2. Cassie

Luna Sana, my mother, stared down at me. Her fleshy hands gripping the ends of her thrones arms. 

One of those hands had my sisters placed tightly on top. The room smelt of sweet violets, my sister had clearly been there for a while already.

My mother’s eyes, cold and glossy, barely looked at me. On her left stood the head of the Elders. Advisors to the Alpha. They were meant to be the wisest, most trustworthy men in the pack.

One of my first plans as Luna had been to disband them. To end the Elders judging every eighteen year old after their first shift. Deciding whether the mark branded on their skin meant they were fit to contribute to Kallio’s upper ranks.

Elder Brent's gray, cool gaze met mine, his sneer already curling upwards. I’d only told Dominic of my plan to disband the crusty bastards. Had giddily confiding my plans to Dominic contributed to this disaster? 

In silence I waited, hands clasped in front of me while the guards shut the huge wooden doors and left me at my own family's mercy.

My baby sister silently stared. 

Cool and composed, waiting for my reaction. Our matching cat-like amber eyes and glossy brown hair made us almost identical. Except right now I was ragged, red-eyed and distraught. 

We should be mourning together, except I was grieving, she was scheming. For we both know what really happened in that mine. Now she sat at my mothers side basking in my confusion.

“Cassie…” my mother began falteringly. I remained slumped on my knees, aware of how appalling I must look in this slinky black dress. Breasts straining against the corseted soft black silk, a dangerously high split.  

I’d dressed up for Dominic, not a trial. 

“Cassandra…what you have done tonight…trying to seize power this way is unforgivable.” The world ground to a halt. My lips moved with no sound, choking on the assumptions she had made.

“Mama that isn’t what happened. You must believe me-”

“Your father and Dominic are dead! You have been seen sneaking out plotting! Elder Brent raised his fears only a few days ago and now here we are!” 

Her jowls wobbled with every accusation, Elle keeping her hand on top of hers. 

Even in the middle of the night, I noticed her golden tiara was perfectly placed on the top of her bundle of brown pin-curls. Her vanity was only surpassed by Elle’s.

“What fears? I was sneaking out to see Dominic! We’re in love! You have no idea what’s happened! I was on my way to see him when Elle-”

But before I could complete my sentence Elle released my mothers hand, strode forward and slapped me across the face with venom. The cracking sound echoed around the huge room alongside my cry.

Nobody stopped her as Elle proceeded to kick and scream down at my crumpled body. “You killed Papa! Why? So you could be Luna now instead of in twenty years? What’s wrong with you Cassie! Why did you have to be so selfish!”

Winded I gasped for air as Elle grabbed my hair and yanked my face to meet hers. My training kicked in and I swiftly raised my hand to block her next slap and punch her in the nose with everything I had. 

Half a second before my fist collided she smiled. 

She planned every step of this. I’m dancing to a tune I can’t even hear. 

My punch sends her reeling, gasping and choking like I’m full of murderous intent. A sickening crunch confirmed I’d broken her nose. 

“Elle! Oh come back here, don’t hurt yourself,” my mother crooned, as she dropped my head and flung herself into my mothers arms, gasping for air with added drama. 

I dragged myself upright, adjusting my black corseted dress as properly as I could, closing the silken thigh-high split Elder Brent’s eyes were glued upon.

Elle tilted her head from our mother’s embrace and scowled. “Cassie…you're a monster. You should pay for what you have done tonight with your life. It’s the only way-”

“But no! This isn’t right! I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING! Why won’t anybody hear the truth? Father has been murdered, but not by me. Elle, you did it! It was all you!” my voice growing shrill and panicked. “Tell the truth! You know exactly what happened tonight! You know what you did! You planned it all! You’ve set me up! Why can’t anybody else see this!” 

I heard my mother take in a sharp breath. Like an idiot, I thought for a brief second she had finally seen sense and believed me over her favorite child.

“SILENCE!” Elder Brent growled. Using the heavy wooden staff he always carried he tapped the stone floor sharply. His voice remained quietly terrifying as he casually produced a notepad. 

