Chapter 5 5
I reached the main double doors, their heavy oak looming. Holding the cold, brass knob of the left door, I turned it slowly, wincing at the tiny, echoing click. I guess the goddess thought it wise to answer my prayer fast tonight, because the door was, miraculously, unlocked. I pushed it back just enough for me to slip through, no need to risk the groan of both doors opening. I tiptoed in, easing it shut behind me with infinite care.
It was almost dark inside. The grand foyer was a cavern of shadows. The chandelier was off, the sconces unlit. The lights must have been ordered off by that very person I was avoiding like a plague. But it wasn’t even 10 p.m. yet. God save me.
Holding my breath, I aimed for the grand staircase, a hulking silhouette against the slightly lighter dark of the tall windows. I moved with painful slowness, making sure the soles of my shoes didn’t scuff the polished marble, terrified of knocking over one of the ridiculously fragile porcelain vases on the side table.
I was halfway across the open space when I heard a noise. A faint tap-tap-scuff. I halted, frozen mid-step. My blood turned to ice. I held my breath, fearing the worst.
Then I almost screamed as I spun and saw a raised walking cane silhouetted against the window, poised as if to strike.
A soft, hard series of chuckles broke the silence, a sound like dry leaves rustling. I recognized it immediately, and the fear dissolved into shaky, furious relief.
“Goodness, Quinta!” I murmured between gritted teeth, my hand flying to my pounding heart. I looked around cautiously, half-expecting the real threat to emerge from the shadows.
The old woman stopped laughing, though I could bet tears of mirth were slipping from her crinkled eyes now. She definitely enjoyed pulling this prank on me. She leaned heavily on her cane, waving a dismissive, gnarled hand. “You little wolfless girl. Where have you been all night?” she muttered, her voice a papery whisper as she shuffled closer.
“All night? Come on. I was just out for a few hours,” I sighed, the tension leaving my shoulders in a rush. I motioned upstairs with my head. “Is she asleep?”
Quinta nodded, her white hair a faint glow in the dark. “Maybe. But I think she’s in your father’s old study or in his chambers. You should go quickly, child, before she finds you.”
“Thank you,” I whispered, the words thick with gratitude. I got close and pressed a quick kiss to her wrinkled, cool forehead. She smelled of lavender and parchment. She smiled, a brief, warm flash in the gloom.
This time, I abandoned the main staircase. I headed for the smaller, servants’ staircase tucked behind a paneled door in the hallway – a precaution so I wouldn’t run into that person. My hand was on the discreet brass handle when a voice sliced through the silent house, cold and clear and final.
It was a voice that had morphed, over the years, to be as hard and unyielding as the marble floors. The voice wasn’t loud. It didn’t need to be. It was the kind of voice that stopped everything, that made the very air in the grand foyer go still and heavy.
It made my blood freeze solid in my veins.
“Hold it right there!”
I felt my spine lock into place, every muscle rigid. As if on cue, a soft click echoed, and then light – harsh, unforgiving light from the massive chandelier overhead—flooded the space, bleaching the shadows and leaving me utterly exposed.
Oh god. Why me?
I turned slowly, the movement feeling stiff and unnatural. She stood at the bottom of the main staircase, one hand resting lightly on the polished newel post.
How had she gotten there so quietly? The house was a tomb. Had she been standing there in the dark the whole time, waiting for me to think I’d made it? Watching my pathetic, tiptoeing performance?
She began to move closer, her steps silent on the marble. Her light night robe, a pale, silvery thing, seemed to move with a cautious dread of its own, as if it feared the touch of her hands.
Then she stopped, just a few feet away, and fixed me with those eyes. They were an art piece, everyone said so. Deep, intelligent, fierce. And they were a perfect mirror of my own. Looking into them now was like looking into a future version of myself that was made of pure, unyielding ice.
“Are you just returning, Arielle?” Her voice was calm. Deadly calm. Her gaze didn’t leave my face as she glanced, just a flicker, toward the large, ornate clock on the wall. My own eyes darted to follow, a coward’s move to avoid hers. The brass hands glared back: well past the hour. “It’s past curfew,” she stated, the words dropping like stones. “Where the heck have you been?”
I gulped. I could feel the ghost of that stranger’s stare, Logan’s stunned face, the taste of betrayal and expensive whiskey—all of it churning in my gut. I straightened my shoulders, forcing a slow, deliberate breath, trying to smother the anxiety clawing up my throat.
“Around.” I gestured carelessly into the empty air beside me, then rubbed my arms. I regretted not grabbing one of my warming fur jackets on the way out. Standing before her like this, caught and small, always gave me the chills.
“Around?” The single word was a lash. “Don’t you dare lie to me. Where were you?”
“I’m sorry.” The apology was automatic, a shield.
Her eyes narrowed. “You snuck out again?” The look she gave me was a complicated one—it demanded I not lie, but it also pleaded, in some deep, hidden part of her, for it not to be true. For me not to be this constant disappointment.
I could only meet that conflicted gaze and offer the weakest truth. “Sorry, Luna.”
She didn’t shout. She didn’t have to. A low, soft growl vibrated in her throat, not the full, commanding rumble of her wolf, but a clear, human sound of pure, strained irritation. It was a clearer indication of her mood than any scream. Her eyes, those mirror eyes, went from fierce to utterly cold. The warmth I sometimes glimpsed, the mother behind the Luna, was gone, locked away.
I lowered my head further, my hair falling to curtain my face. “Sorry, mother.” I looked up through my lashes, hoping the informal address, the reminder of our blood and not just our ranks, might soften her.
It didn’t. Not a flicker. Her expression remained carved from stone. It never did soften when she was like this, poised on the edge of delivering a hellish earful or, worse, a methodical interrogation.
I threw a helpless, fleeting glance toward where Quinta had been. The old woman had sort of recoiled into the deeper shadows of the hallway, a silent spectator now.
Then came the question I’d been dreading since I slipped through the hedge. The big one. Her voice dropped, becoming quieter, more dangerous.
“Did you go to a restricted place?”