Moon Shadow (Mount Henley Trilogy Book 1) Read online

  Finally, I had to break the silence. “What the hell was that?” I demanded.

  He smiled as a look of relief washed over his features. “Alice, everything Kulani just said and what you saw was real. I am a werewolf, and so are you. Everyone on campus is a werewolf. We are members of the largest group of werewolves on the continent and the original founders of the Great Pack.”

  “Hang on, slow down.” I held up a hand and tried to process what he was telling me. “Are you saying all of the students and teachers turn into wolves? And another thing, wouldn’t I notice if I was turning furry once a month instead of getting my period?” I blushed, suddenly embarrassed I had brought up my period. Then again, I had also just seen my teacher’s wife naked, and I blushed even deeper.

  Jack, bless him, didn’t seem to notice. Kulani answered my question. “Alice, you will turn on the first full moon after your sixteenth birthday. After that, you will turn on the three nights of the full moon that is the night just before, the night of, and the night after the full moon. It takes a long time and lots of practice to be able to shift at will. Most wolves aspire for full control, but many never achieve it. If you’re lucky and train hard, you may learn to shift between the half-moons by your senior year. Over the next few months, you will experience a heightened version of what humans call puberty. You will have a ravenous appetite, be quick to anger and defend, and feel a strong impulse to mate. It is very important to be aware of when you are thinking as your human self and when your wolf instincts are trying to take control.”

  “Oh, my God!” I couldn’t help laughing, a little maniacally actually. “Did you just say ‘mate’?’” I rolled on the dried leaves as I laughed like a madwoman.

  Kulani grinned. “Alice, Alice, relax. Here, take a sip of water.” She offered me a canteen that she must have retrieved along with her clothes. “This really isn’t a laughing matter. Werewolves mate for life. If you give in to your primal impulse, you don’t just face a walk of shame in the morning and a pregnancy scare, you risk giving yourself to another wolf for the rest of your life. It’s not like you can break up or get a divorce. It’s a bond, an instinct that will override your common sense. It is unbreakable, even by death.” She looked at Jack in a way I could hardly describe. I suddenly knew what those romance novels meant when they said her eyes smoldered. Jack stared back at her, a goofy smile played across his lips. I felt as if I’d interrupted a private moment, but I also had to know more.

  “Mate for life? That’s barbaric.”

  “Maybe.” She smiled again. “But it’s also very powerful. Besides, it’s biology, not society.”

  Jack laughed. “Just get a handle on your wolf side. That will be the most important thing for you to focus on.”

  “C’mon,” Jack said, standing up and brushing off his jeans, “I packed a little picnic. Let’s head back to the Jeep.” He turned and walked off into the woods. I had no idea where the car was, so I was quick to follow. My frantic dash through the woods hadn’t taken me too far, and we got back to the Jeep in about five minutes.

  “Guys, this is … this is crazy!” I managed to get out between bites of a PB&J. It was hard to believe I could still eat after all of the new information I needed to digest. Kulani cut a large slice of lemon poppy seed bread and passed it to me.

  “I know,” Jack said. “Just be grateful you were told before you changed.”

  “Oh no, is that what happened to you?” I hadn’t meant to ask, but he didn’t seem offended by my nosiness.

  “Yeah, actually. I was sixteen and had run away from the orphanage I was raised in. I felt so much turmoil and energy, and was angry all the time. I didn’t know what was going on with me, but I was worried I’d lose it and hurt someone. I struck out on my own, and after two weeks of hiking through the backroads, the full moon rose. I turned that night and ran through the woods until I was lost. The next morning, I woke up naked and alone. I had no idea where I was. I also didn’t know how to change on my own, or that I could, so I walked until I found civilization.

  “By the time I’d stolen a pair of jeans off of a clothes line and had dug some food out of a restaurant dumpster, I had convinced myself the whole thing was a hallucination. Maybe I’d picked the wrong mushrooms while foraging through the forest? I got lucky, though. Some kids can’t figure out how to turn back, they can go feral and cannot remember their human nature at all. It’s such a mind warp that it can literally drive you crazy. I’d gotten as far as Kamloops that first night as a wolf, from Vancouver.” He looked at me. I tried to look suitably impressed. “That’s over 350 kilometers,” he added. “Uh, around 215 miles.”

