Tangled in Moonlight: Unshifted - Chapter 470

Chapter 470: Ava: Old Friend
He’s surrounded by bristling wolves and one very angry Alpha, yet the golden-haired stranger doesn’t so much as blink. He stands with the kind of preternatural stillness that’ll make your skin crawl—hands clasped elegantly behind his back, expression placid as a frozen lake.

His suit remains impossibly pristine despite the mud and snow around us, not a single hair out of place.

Lucas’s body is tense, radiating alpha dominance. “Who the hell are you?”

If I don’t intervene…

“It’s fine,” I say quickly, shoving my way to his side and placing my hand on his forearm. The muscles there are coiled tight and hard. “He’s a friend.”

It might be stretching the definition of ‘friend’ to its breaking point, but now’s not the time for semantics. The tension crackling through the air is thick enough to choke on, and my bodyguards are ready to kill.

Which… I would hate to admit it, but I don’t think they’d win.

I step forward, carefully positioning my body between Lucas and our unexpected visitor. “Wow. Long time, yeah?”

Acarus inclines his head, just a fraction, his unsettling blue eyes never leaving mine. “My mother sent me.”

As expected.

Lucas’s growl vibrates through the cold air. Several wolves shift their stances, hands tightening on weapons.

“He’s Sister Miriam’s son,” I explain, keeping my voice deliberately calm. “He helped me, Marcus, and Vanessa during the Fae Ward.”

Lucas doesn’t relax exactly, but he steps back slightly, though his body language remains rigid with distrust. I get it. Acarus lacks any discernible scent—just a clean absence where something should be. For creatures who navigate the world primarily through smell, he must read like a walking void.

Eleanor, clutching her journal to her chest like a shield, breaks the standoff. She steps closer, her head tilted with curiosity, glasses sliding down her freckled nose. “Your magical signature is strange,” she says, pushing her glasses up. “What exactly are you?”

Acarus regards her with a cool frown, looking her over with a hint of disdain. Silence lingers, until she shifts her weight and loses the eye contact.

“I’m under no obligation to speak with you,” he finally says, sounding impossibly cool.

The dismissal is polite, but absolute. He turns back to me without giving Eleanor a second glance, and her cheeks flush pink. I feel a twinge of sympathy as she retreats, wounded by his casual rebuff.

“You’ve got it here, don’t you?” Acarus asks, his perfect posture somehow straightening even further. “The dream-eater.”

The question slices through the tension. My stomach drops. Of course he knows. Sister Miriam always seems to know everything, even though she’s never around. “Yes.”

Magister Orion, who’s been silently observing from the edge of our circle, steps forward. His massive form dwarfs even Acarus. “It’s twitching,” he rumbles. “I believe it is about to wake.”

Acarus’s eyes flick toward me, searching. “Have you been tired lately? More worn out than usual?”

The question catches me off guard. “A little bit, maybe.”

Acarus nods as if I’ve confirmed something significant. “Then you’re already out of time. You won’t be able to keep it caged.”

I bristle at that, even as fear spiders up my spine. I want to tell him we’ve managed so far, but… we haven’t. It’s been in some strange coma, and I barely subdued it. “It’s still unconscious. We have wards on it.”

“Not for much longer.” There’s no gloating in his tone, just cold certainty as he gives the Magister a polite nod. “We made it. We must unmake it.”

The Fae inclines his head.

I’m not sure I could defeat it a second time if it broke free. And if it’s feeding on me somehow, drawing energy while contained… I shiver. Scary I wasn’t even able to notice it.

“So why now?” I ask, changing tack. “Why have you and your mother been gone so long?”

Acarus runs a hand through his hair—the most human gesture I’ve seen from him—and glances at the encampment behind us. Our little refugee camp and new, temporary-but-feeling-pretty-permanent home.

“There are a lot of pieces in motion,” he says carefully. “My mother can’t risk her position for a few wolves.” Then, after a beat: “No offense, sweet Luna witch.”

“None taken,” I respond dryly.

Lucas, however, clearly takes some. His jaw clenches hard enough to hear the grinding of his teeth.

I suck in a quick breath as I see Lisa inching forward, staring at Acarus with blatant curiosity.

He might know, Selene agrees.

“Can I speak with you privately?” I ask him. “There’s something I want to pick your brain over.”

No point in airing out Lisa’s dirty laundry for the entire encampment to hear.

Acarus inclines his head. “Let us go inside your…”

He pauses and looks the tent over with a faint frown. “Why waste your energy warding such an insecure construct?”

My eyebrows twitch. They want to draw together into a scowl, but I keep it off my face. “We’re short on buildings. The tent is fine. Come on inside. Lucas, do you want to…?”

“No.” Lucas frowns at Acarus. “You can speak with him. I will check on this dream-eater the Magister says is twitching.”

“I will escort you,” Magister Orion says courteously. “Ava, call for me if you need me.”

He, too, knows what I’m going to speak with Acarus about.

Lisa looks hopeful, and I nod in her direction, inviting her in.

Acarus follows my gaze, his expression unreadable. The look he gives Lisa is assessing, clinical, like he’s solving a complex equation.

I hope he can help us.

Inside my head, Grimoire’s voice murmurs with uncharacteristic uncertainty: He feels strangely familiar. Are we sure he’s a vampire?

Selene sighs. As sure as we can be, with Sister Miriam. He seems to be a vampire, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s more to him than that. We know he isn’t her biological child, but she hasn’t been forthcoming as to the circumstances of his birth.