Bitten

As her transformation continues, Vanessa is tormented by the hallucination of Celeste, who cruelly accuses her of hesitating and allowing her to die. Consumed by rage and grief, Vanessa snaps a metal bedpost off with supernatural strength and hurls it at the phantom. This emotional eruption completes her transformation into a wolf. Now fully transformed and driven by a powerful desire for revenge, she smashes through the steel door, intent on finding and killing the monsters responsible for Celeste’s death.

In wolf form, Vanessa uses her newly heightened senses to navigate the castle, following a scent she recognizes from the attack. She overhears a conversation between Lord Allard and a woman he calls his queen, discussing a possible traitor within their ranks. Vanessa bursts into the throne room and confronts them, finding 12 beautiful, finely dressed werewolves who laugh at her stumbling entrance. The woman on the throne is the Wolf Queen, and beside her are a boy with burgundy eyes and the girl who attacked Celeste, whose name is Evelyn “Evie” Lee.

Fueled by the memory of Evie hurting Celeste, Vanessa prepares to attack. The queen says to “[s]tand down” once and then almost immediately encourages the fight, telling Vanessa to take her vengeance. Vanessa brutally attacks Evie. The queen stops the fight with a single word and then effortlessly lifts Vanessa by the throat, demonstrating her immense power. Vanessa sees her reflection for the first time: a large brown wolf with glowing purple eyes. The queen magically paralyzes her, forcing her to bark, before dismissing the rest of the court.

With only the Wolf Queen and her son, Sinclair “Sin” Severi, remaining, the queen explains their lineage as werewolves descended from faeries who rule over Seven Courts. As the Wolf Queen of North America, she explains that the hierarchy is determined by eye color, which reveal rank, noting that Vanessa’s purple eyes are unprecedented. To test Vanessa’s rank, the queen compels her successfully. Sin, an Alpha with red eyes, is also able to compel her. However, a kitchen servant named Anthony, who has yellow eyes, fails, proving that Vanessa outranks him.

The queen offers Vanessa a choice: join her court and train at Castle Severi or be killed. She compels Vanessa back into her agonizingly painful human form, and Sin rips down the ancient throne room fabric and throws it over her. Able to think clearly again, Vanessa asks who killed Celeste. The queen and Sin both deny any knowledge of the murder. Realizing that she will never get justice or survive on her own, Vanessa agrees to stay and swears a binding blood pact with the queen.

Sin carries the weakened Vanessa through the magical castle, explaining that they’re in Castle Severi, located in a hidden realm accessed through a portal at the Castillo de San Marcos in St. Augustine—meaning that she’s only minutes from her home. He tells her that her father, the local sheriff, knows of their existence and will be safe so long as he tells no one what he saw, which deepens Vanessa’s feeling of betrayal. Sin warns her that leaving the court isn’t an option; werewolves who become Lone Wolves eventually destroy themselves, as werewolves are powered by their packs.

He leaves her in a lavish new room. Upon seeing her reflection, with its violet eyes and streaks of purple hair, Vanessa understands that she’s no longer human. She resolves to stay, learn the court’s ways, and uncover Celeste’s killer.

A young maid named Oona Gallagher arrives to prepare Vanessa, revealing a magical hidden bathroom behind a moving painting. When Oona presents a red dress, it triggers Vanessa’s trauma. Overwhelmed, Vanessa unintentionally compels Oona to burn all the red dresses, and Oona sets the entire wardrobe on fire. The flames spread quickly until Calix bursts in, heaves the burning rug at the fire to extinguish it, and scolds Vanessa, telling her that even if she has a technical right to compel those of lower station, basic morality means that one does not compel the maids.

Vanessa recognizes Calix as one of her kidnappers. After a hostile exchange, he throws her over his shoulder and carries her deep into a cavern beneath the castle, where other werewolves are gathered around a moonlit pool. Announcing that this is “the Drowning,” he shoves her into the water.

Submerged in the magical pool, Vanessa begins to drown. Her rage and desire for vengeance for Celeste give her the strength to force her transformation into a wolf. Now powerful enough to swim, she emerges from the water. The Wolf Queen explains that this ritual, the First Rite, uses the enchanted “moon pool” to reveal a new werewolf’s destiny.

A woman with blue eyes named Lyra, the court’s Oracle, is called forward. She slices Vanessa’s wrist, tips three droplets from the blade into the pool, and then coats her fingers in the blood-and-water mixture and bathes her own eyes in it to see Vanessa’s fate. Lyra declares Vanessa a “Truthseer” and delivers a cryptic prophecy: “The push and pull of the heart will entangle itself in a web so deep, one might not emerge, but once untangled, legacies will rise. Kingdoms will unite. Greatness beckons” (94).The entire court transforms into wolves and howls. While Vanessa is still in wolf form, the queen places a crown of scarlet starflowers atop her head before transforming herself, and Vanessa joins the howling, privately vowing death to them all.

Back in her room, a fearful Oona avoids Vanessa until Vanessa apologizes for compelling her. Oona forgives her and explains that the court’s hierarchy is reflected in eye color: black for Regents, red for Alphas, gold for Betas, brown for Deltas, and gray for Omegas. Vanessa’s purple eyes fall outside these established ranks, making her position unusually difficult to determine. She also explains Vanessa’s gift as a Truthseer: an innate ability to know when someone is lying. Oona demonstrates how the gift works, showing that it feels like a flare of heat for a lie and comfort for a truth, but she warns that it can be manipulated with clever wordplay. She cautions Vanessa that her unique powers make her a target; the nobility will now see her as a weapon to be used or destroyed. Alone, Vanessa rejects the court’s comforts and sleeps on the floor.

Vanessa wakes to find “GET OUT BITCH” written in what appears to be blood on her nightgown (100). Moments later, Sin arrives to escort her to class and shuts her door. She rushes to the mirror and sees that the threatening message and blood have vanished. Fearing that she’s hallucinating again, she tests her new Truthseer ability on Sin when he knocks again, confirming that she’s awake and that the threat was likely real.

She tells Sin what happened, and Calix overhears with his enhanced hearing. They speculate that it was the work of an Empath, who can project illusions, or an Alchemist, who can create vanishing substances. They agree that it was a serious warning. On the way to class, Sin states the four main laws of the courts and reveals that the queen only spared Vanessa because her unique purple eyes signal that she’s powerful.

The werewolf classroom is an enchanted, open-air meadow inside the castle. Vanessa is immediately confronted by Evie and her entourage, which includes her brother, Eric, and a duchess-in-training named Katerina. They openly mock Vanessa for being “Bitten” rather than a Born werewolf. The instructor, Alvarez, reprimands Evie for her interruption by compelling her to recite the court’s political structure, which descends from Regents to dukes and duchesses, earls and countesses, barons and baronesses, and finally the lesser packs governed by those nobles.

Vanessa finds a seat in the back near Calix and two other students, Portia and Myles, who are kind to her. They help her with the lesson and warn her that she must learn quickly, as the nobility is ruthless and will not accept a weak or uneducated member into their future packs. As the lesson ends, someone throws a wadded paper at Vanessa. The note, written in red ink, contains another threat: “If you think class was bad, imagine what will happen to you the next time you’re alone” (112). She realizes that she might not survive the night.