Filed to story: Tangled in Moonlight Unshifted Novel by Lenaleia
It means that Ava’s connection to the elements has been strengthened, Selene explains, her voice taking on a thoughtful tone. Her experience in the realm of Lycan souls has awakened something within her, a power that was always there but lay dormant until now.
someone? What if I can’t handle it? What if it comes out of fucking nowhere and blows up an entire city or something?”
That’s why we need to find someone who can teach you, Selene replies, her voice calm and reassuring. Someone who understands the nature of your power and can help you harness it.
“But who? Who could possibly understand what I’m going through? You told me before that the magicians died out a long time ago as they turned into shifters.”
We’ll find someone, Selene assures me, her voice filled with a quiet determination. There are others out there who possess similar gifts, who have walked this path before. We just need to know where to look.
“And how the hell are we supposed to find that out?”
Her ear twitches. I have my ways.
“If you ever need me, child, simply light a candle and call my name. I’ll find you.”
My eyes snap open in the middle of a deep sleep, and my heart races, a thunderous pounding in my chest that shakes my entire body.
The dream was too real, too close to memory. Selene’s ears perk up as she lifts her head from the foot of the bed. What’s wrong, Ava?
I shake my head, eyes darting to the door. Kellan’s somewhere in the apartment, ever present, always listening. I think I know how to contact Sister Miriam. The maybevampire lady.
Selene’s blue eyes widen. How? She sits up, her full attention on me.
When she visited me before the ceremony, she said if I needed her, I should light a candle and call her name.
That she’d find me.
Tell me everything, Selene says, her voice gentle in my mind. Every detail.
I recount the memory, the cloying scent of incense, the invasive way she touched me, her cryptic words. The dread and intrigue she instilled in my mother.
Your mother fears her, Selene muses. As she should. Vampires are not to be trifled with.
But she might have answers. About what I am. What’s happening to me. She seemed to know.
Selene is quiet for a long moment. Vampires are ancient, powerful creatures with their own agendas. She may help you, but there will be a price. There always is, with their kind.
I swallow hard, a shiver running through me. I’ll be careful. I promise.
Try to sleep, Selene says, curling back up. We’ll talk more tomorrow.
I nod, sinking back against the pillows. But sleep is elusive, my mind spinning with possibilities and fears.
Sister Miriam’s red eyes follow me into my dreams, her silken voice a whispered promise. “I’ll find you.”
I toss and turn, the sheets twisting around my legs. Power pulses under my skin, a restless itch I can’t scratch.
What if she’s the key? What if she can unlock the mystery inside me, teach me to wield the elements like weapons?
But Selene’s warning lingers, a cold weight in my stomach. There will be a price. With vampires, there always is.
Shadows play across the ceiling, indifferent to my struggles. Outside, the moon is bright, almost full. Its call sings in my blood.
* * *
The days pass in a blur.
Lucas comes and goes between Blackwood and
Westwood. I don’t know the details, but I do know that the search for my parentsand Alpha Renardis heating up.
From what I’m told, they’re no closer to finding them.
But the fact that they’ve been so silent, so underground, has everyone nervous.
Jericho still runs me and Lisa ra things have changed. I’m strong ery day, but and he’s begun incorporating real selfdefense. Mainly, falling.
“You need to learn to fall,” he declares out of nofuckingwhere, popping into my field of vision like one of those winding popup toys. I manage to keep my face blank even as my heartbeat spikes for a second from the scare.
“Fall?”
The word seems to echo off the exposed brick walls of the gym, bouncing back and smacking me in the face. It’s raining outside, and he’s decided to show us a little mercy by letting us do all of our torture indoors today.
Jericho’s scarred lip curls. “Yes, Ava. Falling.”
“But I thought we were going to learn actual fighting today.”
“And how do you think you’re going to learn that without first learning how to fall?”
He has a point, I think. No, I know he has a point. But I don’t want to admit he does, so I cross my arms and scowl at him.
“I know how to fall.”
“Oh, do you now?”
He moves faster than I can track, from weathered and unimpressed to having my entire body slammed into the mat.
All the air rushes out of my lungs in the space millisecond.
of a
It takes time to relearn how to breathe after the shock.
“Get up,” he barks.
Scrambling to my feet is an effort, my tailbone throbbing with every movement.
“You call that a fall?” Jericho scoffs. “You hit the ground like a sack of potatoes. Bend your knees, tuck your chin, slap the mat with your palms.”
There’s no point in telling him that he never taught me shit before throwing me down. He’d just laugh. So I grit my teeth and nod, determined to figure it out.
He comes at me again, and I try to remember what he said. Bend the knees, tuck the chin, slap the-
My back hits the mat, and I wheeze.
“Again,” Jericho orders.
And so it goes. Over and over, he knocks me down, and over and over, I struggle to my feet. Each time, he barks out a correction. It’s always something. How I hit the ground. How I get up. How my body moves.
Every part of my body is connected into one giant bruise, and the mat becomes a nightmare I’m never going to forget. For being something foam and giving, it feels like stone when I land on it. Pretty sure my butt has left permanent imprints on it.
From the corner of my eye, I catch a glimpse of Lisa. She’s with Kellan, who’s putting her through some kind of calisthenics routine. Pushups, situps, lunges, weird walking crablike movements. It looks exhausting, but at least she’s not getting thrown around like a child’s playtoy.
Longing tugs at my heart as I watch them. What I wouldn’t give to trade places right now and free myself of my vicious tyrant overlord of a trainer. 3
But then Jericho is coming at me again, and I have to focus.
Bracing myself, I do my best to anticipate the fall, determined to do it properly.
I don’t, of course. The mat slaps the air straight out of my lungs once again as I groan in very, very real pain.
“You’re not concentrating,” Jericho growls. “Get your head in the game, Ava.”
I push myself up to my hands and knees, panting. My arms tremble with the effort, and I can feel the sweat dripping down my face. My shirt is stuck to my body, positively soaked, and I think I popped a stitch in the crotch of my leggings.
“I’m trying,” I grumble through clenched teeth.
“Not hard enough.”
He’s right, of course. As much as I hate to admit it, I know I’m not giving it my all. I’m too busy feeling sorry for myself, too busy wishing I was doing something else. Too busy hurting.
But this is important. I know it is. If I’m going to survive in this world, if I’m going to protect myself and stop needing to be rescued like some damsel in distress, I need to learn how to fight. And that starts with learning how to fall… apparently.