“Rogues,” she says, the word clipped. “They tore the pack apart. Him with it. I ran. Took you and made sure no one knew what you were. Or what you could be.”
I release a breath I didn’t know I was holding. “So all the town-hopping? That wasn’t just paranoia. You were hiding me from an entire supernatural war.”
“From tradition,” she says bitterly. “From people who would’ve used your blood like a flag. You’re half-wolf, Maya. Half-human. You weren’t supposed to be possible, and that makes you valuable. Or dangerous. Depending on who’s judging.”
I sink into the chair across from her, brain replaying every warning she ever gave me. Every whispered bit of advice that used to feel frustrating. Now it just feels like foreshadowing I was too dense to see.
“I didn’t want this for you,” she says, eyes watery. “I wanted you to have a choice.”
“Do I still?”
She hesitates. That aloneis an answer.
I glance at her hospital tote still hooked over her shoulder. She sets it on the back of a chair, then pauses, visibly uncertain.
“Wait here,” she says quietly, and without another word, she disappears down the hallway.
I sit frozen at the kitchen table, heart pounding like it’s counting down to something. A minute passes. Then another.
When she returns, she’s holding a different bag—smaller, older, the leather worn soft from years of hiding in dark closets or travel boxes. It’s the kind of satchel people keep not because it holds things, but because it holds memories.
She sets it down gently on the table between us, her fingers lingering on the flap like she's not quite ready to open it.
I know whatever’s inside that bag, answers, photos, maybe pieces of a life I never got to live, it’s the truth I’ve been denied my entire life.
She opens it with reverent fingers and slides out a photograph. A man and woman, smiling at each other like they already knew the ending would be tragic but were in it anyway. He’s got dark curls and warm eyes, built like every storybook protector I ever imagined but never believed was real.
“That’s your father,” Mom whispers.
He looks kind. And strong. Like someone who made people feel safe just by walking into a room.
Mom pulls out a necklace next—a silver crescent moon tangled with a carved paw print.
I touch it, and something in me thrums. Familiar. Electric.
“It was his,” Mom says, voice soft. “Now it’s yours.”
The pendant is warm against my palm, like it remembers who it belonged to. Like some part of him is still here, stitched into the metal.
My throat tightens. “He knew?” I ask. “That I might...shift?”
“He hoped,” she says. “He said you’d find your way back to your wolf when you were ready.”
I swallow past the heat building behind my eyes and slide the necklace around my neck. It settles over my collarbone like it belongs there.
And maybe it does.
I don’t know what I am yet. Not really.
But I’m not running anymore.
“I have a fight coming,” I say, voice steady.
Mom frowns. “What fight?”
“There’s this girl,” I say, exhaling slowly. “Cassie. She thinks she’s the future Luna.”
Mom’s brows knit. “Luna?”
