Luna of Rogues

Part 14 - Secrets

Well hello again. Yet another chapter done. I'll finish this by summer if it's the last thing I do.

Edit (the summer after): Suuuure, young me. I believe you.

Warning: Chapter may contain an extreme case of 'the feels'. Side effects may be uncontrollable weeping or wanting to rip out the guts of a certain character. Okay, it's not really that bad. Just ... be prepared.

The thin envelope rested on my palm, so light it was almost immaterial. I was perched on one of the higher walls in the ruins, my legs dangling over a twenty-foot drop to the courtyard. One slip, and I would be a human pancake on the stones below. It didn't bother me in the slightest.

I had been trying to work up the courage to open it for hours now, but it was only when the sun's rays claimed the horizon that I finally ripped the envelope. Inside was a single sheet of paper, dyed yellow with age. Taking a deep breath, I began to read. It took time and effort to sound out every word, but I managed it eventually. Mainly because Rhodric had written with consideration for my literacy skills.

If you're reading this, I'm dead. Well, actually, that's a bit overdramatic. You might have just found my hiding place.

I'm writing while you're eleven years old and building a tree house with my son. I fully intend to tell you everything when you turn eighteen, but there's no guarantee I'll survive that long, and I thought it best that the truth doesn't die with me.

Over the years, you may have wondered exactly why we came to your birth pack. I don't make a habit of attacking packs openly, but I didn't have much choice. See, I was looking for you.

But let me start at the beginning: when I first met Jessie (Rhys's mother), I was great friends with another mated couple. Alex and Evie Saunders. They were packlings, sadly, but the nicest I ever had the fortune to meet.

And they were your parents, Skye. And things were all fine and dandy until shit started going wrong. I won't tell the whole gruesome story now. But I will tell you how it ended.

Alex and Evie died. Jessie died. I was left mateless and friendless and half-mad with grief. Went looking for revenge, like the heartbroken youth I was, and left Rhys and Bran with their grandma, and you with your birth pack, hoping they would take care of you. I was wrong, as you know only too well. I killed their Alpha when I dropped you off, and it seems like they took it out on you. Sorry about that.

It took years to track down Jessie's killers. Even then, the worst of them escaped. He had shown an interest in you, so I attacked your pack to find you again.

Trouble was, I had no idea what you looked like. None of the pack leaders were cooperating, and there was no Lauren Saunders, which was the name your parents gave you. It looked hopeless until a tiny, black wolf attacked me to protect her friend. You were the spitting image of your mother.

At that point I couldn't read any further. I crumpled the letter in my mind, taking the time to organise my thoughts.

Rhodric had known my parents. Yes, I had suspected that. But to have it so blatantly written in front of me felt off-putting.

They were dead. It was an assumption I had made a thousand times. I just felt I should care more. They were the reason I was alive. And they meant nothing to me.

My real name was Lauren Saunders. Already, I hated it. I scratched the initials into the dusty stones. LS. It was all backwards. Not right. Not me.

Then my rogue side pushed its way to the forefront, and I was all defiance and anger. None of it was true. My name was Skye Llewellyn and I was Rhodric's daughter through and through. He wasn't dead. He was far too stubborn to die. I did my best to flatten the letter and scanned it to find my place.