I don't sleep after the library.
The folder sits beneath my mattress, next to the notebook. Every time I close my eyes, I see flames. Every time I breathe, I smell smoke that isn't there.
Aldric opened the gate.
He watched my mother die.
He hid me with strangers and spent twenty years pretending to be loyal to the people who murdered my family.
And now he wants to help me.
Trust is a weapon, I remind myself. And he's already proven he knows how to wield it.
But the folder doesn't lie. The reports are real. The dates match. The names—witnesses, victims, survivors—align with fragments I remember from my first life. Things I overheard but never understood.
I need more information.
I need someone who isn't Aldric.
Monday morning, I find Mira in the infirmary.
She's alone—the head healer is visiting a neighboring pack. The small stone building smells of herbs and antiseptic. Bunches of dried lavender hang from the ceiling. Mortar and pestle sit on every surface.
Mira looks up when I enter, eyes wide.
"Luna Elena. I didn't expect—"
"You said you wanted to teach me about healing."
She blinks. "I… yes. I didn't think you were serious."
"I'm always serious."
She recovers quickly. Pulls out a stool, gestures for me to sit. Her hands are steady as she arranges her tools—scalpels, tweezers, vials of cloudy liquid.
"What do you want to learn first?"
"Everything."
She laughs nervously. "That might take a while."
"I have time."
The morning passes in a blur of anatomy lessons and herb identification.
Mira is a good teacher—patient, thorough, passionate. She explains how wolfsbane affects the nervous system. How silver suppresses the wolf's healing factor. How certain poisons can mimic natural death.
I listen carefully.
In my first life, I never learned any of this. I was too busy playing the perfect Luna, hosting tea parties and smiling at elders. I left the practical work to people like Mira.
That was a mistake.
"Can you teach me about antidotes?" I ask.
"Specific ones?"
"Let's start with the common poisons. The ones that look like accidents.
Mira's hands pause over her mortar. She looks at me—really looks—and I see something shift behind her eyes.
"You're not here because you're interested in healing."
"No."
"Then why?"
I choose my words carefully. "Because I want to be prepared."
"For what?"
"For the things that are coming."
She stares at me for a long moment. Then she nods slowly, like she understands something I haven't said.
"Okay," she says. "Let's start with nightshade."
The afternoon brings visitors.
A young wolf with a gash on his arm. An elderly woman with joint pain. A child who swallowed something she shouldn't have. Mira treats them all with the same gentle competence.
I watch. I learn. I help when I can—holding bandages, grinding herbs, calming frightened patients.
No one questions why the Luna is playing healer's assistant.
No one except Sera.
She appears in the doorway at three o'clock, dressed in a sundress that's too light for the season. Her eyes sweep the room, taking in the blood, the herbs, the way my sleeves are rolled up to my elbows.
"Elena." Her voice is honey over gravel. "I've been looking everywhere for you."
"I've been here."
"So I see." She steps inside, careful not to touch anything. "Since when do you play nurse?"
"Since I decided to be useful."
Mira glances between us, sensing the tension. "Luna Elena has been a great help. We've seen fifteen patients today."
"How wonderful." Sera's smile doesn't reach her eyes. "Mother wants you for dinner tonight. Both of us. She says it's been too long."
I haven't seen my birth mother since the wedding. The woman who raised me—who turned her back when I needed her most.
"I'll be there."
"Good." Sera turns to leave, then pauses. "Oh, and Elena? Kael asked about you this morning. He wondered why you weren't in the pack house."
"What did you tell him?"
"That you were probably off somewhere being boring." She laughs. "Old habits, right?"
Old habits.
She still thinks I'm the same Elena. Predictable. Transparent. Easy to manipulate.
I let her think that.
"Right," I say. "Thanks for covering for me."
She waves and disappears.
Mira waits until her footsteps fade. Then she says, quietly: "I don't trust your sister."
"Neither do I."
"Then why do you let her—"
"Because she's not the real danger." I pick up a bundle of dried lavender, breathing in the scent. "She's just a weapon. Someone else is holding the blade."
Mira doesn't ask who.
