Page 9 of Blood Moon

Her winter lips were colder than stone, smoother than marble.

Article VII, Lost Letters from Aadan the First

My first class was located in the Stewart Academic Building of Business and Communications.

Like my decision to attend a university, my major was also a last-minute dilemma.

My love for reading and writing was robust and dreamy, but not enough for me to actually know what it was I wanted to do with it.

Likewise, I found people interesting, and humanity as a construct was an enigma I wanted to pull apart.

But I had no interest in pursuing a master’s degree, so that idea left as quickly as it came.

Bobby suggested communications. So here I was, standing in front of a multistory building, unable to make myself step inside.

“Are you going in there, too?” someone asked. It was an Asian girl with chestnut skin, shoulder-length black hair, and curtain bangs that framed her face. She wore a red fitted shirt, light blue jeans, and a pair of wedges, making her appear taller than me.

“Yeah. I have Intro to Communications. What about you?”

“Business 101 up on the third floor.”

“I’m on the second. Wanna walk together?”

Her shoulders relaxed. “Say less.”

I chuckled at her sigh of relief. “It’s nice to meet someone who finds this whole process as daunting as I do.”

“Exactly. Everyone talks about how exciting college is, but we don’t talk enough about how overwhelming it is, too.

For starters, there are too many people here,” she said as we weaved through the crowd and entered a hallway filled with fresh eyes.

There were people from all walks of life, enough to make me feel a tiny bit suffocated.

“Like, have you seen how big these buildings are? They’re massive, and old, and—”

“ Beautiful, ” I added, noting the porcelain floors.

“And a big waste of energy,” she said. “I’m anxious.

I can’t stop talking when I’m anxious.” She inhaled sharply.

“This place is nothing like my high school. There were like seventy people in my graduating class, and we had sucky lunches and air conditioners that stuck out of windows and leaked water onto the carpets, and I had a science teacher who single-handedly called me out to answer questions because he assumed I wasn’t paying attention, but the thing was, I was always paying attention, so I always got the questions right.

I think it frustrated him, but I’m happy to be out of that hellhole, and now that I look around, I can’t help but notice how nice it is, and you know what, I’m actually thankful for that and hoping I don’t have a professor that’s like my science teacher.

” Another breath. “ God. Are you from around here? I’m Naomi, by the way. ”

I’d never met anyone as anxious as Naomi, and for reasons I didn’t fully comprehend, it made me smile. I liked her a lot. “I’m Mira, and I’m from the area. What about you?”

“I’m from Illinois, an hour outside of Chicago.”

As we walked, I glanced quickly at the room numbers above the door to make sure we were going the right way. “How’d you hear about LLU?”

Naomi’s breathing eased. “I’ve had a few cousins graduate from here, and it was all they talked about.

” We approached a staircase and squeezed in between people while conversing about what her cousins studied when they attended Lakeland University, and if I had any family that graduated from here.

I didn’t. From what I knew, Rena never attended college, and Bobby attended the University of Kansas.

Upon reaching the second floor, Naomi and I parted ways. I wished her luck, and she nodded a few too many times as she wished me the same.

I entered a room with bay windows that overlooked the Campus Center, and I found a seat in a middle row as I listened to a few nearby students talk about some video they’d seen this morning.

It was a close encounter with an animal attack, a few minutes past midnight.

A group of students decided to play a game in the woods when they heard snarls of an unseen creature.

Somehow, they’d caught the sound on tape and uploaded it.

I fixed my posture, took a breath, and hoped that the animal they’d escaped from wasn’t the same one I’d seen last night.

After a few beats, a woman toward the front cleared her throat. She was willowy, dressed in shades of blue with pale blonde hair that fell in a blunt cut right at her jawline. Professor Peterson was her name, and behind her on a screen was a picture of an iceberg floating in a dark sea.

The sight of it made my stomach clench, and I picked at the hangnail on the tip of my pointer finger. I’d take anything but what that image alluded to.

Professor Peterson folded her hands together, took a step forward and said, “Icebreakers, anyone?”

I groaned, and a soft mumble slid across the room. Heads turned from side to side, and she instructed us to pair up into groups of threes and fours. After, we spent the remainder of class guessing two truths and a lie.

By the late afternoon, when my last class was over, I felt the weight of exhaustion in my shoulders and behind my eyes.

As I entered the long hall that would take me outside, a neon orange poster pinned to an announcement board caught my eye.

Someone had ripped the poster diagonally down the middle, cutting off the bolded black font that read:

BEWARE OF …

THE …

W …

I traced the ridged tear with my fingers, trying to make out what the poster was trying to warn us from. The woods, maybe? The wolf? Perhaps even a play on words for our school mascot, the Timberwolves … but why was it torn?

It was probably nothing, but all of that faded as I left the building and entered the overbearing afternoon sun.

In the rolling green grass that encased the Campus Center, a group of students scattered around as they played a game of ultimate frisbee. But leaning against a sycamore tree, basking in the sparse shade that came with it, was the boy.

Of course, it was … of course.

The air was sharp as I inhaled, and I gritted my teeth.

It was obvious he was watching me, that it was only me who seemed to exist to him—even as students, faculty, and staff exited the building around me, even as they took the stairs and I remained still— only me.

But why? What was it about me that bothered him, and what in the world was his problem?

Fine. If he wanted to play this stupid game, I wanted out.

