The night I was born, the colour of the moon was red. It was not pink, it was not orange but a very bright red, just like a fresh wound that was bleeding and had refused to close. Though I have no memory from that night, every wolf that was alive to witness it still does. I hear it in the hushed whispers told like a warning around the fireplace. Mothers frantically pacify their children to quieten on the night when the moon stains the sky with this harsh red. Alphas tense and even the forest lulls into a soft blanket of quiet as though it stops to listen.
Legend has it that the blood moon is a rare phenomenon that only arises when the world is in need of a warning or rather, a correction. Everyone says I'm a mistake, I was never supposed to happen. That night, my mother had laboured long and hard in that tiny hut. She was the only pregnant omega at the time, and a blood moon during my birth? She knew just what it meant and she feared for both our lives. She hoped to the moon goddess that the Moon council would not come. It was a futile thought and she knew it. By now, they were probably on their way already. She begged for the moon to look away, bat least this once, but it taunted her even more, deepening to an even redder shade of red.
I made no sound when I was finally born, no cry or scream could be heard, almost like there was no life in me but my shallow and soft breath. My eyes were already opening, like I was born to observe the world around me, eyes that would always be watching. Those eyes, a mix of very odd and double colours, one crimson and the other a shade of blue like the sky on a clear day. They worried the Moon council the most. No child had ever been born with such set of eyes, never in the history of Moondale.
That night, when the Moon council would make their appearance, the wind howled and tore, bringing down the very hinges of that tiny hut. Those who witnessed it still marvel at the fact that the hut had even been able to withstand the howling of the wind and the storm. There had been seven of them, they made their entrance into the hut like they owned the very night that witnessed my birth. They were dressed in a cloak that was silvery black, under the moon, it glowed even stronger. In their wake, they left a trail of cold authority, like no one dared to even question them. They paid no attention to my mother, all they cared about was me, the anomaly.
"She is not bowing," one of them had said even while looking at me with a faint hint of disgust.
Another leaned closer. "You're right, she is not leaning towards the moon either."
By now, my mother was shaking from fear and exhaustion. Her fear was palpable, they could feel it, the could smell it.
"She is but a child" she said. "Please have mercy on her, she has done nothing wrong." If only she had known, she would have begged for herself instead of begging for me. I wish she had begged for herself.
The elder with ice cold eyes - the one whose name sends shivers down the spine of every wolf and makes them avert their gaze – had slowly tilted his head in my mother's direction, almost like he was just coming to the realization of her presence. "Exactly that," he had answered with such calm, "that is the problem."
They had dragged her outside that night, beneath the Blood moon, as a witness. Oh my mother had put up a good fight, she had screamed, cried begged for them to take her instead. All these while she clung to me desperately. They had spared me just like she wanted. Her execution had been swift, almost like they couldn't wait to rid the pack of the one who had brought an abomination upon them. A silver blade to the throat, her blood spilled all over the earth while the moon had watched on, not even blinking for a single second.
When they recount these story to future generations, even to children as bed time stories or tales under the moon around the fire place, they would speak so glowingly of how deserving of death I had been, but they had spared me mercy. Only the seven elders from that night know the real truth.
The silver blade had been meant for my throat as it had been for my mother's, but it never fell. It had trembled, it had stopped midway and then shattered into a thousand pieces like glass. The moon had surged violent, angry and very much alive. Wolves had been thrown backwards, slammed into trees, wolves could be heard howling even from miles away. Unspeakable and unexplainable grief had gripped packs from all across the territory, bringing them to their knees in surrender.
Yet, through all the chaos, not a single cry had escaped my lips. I only breathed and the moon - ancient and distant as it was, worshipped in all her glory – went silent for me, it was a though my breath had pacifier her anger.
That night, the Moon council had learned fear. They fled for fear. The all fled, leaving me there alone on the frozen ground, my mother's blood staining the cloth I was wrapped in. I was left untouched, unharmed and unnamed. I was not supposed to, but somehow, I had survived. Of all the mistakes of the Moon council, this was perhaps the gravest.
