I found myself running, trying to escape Celeste's words. My whole life had been a lie. Even my fucking hair wasn't real. And my dad knew the whole time. He'd known I wasn't half-human, that I was part Moon Witch, and yet he'd lied to me my entire life and treated me like shit the entire time.
And Celeste? She'd known my dad was a piece of shit who went back on his word, a coward who refused to actually stand up for what he believed in. She could say what she wanted about protecting me, but no one had protected me from my own family. The only time I'd ever known safety and love was with the Ophiuchus pack—and with Kaden. But he was gone, and I was left with nothing.
CHAPTER THREE
After a while, my angry rush to escape turned to a much slower trudge through the sand. I tried my best to reign in my emotions as my body physically calmed down. Even in the daytime, the sky was dark with stars glittering above. The moon illuminated the ground in front of me, and although it was no longer raining, the air was crisp, cooling the tears on my cheeks.
Soon I spotted a cluster of small buildings up ahead and headed toward them, curious to see more of this strange place. All the buildings were painted white and almost sparkled under the moonlight, with rounded corners and flat roofs. The village started at the water and then continued up a hill, reminding me of photos I had seen of Greek islands. There was a dock too, where a few sailboats bobbed on the calm waves.
As I entered the charming seaside village I was drawn toward the sound of people, and soon found myself at an outdoor market where stalls displayed handmade clothing, shoes, candles, soap, pottery, and artwork. I kept walking, and at the other end of the market, I spotted a vast array of fruit, vegetables, fish, and cheese. As I watched, I noticed shells being exchanged for fruit, and at the next stall over, a woman passed over a bolt of beautiful fabric for a collection of candles. Most of the people I saw were women with that ageless quality, though some looked on the older side, and none looked younger than me. Each wore a similar dress to mine in a pale color, while the few men I saw wore loose shirts and trousers. Once again I was struck with the feeling of being caught in a mishmash of time periods.
Everyone turned to look at me as I passed, and the entire market went quiet. It was as if a pocket of silence followed me around, and I felt the prickle of everyone's gazes at the back of my neck. I guessed that since they lived out of the continuance of time, they didn't get many visitors. At least they all smiled at me or nodded politely when I met their eyes, so I didn't sense any hostility at my presence—only curiosity.
A lanky girl with pale blond hair broke away from the crowd and started toward me with a big smile, and I blinked at the sight of the first kid I'd seen in the village. "Ayla!" she called out. "You're finally here! What happened to your hair?"
My mouth fell open as I tried to make sense of her strange comments. "I'm sorry. Do I know you?"
“I'm Larkin,” she said, her voice bright. As she smiled, I noticed a patch of freckles across her nose and cheeks that only made her even cuter. “I'm your cousin."
I stared at her. “My cousin?"
"Yes, my mother was Celeste's sister." She took my arm and led me to the side of the market, under a tree where we could talk quietly without the crowd moving around us.
"Was?" I asked softly, still reeling from the news that I had a cousin. I stared at her, trying to see anything of myself in her features.
Larkin's smile fell. “She was killed by Sun Witches when I was ten, along with my father."
"I'm so sorry. That must have been terrible."
"Thanks. It was a long time ago, but you never really get over that sort of thing." She paused before adding, "Aunt Celeste saved me and brought me to Lunatera. After I finished my magical training, I tried to go back to Earth as much as possible to keep aging, but it's dangerous there with the Sun Witches hunting us. Physically, I'm probably about twelve or thirteen, but I don't know for sure.”
I raised my eyebrows at her. "Physically?"
"I can't grow older while I'm here. I'm stuck being a child forever." Sadness filled her voice, along with a hint of bitterness.
“How old are you really?” I asked, horrified by the thought.
“Forty-two. I think. Although it's rude to ask someone their age, you know." She grinned at me to show she was kidding. "Last time I saw you was when you were a baby. Celeste brought you here briefly to meet everyone before taking you back to Earth. Now, look at you, all grown up. And with red hair too! I like it."
I shook my head, trying to wrap my brain around what she was telling me. Larkin looked like a gawky kid about to become a teenager, and yet she was old enough to be my mom. This could have been me, I thought. Stuck as a child forever.
"I'm glad you're back," she continued. "Though I've always been jealous you got to grow up on Earth. You're lucky Celeste could hide you there so you wouldn't share my fate. Trust me, it's miserable being trapped in a kid's body with an adult mind."
"Why couldn't she hide you too?"
"Celeste did offer to try to find me a human home, but I wanted to stay here with her. She was the only family I had left. Besides, the Sun Witches already knew what I looked like and had felt me use magic. If I'd gone back to Earth, they would have found me eventually and I would have put another family in danger."
I was starting to understand why Celeste had made the difficult choice to hide me with my father. I couldn't imagine being in Larkin's shoes, stuck as a gawky twelve-year-old for decades, unable to ever truly become an adult. No thank you. Suddenly my life with the Cancer pack didn't seem so bad anymore. At least it had turned me into the adult I was today, and made me stronger emotionally and physically. But Larkin? She would never get that sort of growth. My heart ached for her and all she had missed in life.
She took my arm again, her touch light on my skin. "Come on, let me show you around Crescent Cove. It's the main village here in Lunatera." We headed back toward the stalls and she gestured at them. “We make everything ourselves here. We have to be completely self-sustaining, since going to Earth is so difficult and dangerous for us. We have fields beyond the hills with farms, and of course, the ocean also provides for us. We don't have money, so we barter and trade instead, or just share whatever we can. We all try to look out for each other.”
I studied the market with a frown. "If there's no time here, how do you grow food? Or catch fish? Wouldn't they need to be born and grow and all that?"
Larkin shrugged. "Selene provides for us. We don't question it."
“You don't need anything from Earth?” I asked.
"We do sometimes. There will always be things we can't get here, so we take turns volunteering to go to Earth for supply runs. I volunteer as often as I can. We have a few stores we've partnered with where we can sell our handmade goods for money to buy what we need.” She gave me a wry smile. “I'm always surprised what humans will pay for a crescent-shaped pendant or a box with the moon and stars painted on it We don't even put any magic in them! I personally make bath bombs that sell like da bomb." She laughed at her own joke. "Hey, do people still say that?"