Svetlana took a good look at me before she nodded her head when she probably saw how determined I was. “Alright then. Follow me.”I silently followed Svetlana just like she said and we were able to walk past the hallways without disturbing anyone's rest. I glanced up at the moon and was amazed at the fact that Alexei and I took some time to satisfy each other in bed. We reposed after dinner, exactly past seven, and we finished our luscious summit at ten. Although what we did earlier wasn’t the longest time we had before, it was the most tiring one.When Svetlena suddenly slowed her steps to walk beside me, I already felt that she had a question in mind she needed to inquire. I looked at her and bobbed my eyebrows when our eyes met. “Come on, you don’t have to keep it to yourself. Ask me.”“This late-hour rendezvous of ours and you sneaking out, I suppose Alexei doesn’t know about this,” she started while looking at me curiously. “I mean, I don’t want to think that this is bad. I am ju
“This bottle...” The former doctor gasped in horror and he looked at me with trembling eyes until his expression changed from dread to calm, and eventually became surprisingly clueless. Holding the bottles using his hands, he looked at me as he tilted his head to one side. “Who are you, young lady? Why are you here in my room?”Disappointment ricocheted through my system, which caused my shoulder to slump. I accepted the bottle when he handed it to me and he proceeded to stare at the moon peacefully. He murmured something in his breath, a Canidean mother tongue prayer or some sort, as he fixated on the bright moon illuminating the night sky.I heard Svetlana sigh at the back before I felt her walk towards me.“This is how bad my father’s condition is,” she said with a sigh. “He was unstable. In this state, he couldn’t even recognize me as his daughter and he would keep staring at the moon and murmuring a prayer to the Moon Goddess using a Canidean mother tongue until he fell asleep. F
“Aera!” Alexei screamed my name in panic and he knelt down on the floor with me. “Svetlana, what happened?”The scream kept ringing into my ears and the more I listened to it, the more it kept getting louder and agonizing. And each time it jabbed in my ears, my heart would ache and cause me to forget to breathe because I could feel that girl’s pain from where I was standing.After months of earning the respectful voice, the title that changed my life, the revenge I undertook so that I could prove myself to them, it never left me. The pain and trauma I had before I took this privileged path will always come back to me, no matter how much I conceal it. It left a scar in my heart and it will never heal.“She said she couldn’t breathe,” Svetlana answered and hastily looked for something inside her emergency bag.“Then do something,” Alexei demanded, which caused Svetlana to hasten her movements. His voice may sound impatient, but that didn’t make Svetlana lose her composure without slowin
Screaming out of rage and frustration, I charged toward the man but Irino dashed to the back of the man and did something that made him lose unconscious before I could even slash his throat. That made me stare at the offender with trembling bloodshot eyes before I gripped the handle of my hunting knife until I was hurting my own hand. Irino literally took my chance on showing that shifter what he deserve for molesting that girl. Even if he wasn’t the father of the child, he has no right to violate that girl and took the chance to find her mate one day when she turned twenty-one. “That shifter deserves more than what you did! He deserves death! Why steal that chance from me?” I asked out of frustration and stepped towards the unconscious shifter before Alexei stopped me. “Aera, darling. Calm down,” he said in a low, concerned voice. But I was too mad to mind him and act accordingly. “I never said he wasn’t,” Irino bit off, his eyes shooting at me in his most forbidding manner. “He co
“What the actual fuck?” Alexei asked indignantly, his brows furrowed in irritation. “Ridiculous! No way that that fucker asked for my mate to go for him.” Irino smacked his lips before he shrugged carelessly. “Well, he did. And that shit wanted it immediately. Tonight. You can confirm it to Mikhail.”Mikhail winced at Alexei and then he nodded. “He fucking announced it with a huge grin on his lips. I am telling you, I really wanted to smack him in the face for demanding such a thing, but attacking him on his own pack would be treason. Damn.” “There’s no way Aera is going to that fucker,” Alexei said insolently before he frantically shifted his attention to me. “Right? You are not going to go there.” “I am going, Alexei,” I insisted, my answer leaving my lips determined and firm. “What would I not if that would make me get this girl from his pack?” Alexei closed his eyes and he forced me to face him. “Look, darling, you don’t understand. You don’t know that fuck—” “Then make me. Ma
“So, this is the Muck...” I said while looking up at their tall gate.Even if we are still outside, I can feel the dark atmosphere of the infamous pack known as the sinner's den. There was something uncommon in the air that smelled of heavy tobacco with a mix of the foul scent of marijuana leaves. Since they are located at the border of North and East, I wouldn’t be surprised if they secretly built illegal manufacturing of drugs inside.Seeing how the pack looks outside and the meaning of the name behind their pack, now I understand why Alexei forbade me to come here at first. All I could sense was pure evil and I knew I wasn’t the only one who thought of that because my wolf felt the same. Surprisingly, it was our first time feeling rather threatened after treating our South problem as the worst problem we encountered.“Coming here made me think of what Mikhail and I did back when we were teens, it’s awful,” he said and shivered in guilt and disgust.“I had the same feeling when I ca
