone together? "Met in secret? Have you swapped words of any sort?

"I have never talked to him at all," I said, my voice rising, " I did not ask for this, I don't know what this is.

"Shouting at her will not make us answers, High Seer, look at the essence again, we will not accuse anyone until we have the truth." Kaedric said and instantly the hall  became quiet. "Tomasin, what's happening?" 

The High Seer stood before me and studied me for a long silence, his hands dangling around my chest, but not touching me.

Finally, he  said, "The essence of the Alpha is in her, there is no mistake.

The chamber erupted again. 

"How can this be?" bellowed an elder. "A sacred essence of an alpha in a breeder?"

" This is unprecedented in history," another said.

"Someone must have done something," a third said, glaring at me as if the answer were obvious.

I said, "I am innocent I swear!" At this point, I was a few breaths away from crying. 

The High Seer raised his hand and, slowly, the chamber became silent. "There is a way to be sure. But the readings are not clear until after the setting of the sun. We must wait."

"It's fine then, we wait till the sun sets." Alpha Kaedric said. 

Elder Tomasin took a deep breath out. "She will be locked up until then. She will be guarded, she will be watched."

I was not asked what my thoughts were on that but I was locked, guarded and watched.

I don't know how much time passed inside the little room where they put me. There were two guards outside my door and I could hear them talking to each other from time to time, but not so loud that I could hear what they were saying. I sat on the edge of the narrow bed, my arms around myself and I did not want to think about what would happen if the elders decided that I caused it on purpose.

I had nothing. There was no family, there was no title, there was no one who would speak for me if they wished to punish me for something that I did not understand.

When the door finally opened and a guard informed me that I was being summoned again, my legs had become hard as a rock from sitting so still for so long.

The council chamber was different that night, the light came from torch instead of candles, shadows long stretched across the stone floor. There was a woman that I didn't recognize standing in the middle of the room that was older than the elders and was more intimidating  than all the elders put together.

"This is the witch," Elder Tomasin said. "She will provide us with our response."

The witch didn't say anything to me, but she circled me slowly, looking at me with eyes. "There's no crime here," she said. "No magic is off-limits and no manipulation is allowed." She went to the elders. "In the days leading up to a mating ceremony, the stars can fog, a horoscope can briefly match the wrong person. This girl's stars coincided with the Alpha's true destined mate for a brief period of time. That is it. A misjudgement of time. That's all, a mistake caused by the wrong alignment of stars and the upcoming blood moon."

I felt relief, but it didn't last long. 

Elder Tomasin said "remove it".

I felt the warmth that had been in my chest all along since the ceremony started rise, slowly and weirdly, like something being pulled out under my skin, as the witch raised her hands toward me and spoke words I didn't recognize. The radiant light ascended and floated through the room.

It would settle in right into Seraphine Duskmere, which I hadn't even noticed standing near the elders until that moment.

The elders breathed a sigh of relief and some of them prayed thanks.

"The issue is settled", Elder Tomasin announced. "Alpha Kaedric and Seraphine Duskmere's union is blessed. The ceremony will continue."

No one looked at me as they made my way out of the chamber. No excuse, no admission that it was not my fault, no apology, no nothing. I kept my head down and walked toward the door hoping to go and disappear before someone remembered who I was.

I nearly made it.

Silk skirts rustled and rustled as Seraphine moved directly in my direction, and I backed up to allow her to go past. She didn't pass.

She slammed her shoulder into mine and made me stumble.

She leaned in so close, so close, that no one in the room could hear her, gaze locked on mine, icy blue eyes fixed.

"This is not over."