Elora’s POV
“Don’t just stand there.
Come on.” Hazel seized my arm and towed me into the crush of bodies on the dance floor.
I fumbled at the hem of my dress, nearly tripping over my own heels.
“You sure I look okay?” I half-shouted over the music.
She snagged two drinks off a passing tray and pressed one into my hand.
“Of course you do.
You look hot.” She had to yell it.
I sighed, not buying it, my eyes sweeping the crowd.
I didn’t feel hot.
I felt like a fraud in borrowed clothes.
Every other girl here glowed because she believed she did.
Hazel looped her arms around my neck and swayed, forcing my hips to follow.
“There you go!”
I gave her a small, reluctant smirk.
A laugh cracked across the music—loud, theatrical, unmistakable.
I turned toward it, and there she was.
The roommate who haunted our dorm like a rumor.
Sabrina.
She stood with Varek, Declan, and Chloe.
Something twisted low in my stomach the moment my eyes found the prince.
Sabrina said something and laid her hand on the sleeve of his leather jacket.
He didn’t so much as blink.
His face was the same slab of ice it had been in the restroom.
The first time I’d seen him, his hair had hung loose to his shoulders.
Tonight it was scraped back into a bun.
Cold.
And, damn him, beautiful.
That was the honest summary.
Sabrina was stunning too—pink mini dress molded to her body, red hair spilling over her shoulders.
They matched.
Two beautiful, terrible people.
It wasn’t hard to see why they’d been a thing.
Why was I even looking?
I tried to tear my gaze away.
Failed.
My eyes stayed glued to them like a bad habit.
“If you’re not interested,” Hazel sang, nudging me, “stop staring at him.”
I truly wasn’t interested.
I truly didn’t care.
“I wasn’t staring.”
She gave me a flat, sarcastic look.
“Don’t bother trying to make sense of them.
Word is they do this constantly.
Break up, get back together, every other week.”
“Good for them,” I said, shrugging.
“I barely know the guy, and what I know isn’t charming.
So—don’t care.”
She arched a brow, unconvinced, and scanned the crowd.
“I can name ten guys hotter than him.
Him, for example.” She jabbed a finger at a boy walking past.
I followed her finger—and nearly choked.
My brother.
Garrett.
I gagged, physically, trying to scrub the image out of my head.
“You didn’t even see his face,” I said.
“That’s the back of his head.”
“Yeah, and?” Hazel blinked.
“Broad shoulders, dark hair, decent clothes.
That’s all the data I need.”
I laughed and let the music take me.
A few more drinks, and the knots finally loosened.
My worries.
My insecurities.
The exhausting weight of trying to belong.
For the first time in years, I was actually having fun.
Then the music died.
It cut to a squeal of feedback and the dull thud of a thumb against a microphone.
The crowd turned.
Declan stood on a small platform, grinning.
“Test, test—everyone hear me?”
The crowd roared back.
“It’s happening!” Hazel squealed.
“Welcome, everyone, to the annual Astral Festival!” Declan whipped them into a cheer and rode it.
When it faded, he leaned in.
“I could give you a long, boring speech—” he grinned, “—but we all know what you really came for.”
The crowd gasped as he drew a small bottle from his pocket and lifted it high.
Silver light swirled inside the glass, alive.
“Elora—that’s the Moon Goddess’ breath,” Hazel whispered.
“The Moon Goddess’ what?”
“Once I open this,” Declan called, “any one of you might just find your mate.
Right here.
Right now.”
The crowd surged forward, shoving to get closer.
I stayed put.
Off to the side, I caught Sabrina draping herself over Varek with a wide smile.
He rolled his eyes and peeled her off.
“Whatever happens next,” Declan went on, and I dragged my eyes back to him, “take it to the dorms.
Nobody wants to watch.
There are condoms in every building.
Let’s not make any fur babies tonight!”
Laughter rolled through the clearing.
My stomach churned.
It was all too much—mates and magic potions and fur babies.
Could we not just skip to the part where we learned something?
“Five—” Declan counted, and the crowd caught it.
“Four—three—two—one!”
He uncorked the bottle.
A cloud of silver smoke unspooled across the dance floor.
The music slammed back in, but the fog thickened, curling up over my glasses until I could barely see.
I wiped the lenses.
It only smeared.
“Hazel!”
Nothing.
“Hazel!” I called again.
Gone.
