“We should probably tell our instructors about this, right?” Giselle asked, eyeing the unconscious woman that lay in their dorm.

    Winter wasn’t shocked that her older sister’s first suggestion was to tell someone above them. Though they were less than a year apart in age, Giselle had always liked to play the role of the responsible one. As if she hadn’t just been partying with the rest of the new Guardians. As if she didn’t still smell of alcohol and tobacco.

    Karina had remained mostly quiet during the journey from the woods back to Pharus. Though the taller woman would have normally been too ungainly to hold, Winter was able to use her Crest to enhance her own strength and balance, making the several-mile slog manageable. That didn’t make it easy, however. Winter had been pushed to her absolute limits, weaving in and out of the city’s brick alleyways, avoiding areas that were too well-lit. If someone saw her carrying an unfamiliar woman through the streets of Pharus, things could turn ugly. Moonlight Guardian or not.

    So here she was, sweat-slick and panting, sitting on the floor of her tiny, shared dorm room, wondering just what in the name of the stars just happened.

    Winter was no Healer, but she knew basic medical procedures and protocols. Karina still had a pulse, her breathing was regular, and she had no fever. Upon inspection, none of her wounds had seemed deadly, or even extensive. Had she collapsed from sheer fatigue? That would make sense. Summoning an entire longsword using your Crest was a feat in and of itself. Doing so while severely injured was another.

    “When I felt your Pulse, I thought something dire had happened,” Giselle said offhandedly, crouching beside Karina, keeping her distance as if the black-swathed woman would bite. Giselle still wore the navy blue, studded ceremonial dress she’d donned for their graduation ceremony, making it difficult for her to crouch fully.

    “Something dire did happen,” Winter bit back, sipping from her water flask. Since her and Giselle were blood-related, the markings of their Crests were connected. That allowed them to communicate emotions back and forth at will. Unfortunately, in high-adrenaline situations, this could be triggered by accident. “I nearly got killed by that monster.”

    Giselle’s face hardened slightly at that. “I know. That was a really reckless thing you did, today. Seungwan and Sooyoung always tell us to go out into the wilderness with a partner.”

    Winter scowled. She didn’t feel like being lectured right now.

    “Regardless, I’ve never seen or studied anything like it before, in our classes,” Winter said, withholding a shiver as she recalled how close she’d come to death. “It barely had a shape. It was made entirely of mist, but there was weight to it, and it moved as fast as light. If Karina wasn’t there, I would’ve been killed.”

    Winter shivered, thinking of how helpless she’d felt beneath that monster’s grip. Completely at its mercy.

    Winter felt a rush of gratitude toward Karina.

    “If you hadn’t been with Karina to begin with, you might not have had this problem at all,” Giselle said, carefully lifting the hem of the taller girl’s shirt. The space beside Karina’s navel was marked with three claw-marks, several centimeters wide, but the cuts already had that puckered, pink look of healing wounds. “But I guess then she would’ve just died.”

    “I don’t know about that,” Winter said, shaking her head. “Though she was injured when I found her, she looked like she was healing with each second that passed. Like-”

    Giselle snorted. “Like a Fundamental Crest user? No way. She’s like… our age. Way too young to have that much mastery.”

    “Her wounds were worse before I brought her over here,” Winter said solemnly, wiping some dried blood from her forearm. “Trust me. Plus, maybe it’s a thing for people with black Crests. Have you ever seen one of those before?”

    Karina’s Crests still s over her body even as lay motionless. They seemed fitful, slithering across her well-muscled shoulders, at the sides of , dancing on the apices of her collarbones. They were the color of wet ink on a page.

    Giselle shook her head. “No. And I’ve never heard anything about them, either. But we should probably ask someone who’s smarter than us, right? Like… say, an instructor?”

    Winter sighed and, with some difficulty, stood. Her Crest was nearly depleted. Its normally vivacious thrum was now but a tickle on her skin. Her muscles were sore and noncompliant, her eyes begging her to let them shut. But sleep was a luxury that most full Moonlight Guardians rarely ever got.

    “I agree that this is way over our heads,” Winter said. “But we have to think about what’ll happen to Karina if we tell anyone about her. They’ll probably lock her up and interrogate her. Would you want to be at Joohyun’s mercy?”

    Joohyun Bae was known to be the strictest of the Pharusian Council. She ran all the legal and military aspects of the city. Logically, this often overlapped with Moonlight Guardian duties. Almost all of the recruits had been subject to Joohyun icy glare and frigid words at some time or another.

    “You don’t even know this girl,” Giselle narrowed her eyes. “She could be an assassin, for all we know. From one of the other cities.”

    That wasn’t a common occurrence - Pharus had a pretty good relationship with the other cities on this side of the