Determined, I locked eyes with Alexei and assured him it was going to be all right. I reminded him that I can always call him using the mind link for help by pointing to my forehead. That’s what we agreed on before stepping inside the Muck, so the other will always be on standby in case I needed help.Veronica silently led me towards the office and took me in front of a tall black door. I realized it was marble, a type of door that doesn’t exist in the North. Veronica opened the door for me and wished me a happy talk with the Alpha. I examined the place full of smiles before I stepped inside and I heard the door close. I immediately aimed for the table despite the smell of filthy smoke starting to irritate my nose. The smell, the design, and the ambiance were so foreign to me and it didn't give me the ambiance of the usual outmoded yet comforting North. Seeing how Andras's office was built with modern materials, I almost thought that I wasn't in the region I grew up in. I waited for h
“Nonsense! You allowed your own pack to be the safe haven of the other region because you knew that the CCPD couldn’t easily access the North when they wanted... you and your members may have flourished doing illegal things, even received praise from other regions for doing such a good job supporting them, but in the North Canideans' eyes, you are a traitor and a disgraced of this region, Mister Alarcon, and that will remained unchanged until your last breath,” I said without holding back as I met Andras’s eyes. Even though I saw helplessness in them, desperately wanting a saving, I never let myself get swayed by the sudden vulnerability he had shown. Meddling myself with this pack is the last thing I would do while ruling Triton. I am doing fine as the Alpha and I must admit that acquiring these great titles satisfied the weak version of myself five years ago, trying to prove to everybody that I can be better. And getting my hands dirty would lose everything I worked hard for to be o
“I couldn’t believe that shifters here in Buenavista forgot the siblings after just two decades, what are your plans for the Martinez siblings and Calisto now?” Irino asked, breaking the peaceful silence I had with Alexei.“Well...” I looked at Mason and Miya and exhaled deeply. “I would love to give them a proper burial and let the Calisto know that they were the Martinez siblings who survived the fall of the Martinez twenty years ago. The shifters who should be the ones ruling Calisto and not the Alvarez. I would also love to conduct a rescue and search for anyone who survived other than Mason and Miya that day to give Calisto back into their hands.”“What if they were the last of their clan?” Irino asked.“I have no choice but to let Akim take Calisto as the new Alpha like everybody was expecting him,” I answered and paused before I faced Irino and the others. “But I won’t let the others face the same leadership here in Calisto, so I will take the shifters who wanted to leave the p
“I’m sorry, Miya...” I uttered under my breath when she dropped at the last blow.Witnessing how Miya shifted back to human, my knees gave up and I threw the gun in outrage, fear, and sorrow. As much as I was thankful that the gun saved me and Alexei, it was still the most dangerous weapon anyone could have possessed to kill one’s wolf.I immediately held my belly and made sure that the baby was alright inside me by caressing it several times. I watched the siblings' dead bodies lying on the ground and heaved a deep sigh.With a heartbreaking sight, I suddenly remember their fates read by the wolfsayer six years ago. It was blank. Unreadable, as the wolfsayer called it, saying she had trouble reading their mates and possibly that they were one of the few that aren’t fated for another. I recall refusing to believe our wolfsayer before, thinking that she only made a mistake.And it turned out that wolfsayers don’t make mistakes. Because the meaning of Mason and Miya’s blank fate is beca
Miya let out a horrified scream before she shot me using her malevolent, trembling eyes. “This is all because of you... this is all because of you! You killed my brother.”Stunned and weeping, I ignored Miya’s outburst and held onto Mason’s stab wound, pulling him closer to me as I refused to believe what Miya had done to her own brother. Mason's eyes were fluttering when I looked at him and his vision was unfocused while watching the setting sun.“Mason, look at me...” I told him as I kept tapping his cheeks. He slowly complied and gave me a sad smile when our eyes finally met. “The Moon Goddess is very kind to let me see you before my life ends, Aera. I had no regrets about saving you, so you should feel the same.”“No, Mason. You will not die! Do you hear me? You will live!” I persisted, but Mason’s breathing started to become shallow and short, making me panic more than I already was.I was now covered in blood. And I didn’t know where to place my hand when Mason suddenly reached
“I will not mess this up, sister. You can trust me,” Mason said, avoiding my gaze as he faced his sister and undisclosing the state I was in.He could have told Miya that I wasn’t unconscious anymore. Kill me the moment he had crouched down since I was secretly listening to their conversation when I should not. Slit my throat without waiting for me to gain consciousness but he didn’t. He remained pretending that I was unconscious for my own sake.With that considerate gesture, I felt like there was still kindness in him, which Miya had totally forsaken a long time ago because of her rage and her intense need for revenge. I most definitely feared that my life was possibly coming to an end, but I felt rather confident about Mason sparing my life.Silently, I just wished I was right.“I trust you,” Miya said to her brother and then she left the cell afterward, leaving Mason who suspiciously trailed his eyes on her sister and let out a big sigh of relief when she was finally out of sight.