  “Holy crap!” Yeah, I need to work on those metric conversion tables.

  Kulani slipped her arm around him for a sideways hug, then shoved an apple into his hand. He grinned again and started eating the apple after tossing one to me. I nabbed it with unexpected agility and took a bite, surprised I was still hungry after the sandwiches, potato salad, lemon poppy seed bread, granola, and carrots.

  “So, um, not to be narcissistic or anything, but am I really a princess?” I couldn’t help it. I was having a Disney moment.

  “Yeah,” Jack said, almost as if he were sorry for me. I frowned. “You are. And that will cause you no end of trouble. I don’t want to freak you out, but being a bastard has some advantages. No one expects that much out of you.”

  “Jack, that’s a terrible thing to say!” Forgetting my own unbelievable parentage, I couldn’t believe he’d called himself a bastard. For a moment, I realized I was probably in shock, until the moment had passed.

  “Oh, don’t get me wrong. I just mean I can be me, you know? But you, you’re under a long shadow of royalty. There will be expectations of you. Like your husband, for example.”

  “My what now?” I didn’t like where this was going.

  “Alice, you are the rightful heiress to the throne. Once you come into your full maturity”— yup, I blushed like a beet—“there will be certain expectations.”

  “So my birth mother, Marguerite Helena,” I said, trying out the unfamiliar name, “was the werewolf queen? And my Aunt Christina is in charge now? But I’m expected to take the throne when I turn eighteen?”

  “That’s about it,” agreed Kulani.

  “Oh, that’s it, huh?” I couldn’t help the sarcasm, but Kulani didn’t take it personally.

  Jack jumped in. “Right now, the reigning queen regent is from one of oldest werewolf families in the Americas, but she’s not a royal. She married your mother’s Uncle Frederick, who died shortly after your birth.”

  “Spouses keep their family name, so she could not claim to rule as a Luna. She came to power after your father died, because you were the last remaining member of the Luna Clan and had no one to advocate for your throne,” added Kulani.

  “Without a regent to rule until you came of age,” Jack continued, “the Pack faced mutiny, especially from our foreign members. Christina Reynolds petitioned to be your legal guardian and became the first non-Luna non-royal queen regent of the Great Pack.”

  “She convinced the High Council and was granted custody,” Kulani put in, “but to add scandal to tragedy, you had disappeared, some presumed dead.”

  My head darted back and forth between them, they were so in sync. Jack continued the story, “Having already seized the throne, the queen regent initiated the largest investigation and search party in history. The story headlined the papers for months, but the Princess Luna was gone. Finally, rumors leaked that your parents had an alternative plan in motion should they die, and rumors of the missing princess became tales of the ‘Lost Princess.’”

  “Riding the wave of popular opinion, Queen Christina declared the Lost Princess missing and herself queen regent until she—well, you—were found,” finished Kulani.

  “I wonder, though, if she hoped you might never resurface. She still has yet to formally welcome you home, or make a statement to the press,” Jack added darkly. Kulani pa
tted Jack’s arm as if hinting to him not to upset me.

  “We are an old and proud species, Your Royal Highness,” she said. “We have evolved and adapted with the times, but are slow to give up our traditions and power. Werewolves used to disregard other species completely, but these modern times and technological advances make interactions with other groups and nations necessary. Yet we must still preserve our secret from the public and our legacy for the future.”

  “Politics is a whole other lecture, and of course, you will be more directly involved, but for now”—and at this, Jack knelt before me—“I swear an oath of fealty to you, Princess Alice Luna, and promise to see you restored to your throne.”

  Kulani knelt and repeated the phrase. I looked at them both, but couldn’t think of a single thing to say.

  “There will be supporters for your leadership, and those in charge may likely wish you dead.”

  “Dead?” I squeaked.