Swallowed by the fog and the bodies.
And then—worse.
My body ignited.
Heat bloomed in my cheeks and poured downward, to my chest, my core, all the way to my fingertips.
Every nerve lit.
Elysia growled inside my skull, louder than she’d ever been.
Something was happening.
Was it the glasses?
I had to get out.
I clawed through the crowd, blind, useless.
“Sorry—sorry—” I bumped bodies I couldn’t see, apologizing to shapes in the smoke.
I broke free of the dance floor, grabbed a napkin, wiped the lenses—careful, always careful, never taking them off.
The glasses weren’t the problem.
They couldn’t be.
My heart still hammered.
My skin still burned.
My fingertips still buzzed.
‘Follow,’ Elysia growled, urgent in a way she’d never been.
“Follow what?” I whispered.
A figure slipped away from the festival, into the trees.
And without deciding to, I went after him.
My legs moved on their own.
I didn’t know what was happening to me.
Worse—I wasn’t sure it was me anymore.
I was losing control, and control was the only thing I couldn’t afford to lose.
The music faded behind me as the woods swallowed us both.
The figure moved faster, and he knew I was chasing him.
I wanted to stop.
I couldn’t.
Elysia wouldn’t let me.
The pieces fell into place.
The potion.
The smoke.
Elysia clawing at the inside of my ribs.
That man ahead of me had to be my—
He stopped.
Back still to me.
I froze, gasping, and a high ringing filled my ears until the whole world narrowed to the shape of him standing in the dark.
Slowly, he turned.
My breath stopped.
Varek.
His cold eyes fixed on me, dark and dangerous, and my stomach dropped away.
He took one step closer, gaze locked on mine—then held.
Just close enough.
Just far enough to make it clear the sight of me disgusted him.
“Why are you following me?” The words came out on a growl.
I didn’t move.
My heart battered my ribs.
He knew why.
He had to feel it too—the same invisible hook that had dragged me through the trees.
“I don’t know,” I whispered.
It wasn’t the answer he wanted.
He roared, raw with frustration—
—and before I could think, he moved, impossibly fast, and slammed me back against a tree.
A yelp tore out of me, my spine lit with the impact, but I couldn’t look away from those eyes.
Angry.
Confused.
Hungry.
His face hovered inches from mine, close enough that his breath ghosted across my skin.
And there it was again.
That burning, spreading through me, sharper now, deeper, until it drowned out everything else.
I fought it.
I swear I fought it.
But the word I’d prayed to keep locked away for years slid free before I could stop it.
“Mate.”
The second it left me, Varek sucked in a sharp breath.
His eyes still blazed with fury—but his hand rose to my face.
Two fingers traced from my cheek to my lips, and when they parted, he moved them to my chin.
Like a warning.
I lead.
You follow.
How could someone I hated this much light something this powerful inside me?
He leaned in until his lips were a breath from mine.
His gaze softened—confused, searching—and for one suspended second I was certain he’d kiss me.
I should have been terrified.
I should have pulled away.
I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
Neither could he.
The only sound was our breathing, ragged, filling the narrow dark between us—and then he kissed me.
Rough.
Desperate.
Like he needed to prove this was the first and last time it would ever happen.
His hands seized my waist and hauled me into him, and I melted.
I gasped into his mouth.
His hands moved, his tongue found mine, and the kiss went deep and drowning.
Without thinking I grabbed the collar of his leather jacket and held on like I’d fall through the earth if I let go.
I didn’t want to let go.
Varek growled low and pressed me harder into the bark.
His mouth on mine erased everything—the fog, the fear, the fact that I hated him.
I lost myself in him.
Elysia went quiet at last.
Then he tore away.
Eyes shut, forehead against mine, both of us dragging in air.
My first kiss.
What the hell just happened?
His eyes snapped open, cold as ever, like reality had yanked him back by the collar.
He gripped my chin and forced my gaze to his—and before I could speak, his lip curled.
“You,” he spat, like the word tasted foul, “are a pathetic, low-rank puppy.”
My heart cracked straight down the middle.
The fire from the kiss guttered out.
My head cleared.
Our first meeting had already written the ending—he hated me, I hated him, and one stupid potion couldn’t rewrite that.
“You are no mate of mine.” He tightened his grip until I winced.
“Never.”
Then he turned and walked away, and left me alone in the dark with the taste of him still on my mouth.