Crown Of Moonfire

SERA'S POINT OF VIEW

I woke up to the cold. It was dark. The room where I lived with the omegas was made of plain stone. The floor was dirt. It smelled bad because a lot of people lived there. I was lying on a blanket that did not keep me warm. My back hurt from the work I did that day. My hands were dry. Cracked from scrubbing the floors. My stomach was empty. It hurt.

I sat up slowly. The other omegas were still sleeping. Some of them were curled up together for warmth. Others were lying on the floor like they were dead. None of them ever talked to me. Look at me. I was the lowest of the low. The one that the other omegas forgot existed.

I put on my dress. It was old and thin. It did not cover my body well. I had stopped caring about how I looked a while ago.

My feet touched the floor. I winced. Every morning was the same. Cold. Hungry. Painful. I got up. I walked to the door.

The main hall was dark and empty when I got there. The fire in the fireplace had burned down to a piece of coal. I picked up a bucket and a rag. Started cleaning. My job was to clean up the blood from the kitchen floor. A warrior had been hurt in a fight. Had bled all over the floor. Now it was my job to make it disappear.

I scrubbed the floor hard. The blood started to fade. My arms and knees ached. I kept scrubbing.

That was when I saw a bowl. It was a clay bowl that someone had dropped and left there. I had to clean it up. Everything was my job.

I picked up the piece of the bowl. The edge was sharp. It cut my hand. I did not see it until it was too late. The cut was deep. It hurt a lot.

I gasped. The pain shot up my arm. I dropped the piece of the bowl. It hit the floor. I looked at my hand. Saw the blood. It was dark and thick. I remembered what my mother told me when she was dying. Never let them see your blood when you bleed. I did not understand why. I obeyed her.

I put my hand under my dress. Pressed the fabric against the cut. I closed my eyes. Prayed to the moon. Please make it stop. Please do not let them see.

I held my breath. Counted to ten. To twenty. To thirty. When I looked at my hand again the cut was gone. No blood. No scar. Just smooth skin. It was like the cut never happened.

I stared at my hand. My heart was beating fast. This was not the time something like this had happened. I had healed before. Too fast. It was not normal.

I did not understand it. I did not like it. I hid it because my mother told me to. Because something inside me said that if they found out they would hurt me worse.

I cleaned up the rest of the blood. Scrubbed the floor until it was clean. I worked until my hands were raw and my back hurt. Then I stopped.

"Still scrubbing, rat?" a voice said.

I did not look up. I knew the voice. It was Lira. She was mean and beautiful. Sharp like a knife.

I kept scrubbing. My hands were shaking. I did not want her to see my fear.

"Look at me when I speak to you " she said. Her voice was like a whip.

I looked up. My face was blank. I had learned to do that a time ago. If I showed her fear she would hurt me more. If I showed her anger she would punish me. So I showed her nothing.

Lira walked closer to me. She looked at my dress and my hands. She smiled. "The ceremony is tonight. Every omega has to be. Even you."

My stomach dropped. The mate ceremony. Every wolf who was eighteen had to go. The Alpha would walk through the crowd. Find his mate. I did not want to be seen. I did not want to be chosen. I wanted to disappear.

Lira leaned down close to me. Her breath smelled like meat. "The Alpha will walk past you. Feel nothing. You are dirty and thin and worthless. Just like everyone says."

She poured water over the floor. "Clean it again, " she said. "Do it this time."

She walked away. Left me sitting in the water. My dress was wet. I was shivering. I did not cry. I had stopped crying a while ago. Tears did not help anything.

I grabbed the rag. Started scrubbing again.

---

Wren found me an hour later. She was standing in the doorway. Her face was sharp. Her eyes were sharper. She was not beautiful like Lira. She was real. She was the wolf in Ashborne who looked at me like I was a person.

"Sera what happened to your dress?" she asked. Her voice was low and urgent.

"Lira happened, " I said. I kept scrubbing. "She spilled water on me. Make me clean it again."

Wren's jaw. Her hands were fists. "That she-wolf. I am going to hurt her one day."

"Please do not " I said. I looked up at her. "She will hurt you worse."

Wren knelt down beside me. Grabbed my hands. She pulled them away from the rag. "Your hands are raw. Stop scrubbing. It is clean enough."

I let her pull me to my feet. Wren looked at my hand. Frowned. "Sera there is blood on your hand. There is no cut. Where is the cut?"

I pulled my hand away. Hide it behind my back. "There was no cut. It is not my blood. It is the warriors blood from earlier. I must have missed a spot."

Wren's eyes narrowed. She did not believe me. I could see it in her face. She could smell the truth. Wren was good at knowing when people were lying.

"Fine, " she said. "Keep your secrets. I know something is different about you. I have known about it for months. Your eyes. Your scent. The wounds just disappear on your skin."

I said nothing. My heart was beating fast. I stared at the floor.

"Sera, " Wren said. She grabbed my chin. Made me look at her. "I am your friend. The only friend you have. You can trust me. Whatever it is, you can tell me."

