Luna Stardust's Arc

Chapter 6 of 8

Luna stayed by the stone long after the alpha's tracks faded. The feather warmed in her palm. The pups slept on inside the den, and the wind shifted cold across the pine line. She told herself the alpha would return by dusk with the younger wolf at her heel. She told herself again when dusk came and only one shape moved up the slope. The alpha came back alone. She walked stiffly, head low, and stopped at the patch of bare stone between them. In the snow beside her paws, the print she left shimmered strangely — a slick of color caught in the ice, pink and blue and gold, like the feather had melted into the ground. Luna knelt and touched it. The alpha did not look at her. She turned toward the den and lay down across the threshold, her back to the trail. Luna waited. An hour. Two. The younger wolf did not come. Near the tree line she found what she had been afraid to find — a circle of torn earth, scattered tufts of pale fur, claw marks raked deep into the frozen dirt. She picked up a single tuft. It was the color of the watching wolf's coat. Her hand closed around it and would not open again. She could not follow in the dark, not safely, not without leave. But she would not leave either. Luna walked back to the stone and built what she could. She set out every small candle from her pack and lit them one by one, a low ring of flame against the snow. The flames bent and held. Above them, drawn by the warmth or the worry, a few tiny winged shapes drifted close — no bigger than moths, their wings catching the light in soft colors. They settled on the rim of the ring and stayed. Near midnight, footsteps crunched behind her. Luna did not turn. "You shouldn't be out here alone," Lyra Thistledrift said. She crouched beside the candles and looked at the tuft of fur in Luna's fist. "That's blood on the ground back there. Not a lot. But some." She paused. "You're going to look for her." It was not a question. "At first light," Luna said. The alpha lifted her head from the den's threshold. For a long moment she watched the ring of candles, the small fairies, the woman who had not left. Then she rose, crossed the snow, and lay down again — this time beside Luna, facing the dark trail. Permission, given without a sound. The night was not over. But Luna would not wait it out alone, and when the sun came up, she would not be going in blind.