Another breath, and I headed for him, walking so quickly it should have surprised him, but it didn’t. Instead, he moved to meet me in the middle. His face was stonelike, and he opened his mouth to speak before I had a chance to.

“Mirabella, a word?” His voice was velvety smooth when he said it, and I hated how it seemed casual. As if we were friends.

“Excuse me?” I said, a stutter in my voice. How did he know my name?

We were only a foot away from each other, and he blocked the sunlight that would have otherwise blinded me.

And still, he was beautiful. Painfully beautiful.

Anyone could see that from a distance, but being this close to him felt like a sin.

Liquid gold eyes with flecks of green and brown in them.

Dark lashes and full lips. An inexplicable quality about him that left me breathless.

The nameless boy leaned in, and when he did, he smelled sweet and somehow of the earth.

I took a step back, needing space from how overwhelming and real all of this was.

I knew I spoke a big game, but I’d never had the courage to confront anyone before, never really cared enough to be this determined.

I swallowed hard, straightened my stance. “Who are you?”

Something in him changed then, a squint in his eyes as he shifted his weight. He started to say something, but stopped, looked behind him instead. I followed his gaze but couldn’t track where it landed. There were people everywhere.

Someone passed me by hastily, walking like they owned the path. I could sense a collision, but before I had the chance to move, he gently pulled me to the side, taking me off the pavement and into the grass with him.

His hand was still on my backpack when I realized what had happened, and I shoved him away.

“ Don’t, ” I hissed, but he seemed completely unbothered by my reaction, which pissed me off.

Just because he was taller and leaner and clearly looked like he worked out didn’t mean I was the opposite of that …

but really, who was I kidding? I still struggled with breath control while running, and while Bobby had a plethora of weights and workout equipment in our garage, I was never interested in any of it long enough to make an impact.

I perked up anyway. “Who are you?” I demanded, raising my voice now.

He lowered his head. “This isn’t a game, Mirabella. You shouldn’t be here.”

It’s Mira, I wanted to say, but then I blinked. “ What? What are you talking about?” I took another step back. “I don’t even know you.” I scoffed. Who was he to tell me where I didn’t belong? The audacity.

His jaw twitched, and I mentally prepared myself to fight him, even if there wasn’t a possibility I could win.

With Bobby as a father, I learned a few self-defense moves that could help me get away.

Bear claw with my hands and go for the eyes.

A chop down on his clavicle to break the bone.

A swift kick in his jewels to make him fall to his knees.

Yet, as if knowing my thoughts, he smiled, laughed bitterly.

At this, I dropped my backpack, incredibly frustrated.

I knew I didn’t have to stand here and humor him, but there was something in me that wouldn’t let me leave.

Perhaps it was that my stubbornness was in overdrive, and I couldn’t let him assume he could talk to me the way he did, that he could look at me like that with those eyes.

He was a prick, and he deserved to know.

“Why are you laughing? It’s not funny.”

He raised both of his brows and chortled before mouthing, “ Sure .”

“Dude, what the hell is your problem?”

His demeanor changed then, something feral coming on. The warnings were there, the alarm bells ricocheting inside me. Every sign pointed to how I needed to leave now, but I couldn’t walk away …

“ Problem? ” He gritted his teeth. “As if you don’t know,” he said, and I watched how he took a few steps away from me, creating distance.

“Know what? ”

He repeated himself from earlier, but this time there was a subtle dash of fear in his voice. “It isn’t safe for you here, and if you know what’s best, you’ll turn around, pack your bags, and never return. Please, ” he said, the last word sounding as if it had clawed its way out of him. “Just go.”

I was frozen. Any hope I’d once had to get answers dissipated. This person genuinely seemed like he knew me, but there was no way. It was impossible. I’d remember someone like him. “No,” was all I said.

He didn’t respond. He looked past me with caution in his eyes.

I followed his gaze again, and this time, further away, against a building in the shadows, I thought I saw someone watching us.

I ignored the tightness in my chest. “Look, I don’t know who you think you are, but you’ve got me mixed up with some other person.

And just so you’re aware, because clearly you have no home training, it’s actually fucking rude to tell someone you don’t know to leave a place they’ve earned every right to be at. ”

“Sure, keep telling yourself that.”

“Telling myself what?”

He shook his head. Almost as perplexed as me.

“God, must you be so condescending?!” I demanded.

A blink, and there was a flicker in his golden eyes. He took a pained step back as he pinched the bridge of his nose. With a deep exhale, his shoulders released. “You don’t know?” he said quietly, fiercely. Quite possibly, it was the sincerest he’d been since the moment we’d met eyes.

“Know what? ” I snapped, and then, as if I weren’t there, he walked right past me.

I held my hands up in confusion as I looked after him.

He skipped the sidewalk and cut straight across the large patch of grass where people played ultimate.

He dodged the frisbee, catching it without even looking and throwing it to the other team.

He cut past a tree, and I couldn’t help but notice how god-awfully fast he was.

He was walking, but he cleared yards like he ran.

I finally dropped my arms, confused and irritated.

What was his problem, and why was he telling me it wasn’t safe for me here?

That alone would torture me. My safety had never been an issue, ever.

Arguably, Lakeland was the safest place for me to be.

Bobby could get here in less than fifteen minutes with his patrol car if he needed to.

Worse than that, I didn’t even get his name.

He knew mine but would hardly answer any of the questions I’d had for him.

Only, the look in his eyes said it all: There was something bigger and scarier I was supposed to be afraid of, and admittedly, I was terrified to know what that something, or someone , was.