The Banished Shy Luna Chapter 7

The moon had only just lifted when I made my way back toward our den; its pale light smeared the hall in silver and shadow. The day’s weight still clung to my shoulders as if someone had looped a sash of lead around me. The corridor hummed in that late-hour hush, every footstep softer than the last, until voices spilled through the crack in our door—sharp as knives and unmistakably familiar.

“…I told you to leave her alone, Lyra!” Mother snapped, each word a lash. “The more you go after Kira, the more people notice her. Do you not see it? Alpha Lucas looks at her differently now. Beta Darin. Warriors whisper. You’ve drawn their eyes to her!”

Lyra’s laugh was a thin, cruel thing. “Let them look. They always get bored. They’ll move on.”

“They aren’t bored.” Mother’s voice held teeth. “They’re curious. Hungry. Men like that don’t waste stares. If they keep staring, they’ll notice she trembles whenever they’re near. That kind of attention is dangerous.”

Heat rose in my face—not the flush of shame but a flare of anger. They spoke as though I were a thing on display, as though my fear was a costume someone else had stitched for me.

Lyra snorted. “Dangerous for me! Do you not see? She’s ruining everything. The Gathering is mine. My moment. She was never meant to be chosen.” The word chosen stabbed like a blade. “She should never have been born.”

“Ordered,” Mother corrected coldly. “Ordered, not chosen. That difference matters.” There was a slow, awful calculation under her voice now. “The Elders watch this year. If you keep clawing at her, you force them to ask questions. Pull at a thread long enough and it unravels.”

A tremor in the floorboards told me someone moved—Lyra pacing, perhaps, or Mother leaning closer, teeth bared. “I don’t care about Elders,” Lyra hissed. “I care about what’s mine. I will not stand beside her like some equal. She’s a stain and I will scrub her out.”

Mother’s answer was a hush of ice. “If she isn’t gone, you’ll ruin us both. You will have nothing while she climbs.” Her voice coiled like a trap; the mother I knew vanished and something more dangerous slid into its place. “I will speak to him,” she said at last. “I will speak to Lucas. But know this—you push too hard and you risk far more than pride. Alphas can be punished. They answer to the Elders.”

Lyra’s fury cracked like thunder. “Then make him forbid her. Make him banish her from the Gathering. Do it, Mother!”

“I will try.” Mother sounded weary, yes, but not without resolve. “I will pull strings. But be careful what you wish for.”

They fell into a brittle silence. My toes curled on the threshold, every instinct telling me to retreat into the dark and disappear. But the words—she should never have been born—still thudded against the backs of my teeth, sharp and unearned.

I forced my hand forward and pushed the door wider. The room smelled of stew left from an earlier pot, of pine and an old, damp wool that never quite left the den. Firelight leapt from the hearth and painted Mother’s cheekbone in amber. Lyra stood too close to the table, lip curled, hands clenched white-knuckled. Father was at the far side, a shadow in the heat, eyes hard as flint.

“Ah,” Mother said, her voice tipping from anger to something colder the moment she saw me. “There you are. Do you know the trouble you’ve made?” Her words were a stone thrown—small, precise, meant to bruise. “Lyra is under scrutiny because of you. If you’d done your duty, none of this—none of this would have happened.”

My throat closed. My hand hovered at the fabric of my skirt; I clutched it until the weave bit the pads of my fingers. Silence had long been my only shield. I had learned to fold into it like a bird tucking its head under its wing.

“Answer me, girl!” Mother snapped. “Are you deaf or useless?” Her voice rose, shrill and animal. The others in the den quieted, waiting for my sin to be named.

Heavier footsteps announced another arrival, and my stomach gave a small, cold lurch. Father’s face had shifted, a quiet anger building like a storm. I kept my eyes fixed on the floor. If I looked up, it would be an invitation. If I blinked, perhaps there would be more strikes.

The tension snapped in an instant. His hand cracked across my cheek before my body could brace itself. Pain exploded—hot, bright—white stars blooming at the edges of my vision. The sting burned, rippling through my jaw and into my teeth. Sound fell away for a heartbeat; the world narrowed to the scent of smoke and the bitter tang of copper.

“You made me a disgrace before Alpha Lucas!” he spat, voice ragged and raw. “You shame me. You shame this family. How dare you stand there—like a stubborn mule?”

My lips pressed together until they trembled. A scream clawed up my throat, furious and raw, but I swallowed it down until it turned to stone. I held the silence because silence was survival—because every sound might be a reason to strike again, because a word could be used against me in some arrangement of punishment I had no power to name.

Lyra’s face split into triumph as if the blow had been carved specially for her. Mother’s jaw worked, proud and satisfied.

I tasted salt in my mouth. Tears wanted to fall, but I held them back. Tears mattered to them—liquid proof of weakness to be paraded and used. No. I would not give them that.

A flash of anger that burned brighter than the fear: why should I bend and break for them? Why should their satisfaction cost me flesh?