My carriage had been stopped in the middle of the road. The woman's wailing outside shattered the quiet rest I'd been trying to take.
I had just returned to the capital with the Elder Luna Queen from our pilgrimage to the Greyveil Sanctuary. I'd left the palace and was heading back to the Shadowmere Pack Estate when, right at the gates, a woman's sobbing brought my carriage to a halt.
She had a coquettish face, dressed plainly, with only a single moonstone pin in her hair, and a belly round and heavy with pup. Tears glistened in her eyes as she stared at the carriage, looking so pitiful that passing wolves had already stopped to gawk. Her scent drifted through the curtain before I saw her clearly: honeysuckle and warm milk, and beneath it a thread of something overripe, like bruised peaches left too long in the sun. My wolf stirred, uneasy, though I couldn't yet say why.
Through the curtain of the carriage, she watched me sit motionless inside and threw herself to the ground, baring her throat in desperate submission. "My Luna, please, give Celeste Thornwell a place to belong."