The forest was breathing.
Virella felt it in her bones as she stepped deeper beneath the canopy of moonlight and shadow. Each tree whispered her name. The wind curled around her like a ghost. The pulse in her neck thudded louder than thunder.
The pull was irresistible.
She wasn't alone out here.
Alaric watched from a distance, standing just outside the circle of stone ruins. Rian was beside him, arms folded, tense.
"She's shifting tonight," Rian murmured.
"She has to," Alaric said, voice low. "Or it'll tear her apart."
"What if she loses control?"
"I'll bring her back."
Rian gave him a sidelong glance. "You sure? Because the last one who shifted under a blood moon almost killed you."
Alaric didn't answer.
He remembered too well.
---
Virella dropped to her knees. Her breath hitched. Pain crawled across her skin like fire ants. Her bones shifted beneath muscle, and her teeth sharpened as the transformation began.
Her scream echoed through the woods like a battle cry.
Something was trying to claw its way out of her.
Memories she didn't know she had flooded her mind—running through forests on four legs, howling at stars, drinking blood under eclipses. And beneath it all, two voices.
One whispering control.
The other demanding freedom.
Then it came—flesh bending, fur sprouting, bones cracking, her body consumed by the shift.
---
From the trees, Callum watched too. He was supposed to stay away. Rian had warned him.
But he couldn't.
He'd seen this kind of shift before. Not from a hybrid—but from something far more ancient. And far more wild.
"She's not like him," he whispered.
Lucien's voice came from behind him. "No. She's stronger."
Callum turned, startled. "You're following her now?"
"I follow the power," Lucien said, eyes gleaming. "And she has more than Alaric ever did."
"You touch her," Callum warned, "and I will kill you."
Lucien chuckled. "So protective. You know, if I didn't know better, I'd say you're in love with her."
Callum stepped closer, fists clenched. "And if I didn't know better, I'd say you're scared of what she'll become."
Lucien's smile faltered.
Neither of them moved as a deep growl rippled through the forest.
---
Virella emerged from the trees moments later, her form only partially shifted—golden eyes glowing, claws extended, fangs glistening, her skin steaming from the change. Not fully wolf. Not fully vampire.
But undeniably hybrid.
She was magnificent.
And dangerous.
"Virella," Alaric said, stepping into her path carefully. "You're in control. You're stronger than the change."
Her breath came in short, hungry pants. Her claws twitched.
Then she looked up at him—and recognition flickered in her eyes.
"You—" she said, her voice a rasp. "You did this to me."
Alaric nodded. "Yes. And I'll never regret it."
She surged forward. For a moment, Rian lunged to intercept her—but Alaric raised a hand.
Virella collided with him, knocking him to the ground—her clawed hand against his throat. But she didn't kill him.
She wept.
"I feel everything," she whispered. "All at once. Hunger. Pain. Rage. Love. It's too much."
Alaric pulled her close. "That's what it means to be what we are."
---
Later, they returned to the estate. Virella changed into clean clothes and stared at herself again in the mirror. She wasn't afraid this time.
She understood.
Her power didn't define her.
Her choices did.
Varen was waiting when she came downstairs.
"You shifted," he said softly. "You're not human anymore."
She nodded. "Neither are you."
"I still remember what it was like to be his friend," Varen said. "Before all this."
"Then tell me the truth," she said. "Why did you betray Alaric?"
Varen hesitated for too long.
"I didn't betray him for me," he said finally. "I did it for you."
"That's not an answer," she said, coldly.
"He told me once… that when he turned eighteen, he'd come for you. That he'd take you from this place, from this life—and make you his equal. I was scared. Not of him. Of what you would become with him."
"And now?" she asked.
"Now I see I was right to be afraid."
---
That night, Alaric met with Rian and Callum at the edge of the graveyard near Midnight High. The fog was thicker than usual. Shadows danced like spirits.
"She's going to be stronger than both of us," Rian said.
Alaric nodded. "She already is."
Callum stepped forward. "What's the plan, Alaric? Lucien's been circling her like a hawk. Your father's moving in secret. If we wait too long—"
"I know," Alaric said.
He looked toward the sky, where stars began to vanish one by one behind dark clouds.
"We act now."
"What do you mean?" Rian asked.
"I'm summoning the ancient blood," Alaric said. "The original hybrids. The ones that haven't walked this earth in over a thousand years."
Callum's eyes widened. "You're insane. They were exiled—cursed by both vampire and werewolf kind."
"They're also the only ones who can fight my father's army."
"And what about Virella?" Rian asked. "She's just learning to shift. You want her in a war she doesn't even understand?"
Alaric's voice was quiet. But deadly.
"She deserves to know who killed her bloodline."
---
In the hidden archives beneath the estate, Virella crept through the old stone corridors with a lantern in hand. Her great-grandmother's journals had been stashed down here. She hoped they might hold answers.
What she found instead was a letter. Yellowed, sealed with black wax.
It was addressed to her. From Selene.
My dearest granddaughter…
Virella's breath caught.
She opened it.
They will lie to you about who I was. They will tell you I died in war. But the truth is simpler and far more terrible: I died because I loved a vampire. I died because I bore him a child. And that child… was the beginning of the end.
Your destiny is not written in stone. But in blood. In rage. In love.
You will be the one to break the curse. Or the one to doom us all.
----