a Lan

n't s

the wolves outside my window, howling like the moon owed them something

ever suppo

and monsters in silk suits. That meant either Dominic knew and was playing some kind of twisted psychol

rule of journalism: don't panic. Second rule: whe

er lines buzzing with watching eyes and cameras behind vintage mirrors. I slip

eyed men with family names that probably owned half the country. I counted doors

on phases, maybe. A wolf's eye. And something that looked a hell o

r wasn'

k walnut shelves soared to a ceiling dusted in gold stars. The place sme

ine. Not Dominic's handwriting either. I had memorized his sharp, controlled scr

ked i

're reading this,

mother's h

nched throu

of wolves, lunar alignments, blood sigils, and something that looked

about them,

stopped mi

she doesn'

an

the hell were you h

supposed to

through the dar

lutching the jou

e window. Late twenties, elegant, dangerous in a red ro

Domini

," she said. "The h

you

answered. "I was sup

cou

around me, her tone silk-sm

doesn't bel

stiff. "She disappeared when I was ten. Th

s private archive? Tell me, how does a broke jour

wer. She did

lread

u think you uncovered something. But you're a piec

speak, the do

d in like he

e said, voice

ok I couldn't read, part be

nd the j

w," he

s dang

w that

me and extended his

llowed, but on my term

s into a chamber carved from the earth. Torches lin

your mother s

ped wa

ha

Before she

m. "Why didn't

w it was her. Not unt

e walls were etched with symbols. On the far e

e of them,"

he was part of the old bloodlines, moon priestesses.

d m

don't smell fully human. But you're

t. Like I was a chemi

e?" I asked. "Becaus

hift," he said. "But what you are

d what about you, Do

answer w

t it, the thing no one warns you about

nec

ke my bones remembered

I said. "I don't

he said. "Which

jaw. Not soft, not

"Right now. Walk away. But if

m off, punch him, k

the only questi

pened to

. For the first ti

protecting

n I want to kn

. "Then stay, le

rnal again. I flipped to the last page and

himm

glo

burned into

r

know what

r to my roo

inic, not Cassandra, but a

nde hair, his e

smi

late, pr