  Kulani jumped in with a stern look at Jack. “Don’t scare her, Jack. Forgive the exaggeration, Alice. It’s not like they would actually attempt it.” Why did I get the feeling she was trying to convince herself as much as me? “But Queen Regent Christina won’t want to give up her power, you see. They will probably offer you a seat on the council, hoping to placate you with nominal power and wealth. The queen regent may well cross her fingers that you’ll be more of a Paris Hilton type of heiress than the Queen of Jordan kind.”

  “They? Who are ‘they,’ exactly?” I was having a hard time zeroing in on just one question, but my instincts were screaming that I was in more trouble than I knew.

  “Goodness, girl, that’s a long answer. Suffice it to say, the current queen and her supporters will want to keep control of the Clans. Those in power rarely like to give it up.”

  “Jack, Kulani, who do I trust?” I turned to them for guidance. I suddenly felt as if I’d been thrust into a nest of vipers—make that werevipers. I tried to settle my breath as my heart skipped into high gear. Puns are rarely a good sign of sanity.

  “Alice, trust us.” Jack’s golden eyes held mine and seemed to convey nothing but concern for me. “I knew your mother well and your father only very briefly, but they were kinder to me than anyone I’d ever met. Before your mother passed away, I promised her I would protect you. I promise you now, on the blood of my unknown forefathers and on the blood of your birth parents that runs through your veins. I swear fealty to you now and for life.” He flicked his fingernail across his palm and squeezed a drop of blood onto the ground between us.

  I was totally embarrassed by this impassioned speech and bizarre ritual. “Jeez, Jack, lighten up.” He smiled at me sadly. Suddenly I felt ashamed. I hadn’t meant to dishonor his loyalty.

  “Just remember what I said. You can trust us.” I got a creepy feeling he was actually saying “you can trust only us.”

  I changed the subject. “So, you knew my birth parents?” They weren’t “Mom and Dad.” I already had those. Shelving the whole wolf princess crap, I concentrated on something I wanted to know more about.

  “Yes.” Jack looked wistful. “Your parents were wonderful. We were lucky to have monarchs like them. Your mom and I met in school. She was so kind to me, when everyone else called me feral.”

  I started at that, recognizing a common thread in the bullying I myself had endured at school.

  “I admit,” he went on, “I was a little broken-hearted when she befriended your dad. But they were made for each other, and that was obvious. At their twining I met my mate, and it was all over for me. That’s when I knew True Mates were real.” He smiled at Kulani, but then shadows of a darker past flickered across his eyes as he recalled simpler days. Kulani traced the worry line across his brow until it faded. “Anyway, your mother was crowned queen shortly thereafter, and she ruled fairly for five years before she died.”

  A terrible thought struck me. “Did she die in childbirth? Did she die because of me?”

  “Alice …” Jack wanted to say “no, of course not”; I could see that in his face. But I also saw the hard line of truth in his compressed mouth. “The official story is you were born, and … and you had a brother. But the boy had a more difficult birth. He was breech and he aspirated meconium while being born. He didn’t make it, and your mother hemorrhaged and bled out before anything could be done. Your father had a difficult time and did his best to carry on after your mother’s death. He was bereft and grew paranoid about your safety. I’m sure it was his grief that prompted his decisions about your welfare in his will.”

  “When did my father die?”

  “He ruled in your stead as king regent, but was killed in a hunting accident when you were six months old.”

  I felt like there was more to the story, but I couldn’t bear to ask. Suddenly, I was grieving over a family I never knew—a father, a mother, and a baby brother who’d never taken his first breath. The heaviness of the news weighed me down.

  “I … I don’t know what to say or how to feel,” I admitted.

  Jack’s forlorn smile returned. “That’s what makes you a Luna. Honest and brave. It is an honor to serve you, Princess.”

  He had meant it seriously, but being called “Princess” was just too weird. I forced a chuckle. “Okay, Jack, I accept your fealty or whatever. But please don’t call me that.”

  He smiled back at me. “I will have to in front of others. But between us, we can just be friends.”

  “Deal,” I said gratefully, and we shook on it.

