Chapter Thirty Three — The Luna's Judgement
"I…"
The word rattled on my tongue, fragile as glass. A hundred eyes stared at me, and for a moment, I thought my voice would betray me, that the weight of this pack's history and heritage would crush into silence.
But then I breathed. Slow. Steady. The same manner Lucien had instructed me to breathe when fear gripped my chest. I let the air fill my lungs, grounding me, reminding me I was no longer the girl who stumbled into this world. I was Luna.
"I shall hear you both," I said at last, my voice traveling farther than I had anticipated. It stabilized with each syllable. "Not as enemies, not as rivals. But as wolves bound by the same blood. Speak, not to kill one another, but to enable me to understand what lies beneath this struggle."
A murmur spread through the crowd. They had expected judgment hurled quickly, a sentence cast like a spear. Instead, I demanded for the truth.
The wolf with the scar sneered but stepped forward. "There is nothing beneath it. I fought in the last war. I spilled blood so that this pack could have territory at all. That ridge is mine by right. My family hunts there because I defended it. If whelps like him think they can take what I won, then there is no honor any more in our ways."
His voice was accompanied by heaviness behind it, the gravity of remembrance, of sacrifice. I saw wolves among the crowd with nodding heads, hard eyes wrinkled with shared scars.
So then the young wolf replied, his tone acidic with indignation. "Your war was years ago, and yet you keep the land as a miser keeps treasure. We starve. My brother starves, my mother works herself to dust, and you tell us that it is your right to hoard food? That is not power. That is greed.".
The crowd shifted, voices rising, torn between anger at the old warrior and sympathy for the hungry youth. Tension hummed like a bowstring pulled tight, ready to snap.
I sat, elbows on my knees. "And if I were to stand with you, child—would you take the ridge for your self and your folk alone?
His mouth opened, then closed again. He shook his head more deliberately. "No, Luna. I would open it up. Any hungry wolf could hunt there."
I allowed the silence to hang after he spoke, watching the pack absorb his words. I turned to the scarred veteran again. "And if I should rule in your favor, would your pride feed the hungry?"
His teeth ground together. He didn't respond immediately. His silence spoke louder than any denial.
My heart pounded, but clarity ran through the storm. This wasn't just about land. This was about the kind of Luna I would be—one who held to past obligations, or one who found balance for the living.
I rose to my feet, feeling the wave of the crowd's interest bend in my direction. "You both are speaking truth," I began. "One of hunger, one of sacrifice. But the truth that speaks to us all is this: the pack will not survive if we allow pride to starve us or hunger divide us. Territory is not a throne to sit upon—it is the blood of our life, and life belongs to all.".
The words came out of me faster now, fiercer, as if they had been bottled up in my bones all along.
"The ridge will no longer belong to a single kin. It will be open to all to hunt, with regulations determined by the council, so no wolf will go hungry and nobody gets to have what is supposed to be shared.". And you—" I shifted my gaze to the scarred wolf, and without flinching, locked gazes with his angry ones. "Your sacrifice will be remembered. Your scars will never be forgotten. But honor must not be wielded as a weapon against your own pack. You fought for the pack, not for pride. Do not forget that.
Gasps swept through the crowd, shock giving way to whispers, then shouting. Some of the wolves bristled, others lowered their heads. The youth straightened, his eyes burning not merely with triumph, but with something like awe.
The lips of the scarred wolf curled over in a snarl. "You dare deny me my claim?"
Every muscle in the tent stiffened. A growl swept through the crowd like flame.
But I didn't shrink. "I dare remind you that no wolf ever outlives the pack. Not even me." My voice cut through the noise, sharp as a blade. "If you wish to call my judgment into question, then you call not me, but the very blood oath that binds us into one. Do you?"
The challenge lingered in the air. His chest heaved, his fists trembling at his sides. For one terrifying moment, I thought he might leap at me.
But then his gaze moved to Lucien—silent, watchful, still. And something in his anger faltered. He lowered his head, stiff and unwilling. "No, Luna."
The room exhaled as one. The tension of violence bled out, leaving in its wake the thrum of something else—respect, begrudging but real.
After the judgement had been spoken, the crowd began to disperse, their murmurs vibrating with the seriousness of what they had just seen. I felt every step of their gaze following me, measuring me again. They had initially seen me as Lucien's chosen one, but now they had saw me as their Luna.
The youth approached, bowing his head. "Thank you, Luna." His voice cracked with sincerity. "Not for me. For all of us."
I touched his shoulder lightly. "Do not thank me. Thank the pack that still hears truth."
As he retreated, Lucien came out last, his hand stroking the small of my back with a gesture so subtle that I alone could feel it. His eyes shone with something unreadable—approval, perhaps, or well-hidden pride.
"You spoke well," he whispered.
"I thought I would choke." My laughter was trembling, unstable.
"But you didn't." His voice was low, even, full of warmth that permeated deep into the bones of my body. "You stood."
I looked over at the tent where judgment had been passed, where I'd stood before the pack and not lost my mind. Part of me still trembled with fear, but underneath it, something was gaining strength—like roots beginning to take hold.
"Is it always like this?" I whispered.
Lucien's lips wobbled, but not to a smile. "Always. And harder still. But today, they gazed at you. They will remember."
I let the words settle within me, weighty but grounded. Today, I had weathered the judgment. I had accepted it.
⸻
And that night, the hum of the pack lingered after the fire went out. Whispers of Luna, of justice, of change. Some resisted, some accepted, but all had sensed it.
And when I lay beside Lucien, exhaustion clinging to my own bones, his arm flung over me like shield and chain, I realized something I hadn’t yet:
I was getting good at being Luna.
Even when my knees were trembling. Even when my voice was shaking.
Especially then.