MIYA26 years ago...“Yes, honey. You heard your father right. You will be the first female Alpha of the North and the North Canideans will love you once you take the highest rank,” my father, Manolo Martinez, said to me, twirling me in the air and my laughter and shrieks filled my room that blissful night.My mother, Susan Martinez, gave me a warm smile before she walked toward my father’s side. “Okay, that’s enough. The heir to the highest rank will need to get a lot of sleep so she can be the first female of the North when she turns twenty. And that is fifteen years from now. You need to be strong and brave when that happens, Miya honey. For your shifters and for Calisto.”“I would be strong and brave, mother. I promise,” I vowed with my hands spread in the air and then explained excitedly when my father twirled me even faster.After a few turns, my father placed me down and gently tucked me into bed. They kissed my cheeks and wished me good night as their daughter and now the newl
I woke up in a dark room with fear and anger filling me, my hands and feet tied behind my back and I was helplessly facing the floor, trying to shout for help but no words could emerge from my mouth other than a silent moan.Struggling yet determined to move, I tried to free myself by flinging my hands constantly behind my back but my whole body was still numb that I even find it hard to blink or even turn sideways so I would not put all my weight on my stomach since I was a month old pregnant. I am soon to become a mother and I couldn’t lose the most precious blessing the Moon Goddess has given me when other shifters are struggling to bear a child.I never thought that a shifter like Miya, let alone a shifter whom I treated as one of my closest friends and a sister more than I treated Aena would do such a thing to me. And maybe— no, certainly, I am to be blamed as to why I am here in this dark and cold room only the Goddess knew where it was located. It appeared that I trusted Miya t
A week later...Wearing a black dress, I made myself inside Calisto’s hall without minding the mixed gaze of everyone was piercing me.All eyes immediately turned on me when I stepped inside and they gave me a deep respectful bow when I walked past them. Not just Calisto but all shifters from other packs who paid a visit to my father’s funeral. After everything that I had been through, the praise and the exaggerated appreciation, seeing them treat me like I was next to the Moon Goddess was never new, especially when there was a rumor that I helped Muck and not long after when Andras revealed that it wasn’t a rumor but the truth.Aera the Great. That’s what they called me even before the revelation. Now that the truth was out, they began to worship me for driving out all the Antartis as though I did it by myself. I had help. Andras could receive some attention as well, including the Muck’s brave shifters who fought with me during the riot, but the North has never been a fair region eve
“I am what?” I blurted, holding my stomach, unable to believe what Yelena said. “No, I am not.”“You are. Look.” Yelena held my waist and made me face the mirror. And then she tilted me to the side and carefully scooped my bump I never knew I had. “You are pregnant.”I gasped when I realized Yelena was right and my hands flew to cover my mouth in shock and delight. “Oh, my Goddess... I am! I am indeed with child, Yelena.”“You are...” Yelena gushed and did a little jump while holding my hand. Out of excitement, the news made me jump as well with her, but Yelena stopped me immediately. “Careful, Aera. You cannot jump or fight, or do straining activities from now on. You have a precious life inside you now. Oh, what a blessing for you and your mate! We shall tell the others, especially Alexei.”“No,” I cut her off, making Yelena's eyebrows arched in wonder and confusion. “I'm afraid we have to keep it for ourselves, Yelena,”“Why?” she asked with a little wondering laugh that turned out
“W-What?” Mason asked, his tone in utter disbelief and rather contemptuous. “Aera, are you hearing yourself? Are you forgetting yourself? He is your father.”The corner of my lips arched and I looked away, dropping my gaze to the table with a silent yet spiteful laugh before I looked back at him testily.However, this time, my lips turned into a thin line and my reaction turned cold, my face went slack quite intentionally, not because I regretted what I said but because I was disappointed by the fact he had the courage to ask me such an absurd request when he knew my painful past. And seeing how he gave me the reaction, right exactly the opposite reaction I would like to receive from Mason, I knew that the madness inside me that had been kept and caged for long awakened, wanting to spew forth and wild.“A father who abused me mentally and physically,” I corrected him, my voice rising in fury. “Now, let me return the question to you, Mason. Are you hearing yourself? You know exactly wh