  Kulani smiled with a clap of her hands. “Well, that’s settled. Now, who wants cake?”

  * * *

  When we got back to campus, dinner was already underway. I waved goodbye to Jack and Kulani and trudged up the wide staircase to the Mezzanine, where I felt the weight of dozens of eyes turn toward me. Did everyone know?

  Determined to appear unruffled, I held my head high and made my way to the buffet. I loaded my plate full, giggling a little that I was hungry, AGAIN! Turning from the buffet, I searched the tables for Shea. She was sitting off to the right by the windows and by herself. I wondered about what Jack had said, and felt furious that she was the only person all alone in a room full of people, werepeople, whatever.

  I made my way toward her, ignoring the stares and whispers that I felt sure were directed at me as I passed.

  “Hey,” I said and sat down next to her. “How was your day?”

  She looked up at me surprised. “Umm, it was okay.” She seemed nervous for some reason.

  “Well, I should be mad at you for not warning me, but I guess I understand that you couldn’t let the cat out of the bag, or should I say wolf?”

  Shea grinned, her discomfort seemed to evaporate. “So the secret is out, huh?”

  “Yeah, but I’m not sure I get it, or completely believe it, for that matter.”

  Shea laughed. “Yeah, it’s a lot to take in. Most of the sophomores have all of freshman year and part of sophomore year to get used to the idea before they shift for the first time. Plus there are those who know what they are from birth.” She subconsciously glanced at Jillian’s table.

  “I turned last month,” she admitted, “and it was weird.”

  I laughed. “That’s the understatement of a lifetime.” We both giggled.

  While we ate lunch, Shea told me a little about her shifting experience. “We all meet up in the glen behind the training grounds at the northeast end of the foothills. The boys go elsewhere. They’re big on keeping our paws off of each other.”

  We cracked up over the pun and were wiping away tears of hilarity, when a snooty voice interrupted. “Oh, discussing bloodlines, are we? Definitely an amusing subject in your case, Shea. Alice, shouldn’t you know your place by now?” Jillian had a difficult time maintaining an upturned nose while simultaneously looking down on us.

  “What’s wrong, Jillian? That time of the month?” I quipped. When I caught Shea’s eye, we burst out laughing again, not at Jillian, but she took it that way anyway an
d stomped off.

  She sobered a little and said shyly, “You know she has a point, right? It may not be good for your royal image to hang around a Winterstone like me.” She looked down at her lap.

  “Shea, climb out of your pity soup. I pick friends on merit, not bloodline. I feel more like an outsider than you realize.” When our eyes met next, we’d reached a silent agreement and mutual accord.

  “C’mon,” said Shea, “let’s go study. I’ve got notes you can borrow from some of the afternoon classes you missed.”

  We spent a companionable evening in one of the parlors, pouring over textbooks. Since the next day was Saturday, Shea and I made plans to hang out so she could show me the rest of campus.

  I went to bed that night completely drained. I thought I would toss and turn for hours, but my head hit the pillow, and before I knew it, I heard birdsong out the windows and morning light was streaming in. I felt a little surreal as I reviewed yesterday afternoon. Earth-shattering, mind-blowing, preposterous, and exciting—I named my feelings as I scanned my inner turmoil. Then I hit on something I’d completely forgotten to freak out about; the whole life-time mate thing. Could that really be for real? Good grief! Dating was hard enough without eternal matrimony looming over every horny teenager. If I thought life was unfair before…. I had to look on the bright side, I was a freaking princess! I cackled a little and decided maybe I was still in shock. Feeling denial was as useful as any phase, I threw back the covers, determined to face the day with a smile. I had the whole day to do whatever this crazy wolf town had to offer.

  After a shower and quick bowl of cereal, I raced downstairs before I realized I didn’t know Shea’s room number. I veered off to the dining hall and was surprised to see so many people up as early as I was. I thought I was a morning person, but maybe that was also a wolfish trait? The food smelled good so I grabbed a plate and sought refuge in a friendly face. Shea was by the window with her nose in a book.