RUST AND FIRE
Freya
Brin’s hut smells of bitter herbs and smoke. I sit hunched on the cot, sweat dampening my hairline, my palms clammy. The tonic he gave burns down my throat. It tastes like metal and feels dry like ash, choking me. Then the shaking begins.
Nyx howls inside me, but her voice is muffled. The silverdew in my veins claws for dominance while the tonic tries to burn it out. My stomach churns, bile rising.
“Stay with it,” Brin orders, setting a cold cloth on my brow.
“I—” My voice breaks. “I can’t—”
“Yes, you can.”
Nyx growls, louder now, no longer smothered. I claw at the blanket, my body jerking as if lightning rips through me. Pain grates my bones, my chest, my throat. Then, with a violent shudder, I cough, the taste of iron flooding my mouth.
Brin holds me by the shoulders. “Breathe,” he says firmly. “It has to leave you. Every trace of silverdew.”
“It feels—” I gag again, bile mixed with blood spilling onto the floor of his hut. “Like I’m dying.”
“You’re not dying. You’re fighting. Do not stop.”
“It didn’t feel like this yesterday!”
“Today’s dose is stronger,” he says, rubbing my back.
I clutch my ribs, trembling, vision dimming as sweat drips down my face. Nyx snarls louder, pacing inside me. Her presence is jagged, painful, like chains tearing apart, link by link.
“Let her through,” Brin urges. “Don’t fight your wolf. Ground yourself in her.”
“I can’t—” My words break into a scream as heat sears through my blood. My nails dig crescents into my palms, reopening the previous cuts.
“You can,” he insists. “Repeat after me: The wolf is me and I am the wolf.”
I choke out the words, half-sobbing. “The wolf… is me and… I am the wolf.”
The world shudders. Nyx’s wild, furious growls fill my head.
“Again!” Brin orders.
“The wolf is me and I am the wolf!” I shout, and Nyx roars with me, so loud my bones shake.
Then it crashes—like a wave breaking. My chest heaves, but the burn eases. My wolf is there. I feel her. Bruised, weak, but awake.
Nyx’s voice breaks through, clear for the first time in years. ‘Finally. You let me breathe.’
Tears sting my eyes. I whisper back in thought, ‘Don’t leave me again.’
‘Not if you stop letting them muzzle us.’
Brin’s face softens. “Good. You’ll survive this.”
I collapse against the wall, panting. “What if I can’t keep her? What if she fades again?”
“You won’t,” he says. “But you need discipline. And strength. You’ve been too long without both.” He glances toward the door. “Tamsin’s waiting.”
◆◆◆
The training yard reeks of dust and sweat. Morning light shines on the edge of blades hanging from racks. Tamsin stands at the center, her dark braid swinging as she paces, face and arms tanned from all her time under the sun. She’s one of Brin’s cousins, but fiercer than any soldier I’ve seen.
I remember standing in one of these yards as a girl, wooden staff in hand, sweating through drills meant more for form than for battle. Lunas are trained to defend, not to fight. To last long enough for the Alpha to reach them.
But it’s been years. And years are enough to dull a blade.
Tamsin circles me, sharp-eyed. “You’ve had training.”
“Some.” I shift into a stance I half-remember, knees bent, arms lifted. “Enough to look like I know what I’m doing.”
“Enough to get killed.” She lunges without warning. Instinct kicks in—I sidestep, pivot, just like I was taught. But she catches my wrist, twists, and has me pinned in a blink.
I grunt. “That was unfair.”
“Your enemies won’t warn you either.” She releases me, but her eyes remain sharp. “You’ve got the bones of a fighter. You’ve just buried them under years of silence.”
I roll my shoulders, the old movement patterns tugging at muscle memory. “Lunas aren’t meant to lead with claws.”
“No. But you’ll need them now.” She squares up again. “So—remember. Wolves don’t only fight with their bodies. They fight with dominance. Posture, breath, presence.”
I snort. “I know how to hold a gaze.”
“Then do it.”
Her wolf bristles under her skin, and mine rises to meet it. Nyx growls, urging me to bare my teeth, to show I’m not prey. I lift my chin, meet Tamsin’s stare head-on, and let the sound roll from my throat.
She nods, the look on her face changing to something that resembles satisfaction. “Better.”
We move again. This time I parry her strike, roll with the momentum, and manage to lock her arm. My muscles protest because they’re too weak and slow, but the technique is there.
Tamsin grins through the strain. “There she is.”
I shove her back, panting. “Rusty. That’s all.”
“No.” She shakes her head. “Caged.”
The word reminds me of my crown—caged behind iron. It is time to set it free. Time to set myself free.
We drill until my arms shake, until my wolf’s growls weave with my own breath. Every time I stumble or slip, I remember what I’ve lost. But in flashes, I feel the old rhythm return. The crouch. The pivot. The dominance in my stance.
When Tamsin finally calls halt, my body is trembling, but Nyx is no longer silent. She hums under my skin, stretching.
Tamsin tosses me a skin of water. “You’ll remember faster than you think. Wolves never forget. They only sleep.”
I drink deep, tasting iron and earth, and wonder how much of myself I’m ready to wake.
Tamsin folds her arms. “Tomorrow, we revise laws, Freya.”
I blink at her, not liking the way she finally said my name. “Laws?”
Her smirk widens. “What use is a Luna who can fight, if she forgets how to rule?”
◆◆◆
That night after a warm bath, I walk the hallways of the keep, muscles aching with everything Tamsin put me through. Torchlight flickers over stone walls, stretching my shadow long like something sinister. I want only my bed now, but a voice grabs my attention.
It’s Kade’s voice, coming from outside Izel’s chamber. I don’t turn the corner; instead, I back further away and focus hard, trusting Nyx to pick up his voice from the distance.
“Have some patience, sweetheart! After the Conclave,” he’s saying, “I’ll make it official. We’ll have a mating ceremony.”
I barely hold back a gasp. My heart feels like it’s been stabbed.
Izel’s laugh follows. It’s gentle and shrill, and it grates on my nerves. “And Freya?”
After a pause, Kade answers, “The Conclave will decide her fate. Either way… she won’t trouble us again.”
His cruel words slice me open. My hands tremble against the stone wall.
Nyx growls in my chest, irritated. ‘He is not yours. He never was.’
I back away from the doorway and sprint towards my chamber.
Twenty-eight days.
That’s all I have left.
The thought doesn’t paralyze me. It ignites fury—one I know is capable of burning everything down.