Survival to me was not a gift, it was a skill, a gruesome brutal skill.
My life involved growing up on the edge of the maps, living and existing in places where pack law was at it's thinnest and no form of kindness could be found. I learned quickly how to adapt to my situation. I did everything I could to survive, from stealing heat from dying fires even to running with without snapping twigs. I slept light, that was the only way to survive before death would decide for me. One thing I quickly learned was that lone wolves are illegal, but I became one anyway, not like I had much of a choice.
My first shift had been the most gruesome experience, it nearly killed me. I had just clocked thirteen at the time. The moon that night was so full and so bright, in short, it had been breathtakingly beautiful, but nothing about my shift had reflected this beauty.
My bones had started breaking and then stopped midway, I felt claws tear through my palms but they never fully formed. Fur, silvery white, had ghosted my skin like a quiet promise but quickly changes it's mind. For the first time since I was born, I screamed. I had screamed not for the pain. It was because of the understanding – I was not failing to shift, there was something holding me back. After that night, silver made me remember. Every wound would leave a scar and a vision. Sometimes I would see women being dragged into ritual circles, their hands bound and power stripped from them by men in the name of law and order and balance of the pack. I wish I could tell someone, anyone – there was no one to tell.
As I grew older, so did the whispers grow. I became like a plague you would catch just by saying my name out loud. The woman who would not submit, the half shift beast, a wolf who knelt to no one. At first they came at me in pairs and then they started to hunt me in groups. Then one night, the hunts stopped altogether. I could not decide which was more unnerving, being constantly hunted or not being hunted at all. I should have known when they stopped coming after me, they were only waiting for me to slip.
And the perfect slip had presented itself on a platter. That night, I was three valleys away, my blood coming out in steady pumps, painting the snow in the same shade of red as the moon in the night I was born. That night, the pack heir had died, at the same time I was bleeding after being caught in a trap of silver I hadn't seen until it was too late. In my thoughts I had been very tired, not weak but very tired.
I remember the moon that night, full and sharp…something in the air tightened like a breath that had been held for too long, my spine had pickled, my vision blurred. Somewhere in the distance, I felt a body hit the ground and claws marked the flesh. The I felt it, a pull. It was not a command, it was not control, it just wanted my attention.
I knew then, they were going to blame me. They had taken two days to catch me. Although the wolves who had caught me could not look me in the eye, I knew it was out of superstition and not out of compassion or mercy.
I looked ahead and could see the Moon council waiting for me in the clearing. There was no need to pretend this was a trial.
"This creature is a distabilization to the order of the moon" it was the elder with the ice cold eyes speaking. "She exists out of hierarchy, outside of obedience."
It dawned on me then. They feared what they could not control. I existed outside of obedience and control, that made me a threat. I laughed then, it came out cracked and sharp, like jagged glass. They didn't fear what I could or might do, they feared that I could not be controlled. I finally understood the truth.
They had me bound in silver, prepared the execution circle beneath the cover of the moon. They had a confidence that this time, they would end me differently. How wrong they were. Pain I have learned, has a way of unlocking doors. The moment the blade cut through my flesh, the moon went crazy. She screamed, but not a loud scream. No, she screamed through every wolf who had ever had their knees bent to it. Shifts were broken, alphas all lost control and the sky, she fractured with a light that was not of this world.
I felt it then, my shift. For the first time, I did not stop halfway. My shift came fully, it was calm, it was terrifying, but it felt complete. I did not run like thy expected, I did not fall on my knees to beg. No, instead I stood tall, my ground beneath my feet. I stood as a testament of what they had tried to erase.
To later generations, they would label that night an uprising. They would label me a monster, a crack in the order that held the moon, they would whisper my name as a curse, as a warning to anyone who tries to defy the authority they had so careful crafted.
Through it all, as I stood tall in the wreckage of their certainty, one truth rang clear through my mind, even clearer that the howls that were now being torn from my chest:
I was never a curse and I was never cursed. No, in stead of a curse, I was corrected and made a correction for all to see.
Deep inside of me I was convinced that this, this was only the beginning.