The Hunter's Truth

LUNA

“Say goodbye?”

My voice comes out cracked and furious at the same time. I push myself off the kitchen floor even though every muscle in my body screams at me to stay down.

Jace’s hand is still locked around mine. I use it to pull myself upright, my legs shaking beneath me.

“Goodbye to what?” I demand. “Somebody better start explaining what the hell is happening right now.”

The air changes before I hear him.

It’s subtle at first. A pressure shift. A strange heaviness settling over the kitchen, as if the room has suddenly forgotten how to breathe.

The mark on my forehead flares.

Heat shoots through me, sharp enough to make my eyes water. It has nothing to do with the fever. My entire body goes rigid.

And then something inside me reacts.

An instinct I don't understand claws its way to the surface.

Wolf.

The word isn't mine. It doesn't come from my thoughts. It feels older than that.

Wolf. Wolf. Wolf.

I turn toward the doorway before I even know why.

Orion stands there.

He's completely still, watching me with those strange, gold-touched eyes. There's something unnerving about how patient he looks.

“You're a wolf shifter, Luna.”

He says it as calmly as if he's telling me what day it is.

“Your body is Awakening. The fever, the strength, the mark. None of it is a sickness. It's what you are. It's finally coming to the surface.”

“A wolf shifter?”

I let out a short laugh.

It sounds ridiculous. That's good. Ridiculous is easier than real.

“You're insane. I'm not a—”

“Luna.”

Nana Mae's voice stops me.

I look at her.

Really look at her.

And there it is.

The truth.

Not shock. Not confusion. She isn't even surprised by what Orion has said.

She's just tired.

Old grief sits in her eyes, the kind that has been carried for so many years it has practically become part of her.

“You knew.”

The words come out sharper than I mean them to.

“Nana. You knew about this?”

“I knew.”

Her voice is barely above a whisper.

“Baby, I've known since before you were born.”

The betrayal hits harder than the fever.

Harder than the fire that carved itself into my forehead an hour ago.

I stare at the woman who raised me. The woman who packed my lunches, drove me to track meets, sat beside my bed when I was sick, and held my hand through every nightmare I had as a kid.

Something inside my chest cracks.

“How could you not tell me?”

“I wanted to protect you.”

Tears slip down her cheeks, but she doesn't look away.

“I thought if I never said the words out loud, maybe it would never happen. I know now that was foolish. I should have prepared you. I should have told you the truth.”

Her voice breaks.

“I'm so sorry, Luna.”

I don't know what to say.

I should probably have something. Anger. Questions. Something.

Instead, I turn toward the stranger standing in my grandmother's doorway because being furious at him feels easier.

“And you.” I point at Orion. “Who exactly are you supposed to be?”

“My name is Orion.”

He steps farther into the kitchen.

Jace immediately tightens his grip around my hand. His body shifts in front of mine without him even seeming to think about it.

Orion notices.

His gaze drops briefly to Jace's hand before returning to my face.

“I'm a Hunter,” he continues. “My gift allows me to sense new Awakenings before they happen. I guide those who survive to a place where they can learn to control what they're becoming.”

“Survive?”

The word catches in my throat.

“Yes.”

He doesn't soften it.

“Not every wolf survives an Awakening. Without guidance, the body can't handle this much power. It burns through you from the inside until there's nothing left.”

Jace's hand goes rigid around mine.

“You're saying she could die?”

Orion looks at him.

“I'm saying she will if she stays here.”

My stomach drops.

His eyes return to mine.

“You need proof. I understand that. Humans always do.”

He reaches up and pulls the collar of his shirt aside, exposing the curve of his shoulder.

I stare.

A mark is burned into his skin.

It doesn't look drawn or tattooed. It looks as though it grew there.

Two crescents surround a full moon, the entire symbol filled with a faded violet so pale it's almost silver. It looks ancient. Worn down by time.

“This is the mark every wolf carries when they Awaken,” Orion explains quietly. “For males, it appears on the shoulder. For females, the inner wrist.”

My fingers rise instinctively to my forehead.

The skin there is still tender.

“Mine isn't like that.”

“No.”

Something changes in his expression.

He looks more careful now.

Almost wary.

“Yours isn't like that at all.”

I open my mouth.

Before I can ask what he means, his eyes change.

It happens so quickly I almost miss it.

Gold spreads through his irises until there's nothing human left in them. His pupils narrow.

His fingers curl.

Then lengthen.

His nails darken into claws, sharp and unmistakable beneath the kitchen light.

I stumble backward.

Jace goes pale beside me.

He doesn't run.

Instead, he plants his feet, keeping himself between Orion and me as much as he can without letting go of my hand.

“It's all right.”

Orion's voice hasn't changed.

He's standing there with wolf-gold eyes and claws at his sides, and somehow he still sounds completely calm.

“This is only a partial shift. I won't hurt either of you.”

My heart is pounding so hard I can feel it in my throat.

I'm terrified.

I also can't stop staring.

Because beneath the fear is something else.

Curiosity.

Recognition.

A strange electric pull that makes no sense at all.

This shouldn't feel familiar.

I've never seen anything like this before.

And yet some part of me knows exactly what I'm looking at.

My body seems to understand a world my mind has never even heard of.

Orion's claws recede.

His eyes fade back to dark brown.

The ordinary shape of him settles into place again so quickly that for half a second, I wonder if I imagined the whole thing.

I didn't.

“You have to come with me, Luna.”

My stomach twists.

“Where?”

“There's an Academy. Hollowcrest.”

He watches me carefully.

“It's where wolves like you learn to survive what their bodies are going through. Without proper training, your Awakening will kill you within days.”

“Days.”

The word barely makes it out.

I look at Nana Mae.

Then Jace.

Then Orion.

A stranger in my grandmother's kitchen is telling me that my entire life is about to end one way or another.

“I can't just leave.”

My voice shakes.

“My whole life is here.”

“Your life will end here if you stay.”

He doesn't raise his voice.

He doesn't have to.

“I'm sorry. I know this isn't the choice you wanted to make. It isn't much of a choice at all.”

“She's not going anywhere without me knowing where.”

Jace's voice cuts through the room.

He steps forward.

“You expect me to just let her walk out that door with you?”

Orion looks at him for a long moment.

“You should say your goodbyes.”

His gaze moves toward the door.

“I'll wait outside. Take what time you have.”

Then he turns and disappears into the darkness beyond the doorway.

The door closes behind him.

The kitchen goes silent.

For a few seconds, nobody moves.

Then Nana Mae crosses the room.

She pulls me into her arms, and I let her.

All the anger I had left drains out of me the second I feel her against me.

She smells like flour and lavender.

Exactly the way she always has.

The same smell I've known since I was little.

“Your mama told me this day would come.”

Her voice breaks against my hair.

“I just hoped it wouldn't. I hoped so hard, baby.”

Her arms tighten around me.

“I wanted you to stay a girl who runs track and steals fries and worries about boring things like prom and college essays. I wanted that for you so bad.”

“Nana.”

My voice breaks.

The anger is gone now.

There's nothing left but fear and grief, tangled together so tightly I can't separate them.

“I don't want to go.”

“I know.”

She pulls back and cups my face in both hands.

Her thumbs brush gently over the mark on my forehead.

“You have to.”

Tears fill her eyes again.

“And I need you to know something. Whatever happens out there, whatever you become, you're still my girl. You hear me?”

I nod.

“Still mine.”

I try to speak.

Nothing comes out.

So I let her pull me against her again.

She holds on tightly, as if she can somehow fit seventeen years of loving me into these last few minutes.