“One of the captured men, a Harris Elkman,” consulting his notes with a squint, “confirmed his leaders met with you. You planned this event. You knew your father would be out tonight checking the perimeter. Together with Dominic you-”

“What about Elle? We look alike enough, she could have pretended to be me! Your man could have been mistaken!”

But my protests, common sense and desperation were all left ignored.

 “Luna Sana, please deliver your judgment,” Elder Brent concluded, nodding with deference to my shuddering mother who had somehow found a glass of wine to grasp in her free hand.

“I didn't do this it was all Elle-” but one swift smack across the back of my head from Elder Brent's stick sent me reeling. His hood fell down to reveal a balding, grey tufts like a plucked chicken that I might have laughed at any other time. 

My mother did not even flinch, even when I spat blood onto the orange carpet. Instead, she pinched her nose, adjusted her crown and squeezed Elle’s bloodstained hand.

“Cassie, Alpha Kallio is dead. Now, I cannot rule, my health will not allow it. But I cannot allow you to reign as Luna. Never. Not after tonight. You have betrayed us all, and to try to drag Elle into this is just…well it’s utterly disgusting.”

“Mama please,” unable to stop the flow of tears. We might not have been close, but surely she cared for me more than this?

 “But despite everything…you are still my daughter-”

“Let the Elder’s review, hear all sides-” I tried, but she silenced me with a raised hand. Elder Brent raised his stick again, ready for any further protests with his lips thinned and hungry.

“You will abdicate Cassandra. In writing. Elder Brent will prepare the text. We will blame Dominic for everything. Suggest he tried to stage a coup, took you captive. Played on your stupidly weak mind, whatever is necessary.”

“But he fell, he could still be alive! He could prove everything I’ve said if we go and find-”

“He isn't, he’s dead.” Elle replied flatly. Dead was the wrong word to use anyway. Dominic was pushed. Murdered.

“So they’ve retrieved his body, can I see it?”

“Absolutely not,” my mother snapped, her gaze darting to Elle for confirmation. 

Elder Brent and Elle nodded in agreement like my mother was some wise sage. She’s just a fool getting swindled by her favorite child. 

My wolf surged forward, making an inch of my skin tingle. Begging me to shift and flee this room before they kill me in it. Instead I stand firm. To flee is to admit guilt and I’ll be damned before I do such a thing. 

“Elle will assume the role of Luna, under my tutelage. You will live a life of repentance. One more word of defiance, another hint of resentment towards your family and I cannot promise to keep you safe.”

“But Mama…but I didn’t do anything…Elle…Elle please you’ve got to tell the truth?” 

“I am warning you Cassie! Not another word!” my mother shouted, making even Elder Brent jump, his brown robes rustling like a fat seal on a beach.

“We blame Dominic and you live! Can’t you see I’m trying to help you!” Elle added in a low, new tone I’d never heard before. The naive, babyish sister I thought I knew was just a mask. This smirking bitch was the real Elle.

“That isn’t what happened-”

“You should be thanking your sister! She came up with the idea of blaming everything on him instead of just putting your head in a noose like we should be doing!”

“But…” and my words trailed away as I began to understand the hopelessness of my situation. The more flustered I grew, the more Elle nodded in a saintly fashion.

Stood in the cavernous throne room, surrounded by orange and gold opulence my heart began to freeze over. 

In slow motion I studied my baby sister, the girl I’d shared tea parties, tents and countless wishes with. She simply tilted her head to the side and simpered. 

“I’ll never forgive you for this Cassie.” but the gleam in her eyes was one of complete enjoyment as she quietly and efficiently completed her coup. The Guards were summoned and I was taken to my room. Forbidden to leave, to speak, to do anything but rot.

After I signed the abdication Elder Brent broke my fingers with that wooden stick. His gray eyes shone, only the presence of Beta Guards stopping him going further.

“You talk. You die,” he had hissed slowly as I curled up clutching my shattered fingers.

It is almost four years to the day, remembering the sound of that stick makes me clench and stretch out my hands. 

