UNDER THE ALPHA'S MOON

FATHER'S HOUSE

Elizabeth Wood had never liked the smell and sound of her father’s house. It was too quiet and too still like the air itself was against her

But even In the silence, she could always hear the whispers. Not the kind that came from human mouths, but the hushed murmur of people’s thoughts about her, heavy with pity or distrust and she hated it with everything in her.

They had called her the bad luck child for as long as she could remember. Born under a pale winter moon, with her mother’s dying scream as the first lullaby she’d ever heard, Elizabeth grew up carrying the weight of a tragedy she had no hand in. Her stepmother made it a point of duty to wear that story like a badge, telling it to visitors with dramatic pauses, as if she were reciting a terrifying tale. Her father never corrected her and that was what gave her the courage to do so.

Life in that house had been a silent war, one that wouldn't end anytime soon. Elizabeth did all the chores, always scrubbing the floors until her knees ached, washing laundry until her hands turned white, while her stepmother sat all day in the sitting room like a decorated doll that had no use for labor but just for decoration.

In that house, food was rationed as if she were some unwanted tenant or guest, Sometimes she went to bed hungry after cooking a full dinner because her stepmom forgot that she was still around or thought she had eaten while preparing the food as if that was allow.

The house smelled faintly of polish and boiled beans, a combination Elizabeth had grown to hate and it clung to her clothes like perfume. She stood at the kitchen sink, hands deep in soapy water, staring out into the late afternoon light that was already beginning to fade.

“Liz, Lizzz! You missed a spot on the floor.” Her stepmother’s voice cut through the silence like a cold knife. Marian was perched in the sitting room as usual, dressed in silk that shines when she moved, her hair coiled into perfect waves. She never lifted a finger in the house, not when there was Elizabeth to scrub, polish, and dust

Elizabeth said nothing, she went silently to clean the very spot that was already cleaned because in that house, silence was safer. Not long, a set of light footsteps padded across the hall. Tracy, her eleven year old half sister, peeked in with a small smile. Her hands cupped something wrapped in paper.

“Hey lovely sister,” Tracy whispered, glancing to make sure her mother wasn’t nearby. “Mama bought strawberry shortcake today. I know it's your favorite, I hid one in your room before she could see.”

Elizabeth’s heart softened. Tracy was the only ‘sane’ person in the house, the only reason she’d survived this long in this house, the only warmth in a place where she was seen as a shadow, as an outcast ,a blemish, a bad omen

But the warmth shattered when Marian’s voice snapped from the other room.

“How many times have I told you not to call her your sister? She’s no sister of yours, Tracy. You want her bad luck rubbing off on you?, I'm your mother so why don't you always listen to me? ”

Elizabeth froze at the sink, her knuckles white against the ceramic. She knew what was coming next.

“I don’t know why I wasn’t given two boys instead,” Marian continued. “At least they wouldn’t bring curses into this house.”

Tracy’s eyes darted down. She didn’t answer, didn’t dare. As soon as her mother’s footsteps faded away, she hurried forward and hugged Elizabeth tightly.

“I’m sorry,” Tracy whispered, voice trembling. “I don’t know why she doesn’t like you. But no matter what she says, you’ll always be my sister.”

Elizabeth’s throat ached with the words she didn’t say. She didn’t tell Tracy about her mother’s screams, the night she was born, how her mother had bled out in the bed before she could even hold her. In this town, superstitions clung to people like burrs. A child born under a blood moon, one whose birth came with death, was marked.

For Marian, that mark was enough to treat Elizabeth as less than a family or maybe less human, for her father, it was an excuse to withdraw into his own world of ledgers and business deals, leaving Marian to run the house unchecked.

By nightfall, the day’s chores were done. Elizabeth sat on her bed with Pinky, her golden furred dog, her only other friend in the world. Pinky had been a stray until Elizabeth found her shivering under the old bridge two winters ago. Since then, they have been inseparable.

Elizabeth ran her fingers through Pinky’s fur. “This place isn't safe neither is it hom, one day, we’ll leave this place,” she murmured. “We’ll find somewhere where the air smells fresh and feels like home instead of dust and bitterness.”

The plan formed quietly, like a seed germinating in the dark. And a week later, she was gone. No note or goodbye, not even to Tracy and It broke her heart, but if Marian knew where she’d gone, she’d find a way to drag her back.

She found a small, weathered cottage at the edge of Blackwood Forest, where the tree line curled close around the clearing like protective arms. The townsfolk said the woods were beautiful by day and cursed by night, the kind of curse you whispered about but never explained. That suited Elizabeth and Pinky just fine.

The first weeks felt like freedom, no, the first week was actually freedom, Mornings were filled with birdsong and the rustle of leaves. Afternoons were for tending the small vegetable patch, for walking to the town to buy groceries. Sometimes she planted a sapling or two near the edge of her garden, a habit she had when she moved in there.