Rebirth Of The Rejected Luna Chapter 233: Silverfang Border

Tiana's POV

As the sky turned darker, I saw a small inn tucked off the road. The sign above the door was old and worn. The letters are barely readable.

I climbed off my horse and tied her to the post. I patted her gently on the neck.

“You did good,” I whispered. She let out a soft sound and leaned into my hand.

Inside, the inn was warm and quiet. A soft fire burned in the hearth. The light from lanterns flickered on the walls. Behind the front counter stood a woman with silver in her hair. She looked at me carefully, but then gave a kind smile.

“You’re out late,” she said. “Need a room?”

“Yes, please,” I replied. My voice sounded strange. Hollow.

She called for her husband who was a round man with thick eyebrows and a stained apron. They introduced themselves as Mava and Tom. They didn’t ask too many questions. Just my name and I told them it was Mara because I didn't want anyone to be wary or being too cautious just because I was a commander. I told them where I was headed which was a lie as well. I said I was going to visit a cousin who’d just had a baby. Tom joked about crying babies keeping people up at night. Mava laughed.

They gave me food after I paid the necessary bills and sorted things out. It was a meal of hot stew and a thick piece of bread. I sat by the fire, eating slowly while they talked about a merchant who had passed through last week, saying he was being chased by bandits. Tom didn’t believe it. Mava said she thought he was telling the truth.

It almost felt normal.

When I finished eating, Mava showed me to a small room upstairs. The bed was rough but clean. There was a window with thin curtains, and the moonlight came through quite easily.

I sat on the bed and pulled out the talisman from my cloak. The metal glowed faintly, and the strange runes on it shimmered. It felt alive somehow.

Who had made this?

And why exactly did Theo have it the night I was poisoned?

I kept turning it in my hands until the symbols blurred. My eyes were hurting as well as my head which was full. Sleep finally came.

*+*+*+*+*

I woke before the sun rose. I packed quickly and didn’t eat because the journey was still long. Mava gave me a small bundle—some dried fruit and a piece of sweet bread. I thanked her. She warned me to stay on the main road. Tom checked my saddle and nodded with approval.

I left quietly.

The sky was pale. The grass was wet with dew. My horse moved quickly under me, sensing my need to move.

But soon, something hit me.

How was I supposed to get to the outskirts of Beaumont City… without going through Silverfang territory?

I froze.

Silverfang. That place…

That’s where Erika had lived and been banished with the people who had thought she died in the way when in reality Carlo and Corvin were responsible.

And that’s where people knew her face.

People who might recognize me.

I stared down the road ahead of me like it had betrayed me. The trees whispered in the breeze. The leaves moved gently, speaking a language I couldn’t understand. The wind didn’t give me answers.

And now I have a new problem.

One I didn’t know how to solve.

There was no clear path to Beaumont City without passing through Silverfang. None. Not unless I was willing to take the long, dangerous mountain route through wild, ungoverned territory where rogues ruled and patrols were rare.

I tugged the reins, turning my horse around. I couldn’t go through Silverfang like this. Not with this face that belonged to Erika who was supposed to be dead.

And if Corvin ever found out I was alive... the second attempt wouldn’t fail.

I rode back toward the market area near the inn. It wasn’t a busy place like the central market in the city. It was just a few stalls set up under canvas sheets, a blacksmith’s shop, a dye vendor, and a small tailor’s cart tucked behind the baker’s hut.

I slid off my horse and tied her loosely to a post, pulling my cloak deeper over my head. I wasn’t sure what I looked like anymore.

Didn’t matter.

I made my way to the dye vendor first.

“I need blonde," I said to her. Blonde was a colour that was remembered but if it went with brown, I would still look the same as Erika.

The old woman looked at me, then at my dark hair and eyebrows. “It’ll sting,” she warned. “The strong ones always do.”

“Good,” I whispered.

I dyed my hair right there in the stall while she mixed herbs and crushed powders. It burned. Then she did my brows, brushing on the thick yellow paste-like war paint.

"Can you help me cut my hair?" I asked her. "I want something to frame my face. Cover it."

"Of course dear," she said, pulling out a stool for me. She was quick with it and when I looked in the small cracked mirror she handed me, I barely recognized myself.

Perfect.

I bought padded cloth and layered it under my tunic. Stuffed it in the sleeves and widened my waistline. I made my neck look thick with a scarf and added a faint smudge of ash under my jaw to dull my bone structure.

I looked... different.

And that was exactly what I needed to be.

By afternoon, I was riding again and finally got to the Silverfang border where the patrol stopped me.

Five guards.

Three male. Two females. All heavily armed.

“State your name and your purpose,” one of them barked.

I cleared my throat. “Talia Rook. Commander of Shadowclaw’s Third Division. I’m headed to the eastern border on assignment.”

One of the female guards stepped forward, her nose twitching. “Papers?”

I reached into my saddlebag and handed over the forged scroll Peter had once taught me to prepare.

She scanned it.

Another guard glanced at my sword. “Travelling alone?”

“I work better that way.”

He grunted.

The female still looked suspicious. “You smell... wrong.”

“I crossed through Hollow Marsh,” I lied smoothly. “Two rogue dens and a dead body. You want the scent of rot? That’s how you get it.”

“You’ll come with us. The Alpha will want to approve this himself.”

My blood ran cold.

Alpha Corvin.

Elara’s father.

My murderer.