My throat was tight. I wanted to tell her. I wanted to scream it.. The words would not come. The fear was too heavy.

"I have to go " I whispered. I pulled away from her. "The ceremony. I have to be ready."

Wren watched me go. She did not follow me. I felt her eyes on my back as I walked away.

I wore the clothes I had on before. A clean dress that was a little less damaged than the others. It still hung loose on my body. I ran my fingers through my hair. I tried to make it look nice.. It did not matter. Nothing mattered.

The other omegas left the quarters. Walked to the hall with their heads down and their shoulders bent. They knew their place. They knew they were nothing.

I walked to the back. Kept my eyes on the floor. I tried to make myself small. Invisible. A shadow that no one would see.

The main hall was packed. Warriors lined the walls and ranking wolves sat on benches. The Beta stood near the table and the Alphas chair was empty.

Kael had not shown up yet.

I stood in the corner, the one. I pressed my back against the stone wall. Wrapped my arms around myself hoping no one would notice me.

Lira stood near the front, dressed in her leather clothes. Her hair was braided with silver threads. She smiled at the warriors. She laughed at their jokes waiting and hoping.

She wants to be chosen, I thought. She wants to be the Alphas' mate.

I looked away not caring. I did not want to be chosen. I did not want to be seen. I wanted to be forgotten like I always was.

Then the doors. The room fell silent. Every wolf turned to look.

Kael walked in tall and broad with shoulders that filled the doorway. His jaw was hard. His eyes were cold, like gray iron or a winter sky. He wore a fur cloak and dark leather looking like a wolf who had never been beaten.

He walked to the table. Sat in the Alphas chair looking down at the crowd with a face that gave nothing away.

The ceremony. Wolves stepped forward one by one. The Beta called their names. They walked to the center of the hall. The Alpha looked at them. His wolf sniffed the air, feeling the pull or not.

Most walked away unchosen. Some felt the tug. Were matched with warriors or hunters they barely knew.

The ceremony dragged on. My legs hurt. My heart hurt. I wanted to run, to hide, to be else.

Then the Beta called my name. "Sera Wolfe step forward."

The room fell silent. Every single person looked at me. I was stuck and my feet would not. My throat was closed up. The whole pack stared at me with confusion and disgust and amusement.

They were thinking: why is the omega here? They seemed to say. Look at the state of her clothes. She should not be allowed in this hall.

I made myself move one step at a time. I walked to the center of the hall. My hands were. My heart was racing. I kept my eyes on the floor.

Kael looked down at me. I felt like he was weighing me down with his gaze. His wolf sniffed the air. Then his whole body froze.

His nostrils. His jaw tightened. His eyes went wide. For a moment I saw something in his eyes that looked desperate and familiar.

His wolf had found me and the whole pack saw it. They saw how Kael's body leaned towards me, how his chest moved up and down faster and how his hands gripped the arms of his chair.

People started whispering, low and sharp. The. The omega? No it cannot be.

Kael stood up. Walk towards me one step at a time. He stopped in front of me. I looked at my dirty clothes, my skinny body and my shaking shoulders.

His face changed and his eyes went cold. He looked at me at the pack at Lira smirking and at the warriors waiting to see what he would do.

He said out loud for everyone to hear: I would rather not have a mate than be tied to someone like her. He called me dirty. Threw me away like I was nothing.

His words hurt me like a punch. I felt my chest cave in. My knees gave out. My vision went dark.

He had rejected me in front of everyone calling me dirty and throwing me away. The pack laughed, loud and cruel. They enjoyed my pain. Lira laughed the loudest.

I ran out of the hall through the keep and into the forest. I ran until I could not run anymore. I fell to my knees in the dirt and I screamed until my throat was sore.

I cried until I had no tears. He had looked at me and felt the connection. Chosen to be proud instead of being with me. I was nothing to him. Now I was even less than nothing.

The moon was full and bright in the sky shining down on me with a light. It felt like a mothers touch, like a promise.

I looked up at the sky. My tears dried on my cheeks. My mother had told me: never let them see you bleed when you are hurt.. She had not told me about my heart, about the pain of rejection.

I curled up into a ball holding my chest where it hurt. It was empty and cold like a space.

Under the hurt something else was moving, something old and quiet. It did not make the hurt go away. It kept me alive.

Being alive was enough for now.

I lay in the forest until the moon went down then I got up. I walked back to the keep. I walked through the halls and back to my room in the omega quarters.

I lay down on my blanket staring at the ceiling unable to sleep. The mate ceremony was over. The Alpha had not chosen anyone. The pack was confused. People were whispering.

I had a secret, inside me a secret I did not understand. A secret that had just been hurt by the wolf who was supposed to love me.

I touched my chest. The hurt was still there.. There was also a warm feeling, small and quiet.

I thought: the moon made me. The moon made me something. I do not know what.

I closed my eyes and outside the wind was howling. Inside my blood was humming.

Away in a city called Council Hall, an old wolf named Draven woke up. He smelled something of the Moonfire waking up.

He knew that the heir had appeared. He knew he had to kill her before she remembered who she was.