Mira's POV
Mira packed in seven minutes.
There wasn't much to pack. The journal. Her mother's necklace, still unclasped, tucked into her jacket pocket. A change of clothes. The small amount of cash she had left, not enough for much, but enough for buses.
She didn't look back at the apartment when she left.
There was nothing left to look back at.
The first bus took her out of the city. The second took her deeper into countryside she'd never seen flat land giving way to dark hills covered in trees so thick they swallowed the light. The third bus was different.
The driver was an older man with nervous hands. He kept glancing at her in the mirror like she made him uncomfortable.
When Mira told him where she needed to go, he stopped the bus.
Completely stopped. Engine off. Hands gripping the wheel like it had done something wrong.
I don't go past Miller's Ridge, he said. His voice was tight. Controlled. The way someone sounds when they're trying not to be afraid.
Why not?
He turned to look at her. Really look. And for a second, something crossed his face that Mira couldn't name, recognition, maybe. Or pity.
Devil dogs, he said quietly. In those woods. People who go in don't always come back out.
He wasn't joking. Mira could tell by the way his knuckles had gone white.
She got off at the Ridge anyway.
The hike was brutal.
The trail her mother's journal described wasn't really a trail at all, just coordinates and landmarks scribbled in careful handwriting. Left at the split rock. Follow the stream until it stops. When the trees go quiet, you're close.
The trees went quiet almost immediately.
No birds. No wind. Just Mira's footsteps and the sound of her own breathing, too loud in a forest that felt like it was holding its breath.
She walked for hours. The sun moved. Her legs ached. Twice she almost turned back.
Both times, the mark on her palm stopped her.
It had been doing that since she left, pulsing gently, like a second heartbeat. But out here, in the dark of the woods, it did something new. When Mira turned the wrong way, it cooled. When she turned back, it warmed.
It was guiding her.
Her mother's voice, quiet in the back of her mind: Pay attention, baby.
Mira followed the warmth.
She reached the coordinates just before midnight.
And found nothing.
Just trees. More trees. A small clearing with dead leaves on the ground and silence pressing in from every side. No gate. No academy. No door to another world.
Mira stood there, breathing hard, and felt something crack inside her chest.
She had come all this way. Left everything. Followed a dead woman's map into the middle of nowhere based on a journal full of impossible words and a letter that had burned itself into her hand.
And there was nothing here.
She almost laughed.
Then the moon rose.
It came fast, faster than it should have. One second the sky was dark and clouded. The next, silver light poured through the trees like water, so bright it hurt to look at.
And the forest changed.
It was subtle at first. A shimmer in the air. The trees seeming to lean, not from wind, but like they were moving. Stepping aside. Making room.
The clearing opened up, wider than it had been a second ago, and there it was.
A gate.
Massive. Black stone, carved with wolves frozen mid-howl, their eyes inlaid with something that caught the moonlight and turned it silver. The gate was ancient, older than anything Mira had ever seen. It looked like it had been waiting here for a very long time.
It was also closed.
Mira stared at it. The mark on her palm flared hot, so hot it almost burned. She hissed, gripping her hand.
And the gate opened.
Not slowly. Not dramatically. It just moved, swinging inward like someone on the other side had been waiting for exactly this moment to pull.
So, said a voice behind her. You actually came.
Mira spun.
A woman stood at the edge of the clearing. Not young, not old. Dark hair streaked with silver. Eyes that looked like they'd seen too much and decided to keep going anyway. She wore plain clothes, but she carried herself like someone used to being listened to.
Your mother would be horrified, the woman said. There was no smile on her face, but something warm lived behind her eyes, something that said she knew exactly how this felt. She spent twenty years making sure you'd never end up here.
Mira's stomach dropped. You knew her.
I knew her very well. The woman stepped closer. I'm Professor Elara Moonshadow. And before you ask, no I can't stop you from going through that gate. But I can tell you exactly what's waiting on the other side.
Elara's expression shifted. The warmth pulled back. What replaced it was dead serious.
Fifty candidates enter the Lunar Trials tonight. Thirty will quit before dawn. Fifteen will make it through alive. She let that land. You are completely human, Mira. No wolf. No strength. No powers. You will be the weakest thing in that arena by a very, very large margin.
Elara paused.
Most likely, you'll be slaughtered in the first hour.
The words hung between them. Mira could feel the gate open behind her, the air moving through it was colder, sharper, like breathing in a blade.
She looked at the mark on her palm. Still glowing. Still pulsing.
Then she looked at Elara.
Good, Mira said. Her voice didn't shake. I'm counting on them underestimating me.
Something flickered in Elara's eyes, surprise, maybe. Or hope. She opened her mouth to say something else.
She didn't get the chance.
The howling started.
Not far away. Not distant and muffled like wolves in a nature documentary. It came from everywhere, behind the gate, through it, around it deep and wild and hungry, and so loud it vibrated in Mira's chest like a drum.
Dozens of them. Maybe more.
Elara's face changed. The last trace of warmth vanished. What was left was something Mira hadn't seen on her yet.
Fear.
They smell you, Elara whispered. She grabbed Mira's shoulder, hard. Listen to me. Once you step through, I cannot follow. No one can help you in there.
The howling grew louder.
Elara's grip tightened.
Run or die, Mira Ashford. Her voice was barely a breath. The Trials start now.
Mira stepped through the gate.
Behind her, it slammed shut, the sound crashing through the trees like thunder, final and absolute.
Ahead of her, the dark opened up like a mouth.
And somewhere in it, something very large began to move.