I still don’t know why Elle has allowed me to live. Maybe it makes her victory sweeter. 

I was forced to parade outside on the second anniversary of my fathers death. Feeling every eye wishing you dead whilst Elder Brent read a sermon. The devious fucking hypocrite. 

The pack's protests calling for my death lasted weeks after.

Elle was satisfied to leave me in limbo from then on. I learned to keep my mouth shut and my body intact. This non-life has been my world for two years.

Hidden from view, despised by all, my heart barely beats. 

Apart from the one time I humiliated myself. I’ll let my mind wander to the broken fingers and nights sobbing but not then. The lowest I allowed myself to sink, abandoning every teaching from my father. When, in pure desperation, I saw a chance that was never there and tried to offer the only thing I had left.

So my heart has frozen, preserved from suffering any further pain. I have become the packhouse ghost. 

It is essential. Because not only must I survive the false blame, I must also endure my sister ruining the pack I love. 

Everything my father taught me to she is rejecting. Spending relentlessly on fashion and trinkets for herself and my idiotic, drunken mother. 

Four years is enough to show the signs of neglect. The unhappiness oozes out of the pores of the cliffs as families feel the struggle. Less money for the fearsome Kallio guards mean more for the first time in generations we are at risk of attacks. 

Elle giving Elder Brent more power has seen the men and women he defines as “unworthy” due to their unusually shaped brands leaving. Abandoning their duties and feeling ashamed of their Goddess-given wolf spirit. 

So Luna Elle declared an entire cliff face will be resculpted to change the balconies from gothic points to rounded, romantic ovals instead. Ignoring the discontent, the splits being caused. 

Still the Elders gather like vultures. Descended from wealthy mine owners, all the gold Luna Elle buys goes directly into their pockets. Of course they’re encouraging her to spend. It’s insane self-destruction. 

To stop me causing trouble, especially when she has Alpha’s and other people she wants to impress visiting, I have had a guard for the past three years. Beta Cesar.

A dark-haired grump with black hair and devilishly green eyes. Tall and strong we both know he is wasted spending his time with me when he could be a Kallio Guard.

For our first year together, he didn’t say a single word to me. When I asked him about Dominic, he reported it to Elle. 

Elder Brent then beat me unconscious. “Silver witch,” he hissed into my ear as the world turned to black.

Three years in, we have a tentative rapport. I keep quiet, he has nothing to report, we just about get along.

I keep my hair a short, curly brown mess. Elle remains a beauty. With a slightly crooked nose. She needs her charms more than ever now. She could toy with Alphas seeking to marry her before. Dangle her affection before rejecting their offers.

More than one Alpha she invited just for the excuse of hosting an extravagant ball. Dolled up and looking down on anyone trying to approach her regal beauty.

Those times are long gone.

Now the pack is in danger of sinking, she needs real help. Workers are fleeing, discontent is rising. I hear enough whispers to know how the land lies.

She needs a husband. One who can smash apart the rebellions stirring up trouble. Alpha Ayr, leader of the Volare Clan, is a specialist in violence and her first choice. 

She must be excited about this one because she has bothered to ascend the stairs up to my pitiful little chamber for a quick sneer.

“You pull any stunts while Alpha Ayr is here, no more packhouse. Prison. Where the Elders take charge of things. Understood?” 

Quiet enough for nobody else to hear, Beta Cesar lingers at the other end of the room. Pretending to look at the books he has already read a dozens of times he gives the impression of privacy.

“I won’t do a thing,” I answer flatly. “I hope he asks you to marry you straight away.” My wolf snickered at the fact I also hoped Alpha Ayr looks like a mutated, midget ogre with a missing penis. 

“That’s more like it Cassie.”

I don’t reply. Instead I lift my gaze. My baby sister. Tarted up in a corset so tight she might faint. A beacon of midnight blue tulle and chocolate curls. I let my gaze fall to her slightly crooked nose.  

Her rosy pink lips harden with annoyance before I get a sharp slap across the face.

“Fuck off into your little room now. We don’t need filth like you spoiling the Alpha’s good impression of Kallio.”