The Moonlit Curse

Ch 13: Spooked

Kiya was quiet when they remounted their horses and started back towards Silverkeep, and August didn't push her. He was still debating with himself whether it was right to tell her about the Whittemore situation. He could have told her to drop the soap thing, and she probably would have. Jeanie and Jack didn't have a problem, but Arianna certainly would have if he'd gone to her home to retrieve the sweets.

Arianna, the youngest of her siblings, was sensitive and fiercely protective of her adopted father. She was also, along with the rest of the native northerners, deeply distrustful of the military and anyone else from the capital. The siblings agreed long ago that, when it came to their adopted father, all three of them had to agree, or it couldn't happen. She would never have allowed August to bring Kiya to the farm, and he would have—should have—respected that.

But Kiya needed to see.

See what, exactly?

He wasn't even sure anymore. At first it was to show her that there was more to him and the community than the thin connection of living in the same town. A part of him, too, wanted her to see how easily people would abandon their so-called family when circumstances got too difficult. That the people they should trust the most would leave at the drop of a hat.

A not-so-subtle message that her comrades in the Monster Corps would turn on her the moment they found out she had been cursed.

This wasn't the first time someone had been in denial about their new fate as a werewolf. Hadyn always hated these ones. According to him, these newly bitten always had a higher chance of becoming rogues than anyone else.

To bring them around to accepting the truth and opening their minds to joining the pack meant he had to systematically break down the trust they had in their old support system. He had to dig into their lives and shine a light into the deepest, darkest secrets of their family, their friends, and everything else they knew and held dear. And then he had to successfully rebuild that trust in a different way. Bring the new werewolf into a community full of werewolves, most of whom had been through the same thing.

For the first time, August fully understood the complications his brother faced when it came to new pack members. Only, in this case, he didn't have the support of the pack. He barely had the support of his alpha. He was sure that everyone would agree with Hadyn, tell him to poison Kiya, and just forget about the unwelcome soldier.

It would have been clean. Easy.

August chanced a look over his shoulder at her. Kiya was leaning back in her saddle and looking straight up into the sky. Her hold on the reins was loose, but her legs gripped the horse harder than needed for going at a slow walk. Understandable. The Friesian had snapped at her twice, and both times it had come as a complete surprise to her.

More evidence of the intense and rapid changes happening to her. Her voice and appearance were the same, for now. But horses could sense the magic building up in her system and, more significantly, they could smell it. And unlike Kipper, his stallion, Scout wasn't used to that kind of scent.

August had noticed the change as well. Four days after the bite and her scent was already dramatically different to when she first came to Silverkeep. She had been so, almost painfully, human then. Her wolf scent, though incomplete and still developing, was deceptively soft and sweet. He wondered if that was a sign that there was a gentler soul under all that armor and sarcasm.

There had been true venom in her voice when she called Henry a bastard. An ungrateful bastard. It could be nothing, and no one would disagree with her. But the choice of words felt deliberate.

Kiya looked forward again, and her pretty hazel eyes met his. Her cheeks, already rosy from the cold, flushed deeper and she quickly turned away again. "I didn't mean to come off as close-minded," she said, speaking quickly as if to make herself say it before she changed her mind. "And I didn't mean to insult the way you and the town do your business. I'm sorry."