There! A flash of pale skin disappearing around the corner at the far end.
My blood runs cold.
I break into a run, my wolf surging beneath my skin with alarm. When I round the corner, I spot her.
She’s twenty feet ahead, completely naked, moving with that same sluggish, mechanical gait I’ve seen before. Her arms hang loose at her sides, her bare feet making no sound on the stone floor. Her head tilts forward slightly, auburn hair falling around her shoulders.
“Selene!” I call out, closing the distance.
She doesn’t respond. Doesn’t even pause.
I get in front of her quickly, turning to face her, and my stomach drops.
Her eyes are open but completely unfocused, glazed over, staring straight ahead at something only she can see. Her face is slack, empty, like all the life has been drained out of her.
It’s the same look she had that night in the forest. When I found her walking toward the lake, her feet bloody and torn.
The memory explodes in my mind with brutal clarity. The way she moved then—mechanically, unaware, completely unreachable. How she didn’t respond to my voice, didn’t even seem to know I was there.
Horror crawls up my spine, ice-cold and viscous.
The dirty shoes in her bathroom. The muddy footprints.
That night I found her at the lake wasn’t an isolated episode, a one-time incident. It has happened again. And again. Enough times for her to track mud through her bathroom on her bare feet, to come back with those shoes so thoroughly caked with dirt.
How many nights has she wandered outside like this while I had no idea? How many times has she walked through the forest in this trance, vulnerable and alone?
But wait—both Daciana and that healer told me Selene has been working nights at the infirmary. She changed her schedule specifically to avoid me, taking the late shifts that run from sunsettill dawn.
So, when is this happening? During the day when she should be sleeping? And if so, how has no one noticed?
My mind races through possibilities, none of them good. Whatever this is, whatever’s causing it, it has probably been going on for weeks without anyone knowing. Without me knowing.
The thought makes my wolf howl with distress. She could have been hurt. She could have walked into the lake and drowned. She could have been attacked, taken, killed—and I would never have known until it was too late.
My hands shake as I pull off my shirt and place it quickly over her head, working her arms through the sleeves. She doesn’t react to my touch, doesn’t acknowledge my presence at all. Just stands there, swaying slightly, waiting.
“Selene, wake up.” I grip her shoulders, trying to get her attention. “Come on, little wolf.”
Nothing. Her vacant stare remains fixed somewhere beyond me, seeing something I can’t.
I’m about to physically carry her back to bed when I hesitate.
I need to understand what’s causing this. Where she’s going. What’s controlling her. What the hell has been happening to my mate while I’ve been blind to all of it.
There’s only one way to find out. Instead of waking her, instead of carrying her back to safety, I make a decision.
I’m going to follow her.
I step aside, letting her continue forward. She moves past me at once, resuming that same steady, unnatural walk.
I shadow her through the corridors, my senses on high alert. She moves with unsettling certainty, as if she has walked this route countless times. When a servant nearly bumps into us, I block him with a sharp gesture and a look that sends him scurrying away.
Selene doesn’t pause. Doesn’t hesitate.
She pushes through the side entrance that leads to the gardens, stepping out into the moonlit night. The cool air doesn’t make her shiver; the stones under her bare feet don’t slow her down.
She’s heading toward the forest. The same route as before.
