Marked by Moon

**Chapte

Awake

est. She chooses the one who survives

ng. Skin pulled too tight. Me-but *not*. Me-but wild. Me-but free. --- I screamed. And the world shifted. --- I don't remember how I got outside. Only that the night air felt like fire. And the ground-gods, the ground was *singing*. It pulsed with every heartbeat. Every footstep. Like it knew me now. Like it had been waiting for me to step into it fully. My body felt like it didn't belong to me. It ached. It cracked. It *burned.* I fell to my knees, clutching the dirt as the mark on my back lit up with blinding heat. The wolf's head flared-not just warm, not just glowing-but alive. Moving. Changing. It *howled*. --- My skin ripped. Or maybe it didn't. Maybe it only felt like that-like every hidden part of me had been clawing for years, and now the door had finally broken. My bones bent. My breath caught. And then- I shifted. --- It wasn't clean. It wasn't graceful like the stories said. Like the dances the nobles do when they shift beneath silk and song and moonlight. No. Mine was primal. Ugly. Sacred. I screamed so loud it echoed off the mountains. And then I wasn't screaming anymore. Because I didn't have a *voice* anymore. I had a howl. --- My paws hit the ground with a force that startled even me. Every sound was a symphony. Every scent a story. I could hear Sylren whispering inside. I could smell Kael's fading t