Moonfire Bride's Revenge

The ornate mirror in my assigned chambers reflected a stranger's face back at me. Sarah Mitchell, a soft-spoken omega with kind eyes, worked quietly behind me, weaving flowers into my dark hair for tonight's formal pack dinner. Her gentle hands moved with practiced ease, but I could see the fresh bandage wrapped around her left arm through the mirror's reflection.

"You don't have to do this," I said quietly, watching her wince as she reached for another white rose. "Your arm—"

"It's nothing, miss," Sarah interrupted, though her pale complexion suggested otherwise. "Just a kitchen accident. Happens all the time."

As she spoke, something flickered at the edge of my vision—a flash of memory so vivid it made me gasp. Fire. Screaming. The acrid smell of smoke and something else, something metallic and terrible. A young boy with amber eyes reaching for me, his mouth forming my name, but the sound was swallowed by chaos.

"Blake?" Sarah's concerned voice pulled me back to the present. "Are you alright? You went very pale."

I pressed my palm against my temple, trying to dispel the lingering images. "I'm fine. Just... stress, I think."

But even as I said it, I knew it was more than stress. These flashes had been coming more frequently since I'd arrived at Wild Hearth. Fragments of scenes that felt too real to be dreams, too specific to be imagination. Julian had dismissed them when I'd mentioned them yesterday, calling them anxiety-induced hallucinations brought on by the approaching ceremony.

"Perfectly normal," he'd assured me, that silver pendant of his catching the light as he leaned forward. "Your mind is simply trying to process the stress of your situation."

But nothing about this felt normal.

Sarah finished with my hair and stepped back, admiring her work. As she moved, the bandage on her arm shifted, revealing the edge of what looked like a deep, angry gash. My breath caught.

"Sarah, that wound—it looks serious. Are you sure you shouldn't see a doctor?"

She glanced down at her arm, her expression tightening. "The pack healer looked at it already. Said it would take weeks to properly close." She managed a weak smile. "Don't worry about me, miss. Tonight is about you."

Another flash hit me—gentler this time, but no less disorienting. A woman with Sarah's same soft features, but older, teaching a small girl with dark hair how to tend to injured animals. The woman's hands glowed with a strange, silvery light as she worked, and the animals' wounds closed beneath her touch like magic.

*That's impossible,* I told myself, shaking my head to clear it. *People can't heal with their hands.*

But as Sarah moved closer to adjust a flower that had come loose, I found myself reaching out instinctively. My fingers brushed against her bandaged arm, and the moment we made contact, something extraordinary happened.

Warmth flowed from my palm into her skin—not the normal warmth of human touch, but something deeper, more purposeful. Sarah gasped, her eyes widening as she stared down at her arm. Beneath my touch, I could feel something shifting, mending, knitting back together with an energy I didn't understand but somehow knew how to channel.

When I pulled my hand away, we both stared in shock. The bandage had loosened, revealing smooth, unmarked skin where moments before there had been a deep, infected gash.

"How did you—" Sarah whispered, her voice filled with awe and something that might have been fear.

Panic seized my chest. "I don't know. I didn't mean to—I don't understand what just happened."

Footsteps in the corridor outside made us both freeze. Julian's voice carried through the door as he spoke to someone—Marcus, I thought.

"Any unusual behavior?" Julian was asking.

"She's been having episodes," Marcus replied quietly. "Staring into space, muttering names we don't recognize. The Alpha thinks—"

"The Alpha doesn't need to think," Julian cut him off sharply. "Just continue monitoring her mental state. If the stress becomes too much before the ceremony..."

Their voices faded as they moved down the hallway, but the implication hung heavy in the air. Sarah and I exchanged a look of understanding—whatever had just happened between us needed to stay secret.

"Please," I whispered, grasping Sarah's newly healed arm. "Don't tell anyone about this."

Sarah nodded quickly, rewrapping the bandage to hide the evidence of my impossible healing touch. "Of course not, miss. But Blake..." She hesitated, then met my eyes with an intensity that surprised me. "What you just did—that's not something humans can do."

Before I could respond, a knock at the door interrupted us. "Blake?" Julian's voice called out. "It's time for dinner. The pack is waiting to meet their future Luna."

I smoothed my dress with trembling hands, my mind reeling with questions I couldn't answer. As Sarah opened the door and Julian stepped inside, his sharp eyes immediately scanning both our faces, I wondered how many more secrets this place would force me to confront before the night was through.