Maybe she already knows.
Dinner at my parents' house is a performance.
My mother, Elaine, has prepared a feast—roasted meat, fresh bread, three kinds of pie. My father, Marcus, carves the ham with exaggerated care, avoiding my eyes.
Sera sits across from me, playing the doting sister.
And I sit at the end of the table, watching them all, remembering how this ends.
In three years, my mother will testify against me. She'll say I was always troubled. Always jealous of Sera. Always capable of violence.
My father will nod along, silent, complicit.
They won't visit me in my cell. They won't attend my funeral.
They'll pretend I never existed.
"So, Elena," my mother says, spearing a potato. "How is married life?"
"Fine."
"Just fine?" Sera grins. "Come on, give us details. Is Kael as romantic in private as he is in public?"
I think of the empty bed. The locked study door. The way Kael looks through me like I'm made of glass.
"He's very attentive," I say.
Sera's smile flickers. She doesn't believe me. She's already started visiting his study, I realize. The affair is beginning earlier than I remember.
"Good," my mother says. "I was worried. He seemed so cold at the wedding."
"He's not cold. Just focused."
My father clears his throat. "Elena, if there's anything you need—"
"I need nothing."
The words come out sharper than I intended. My father flinches. My mother's eyebrows rise.
Sera watches me with new interest.
"I mean," I amend, "Kael provides everything. I'm very lucky."
The conversation shifts to safer topics. Neighbors. Weather. The upcoming harvest festival.
I stop listening.
I'm watching Sera's hands. The way they rest on the table, fingers curled, waiting. She's nervous about something. Excited, maybe. She keeps glancing at her phone, hidden in her lap.
When dinner ends, she excuses herself to the bathroom.
I follow.
The hallway is dark. Sera's phone screen glows beneath the bathroom door.
I press my ear to the wood.
"—yes, I know. But she's acting strange. Different." A pause. "No, I don't think she suspects. She's still the same Elena. Quiet. Stupid." Another pause. "Fine. Tomorrow night. Your study. Nine o'clock."
She hangs up.
I step back, silent, and return to the dining room before the door opens.
When Sera comes out, I'm pouring myself more wine.
"Everything okay?" I ask.
"Fine." She smiles. "Just tired."
"Me too."
We say our goodbyes. My mother hugs me like she means it. My father shakes my hand like I'm a stranger.
Sera kisses my cheek. Her lips are cold.
"See you soon, sister."
"Count on it."
I walk home through the dark.
The path between my parents' house and the pack house winds through a small forest. Moonlight filters through the trees, painting silver patterns on the ground.
I'm not afraid.
I've died once. Darkness doesn't scare me anymore.
But something moves in the shadows ahead.
I stop.
A figure steps onto the path. Male. Tall. Broad shoulders. The moonlight catches his face—
Kael.
"What are you doing out here?" he asks.
"I could ask you the same question."
He steps closer. I smell whiskey on his breath. He's been drinking.
"I went to your room," he says. "You weren't there."
"Dinner with my family."
"Ah." He nods slowly. "Sera mentioned something about that."
Sera mentioned.
Of course she did.
"I'm heading back now," I say. "You should get some sleep."
"I don't want to sleep."
He reaches for my hand. I let him take it. His fingers are warm, rough, familiar.
"I've been thinking," he says. "About us. About this marriage."
"What about it?"
"I haven't been fair to you."
No. You haven't.
"I want to try harder," he continues. "Be more present. More—"
"Kael." I pull my hand back gently. "You don't have to do this."
"Do what?"
"Pretend."
He stares at me. The moonlight makes his eyes look almost soft.
"I'm not pretending."
Yes, you are.
But I don't say that. I don't tell him I know about Sera. I don't tell him about the affair that hasn't started yet. I don't tell him about the execution waiting in three years.
I just smile.
"Okay," I say. "Try harder."
He looks relieved. He reaches for me again, pulls me close. His arms wrap around my waist. His forehead presses against mine.
"This feels right," he whispers.
No, I think. It feels like goodbye.
But I let him hold me.
Because the game has just begun.
And I'm not the pawn anymore.