ANNA’S POVWe were far into sea for at least two days when they finally let me out of the box.“Where is my father?” I yelled at them, but they didn’t even respond. They just moved on to the next box and when they opened it, my father stepped out, coughing.Tears brimmed in my eyes as I ran to me. “Oh father… I am so sorry,” I cried wrapping my arms around me.He hugged me back, rubbing his hand slowly over me. “It is fine my dear child. It is all over now,” he said in a broken voice, and I realized that it was truly over.We had lost everything. Our land, our status… everything. And it was all my fault.Tears brimmed in my eyes, but I held them back. I still had my father to protect and take care of. We might have been broken but we were not dead yet.Still clutching his back, I let my eyes roam around the place we were in. We were in a cargo ship with nothing but boxes surrounding us. I couldn’t see a cabin anywhere around. It was more like a long floatable vessel that transported u
ANNA’S POV“Hi, I am Xena and please pay no attention to Charles here. You don’t have to use my title,” she said with a laugh, but I was still too shocked to speak. I only stared at the resemblance I wanted to deny but staring at me right in the face.I couldn’t tell if it was just a figment of my imagination, or it was truly staring at me in the face.Have I tried to avoid thinking about Xavier so much that he was now etched in my mind? And I was seeing him in everyone?Her eyes twinkled with worry, and she turned to bold guy who I now knew was Charles and he nodded his head. It was a code that she understood very well because when her eyes returned to me, the smile on her face returned.“You are welcome to the island of Peace. Please, come with me, I will personally show you a place to stay,” she said and waved her hand in the air.My brows raised as for a second, I thought she was going to make magic or something, but two guards appeared before us and they bowed to her.She smiled
XAVIER’S POVI had failed.Tears flowed out of me, and I couldn’t even feel the pain from my injuries anymore because the pain from my heart was stronger. I had failed everyone. My parents, my friends, my sisters and Anna.He would have certainly given her a similar faith and I gave him the chance to escape without killing him. I screamed in frustration praying that time could be stopped and I would have a second chance to reverse the days so I could kill Lartes for his crimes.I didn’t even care if I didn’t become the next king if Lartes wasn’t the one sitting on that throne my father had worked so hard for.The pain ate at me. The guilt destroyed me and when I had used all my energy, I prayed for death to take me or give me one final chance.It was a hopeless situation, and my body was probably broken without repair, but my soul was stronger than it had ever been. My wolf was wounded and probably dying but I had just one prayer.And it was that I returned. Even if it was in another
ANNA’S POVXena becomes a very good friend of mine. She came around every day to check on us and how we were fairing. Her sweetness was still too good to take in but as time went by, I became more and more comfortable with her.I even started looking forward to her visits as she healed the part of my heart that missed Xavier. Spending time with her was like being with Xavier —it wasn’t exactly the same, but it just made me feel like I was close to a part of him.It didn’t complete heal the guilt, but it helped me survive through it. I still cried at night when I was sure my father was still sleeping. His gestures, especially in the last days had been everything to me. The flowers, I could still remember the smells of the lavenders and I wished I could turn back the hands of time and tell him how I felt.It was difficult sleeping on a bed where he wasn’t there. I tried not to think about it, but I couldn’t stop. I knew that there was no one to blame but me yet I prayed that time could
ANNA’S POVXena’s bright eyes became clouded with darkness as she looked at me. “Anna is something wrong?” she asked and before I could respond, she added. “If it’s about the stay in my mouse, then you don’t have to worry. If you are not comfortable meeting Kelvin, its fine. I will just keep coming to you instead. I don’t mind—”“No, it’s not that. It’s something that I have been hiding from you,” I whispered interrupting her sweet rambles.Xena’s eyes became filled with confusion as she looked deeply at me, wondering what was going on.“Please, come,” I said leading her to the sitting room.After she was settled, I went on and told her who exactly I was and how I got there.“… my wolf had recognized him as my mate, but I was too stubborn to listen to it. I just continued acting tough until—” I paused and sniffled back the traitorous tears that were threatening to escape from my eyes.“When my half-sister came, things changed. Lartes wanted her because he already suspected that I was
ANNA’S POVIt finally became clear to me why she appeared at every function and still worked her ass off on the administration of the island. Her mate was a cripple. My heart started bleeding for her as I wondered how she would have felt being thrown here only to discover that the one whom she was supposed to marry was cripple.“Hello, you must be Anna,” he said, pulling me out of my thoughts.I quickly pulled up a smile and nodded. I raised the edges of my dress and gave him a gentle courtesy, “Hello my king… it is nice to finally meet you,” I said trying my best to hide my emotions.He stretched his hand to me, and I had to pinch myself to go near him. I took his hand they were surprisingly strong. “Xena, didn’t you tell Anna that we don’t call ourselves by titles here?” he said with my hand still in his while he looked at his mate.Xena smiled and playfully pushed her lips into a pout. “I am sorry, I forgot to tell her how much you hate them,” she said with a giggle.He let out a
ANNA’S POVI started working with Xena, helping her clear out most of the reports she had. We decided to split it since she was mostly interested in the welfare of the people, she tended to focus more on that.Me on the other hand, I was more interested in working with the soldiers, so I focused on such reports. Security related and other parts of the island affairs that she couldn’t deal with.I went home occasionally when I missed my father and, in those cases, Xena was sure to always follow. She became more than a sister to me. She was the half-sister, that Kira could never be. She filled more than the whole in my soul, and I was more than grateful for her presence and kindness.“Hey, young lady!” Her sweet voice snapped me out of my thoughts, and I blinked to find her smiling down at me.“You will injure your brain one of these days from thinking too much. How can you wake up in the morning and just spend to entire time thinking, aren’t you hungry?” she asked and I laughed at her
ANNA’S POVKelvin’s words caused my heart to twist away from its position and the world began to shake violently in my head. I tried to hold onto something but there was nothing.I was suddenly alone in a deserted land and the only sign of life I could see was Xavier —who was completely out of my reach.“Anna.”I heard my voice being called but I couldn’t move my body in a direction other than where Xavier was standing. I tried to stretch my hands to him, but my body refused to move still.“Anna!” I was shaken back to reality as my name got called a second time. I blinked hard and found that I was still in the mansion with Kelvin and Xena.They were staring at me with worry planted deep in their eyes.“Anna, you zoned out, is everything okay?” Kelvin asked but Xena was silent as she had an inkling of what I could be going through.It was a good thing that Xavier was still alive. My wolf was excited but being told that he was held by a certain house didn’t sound right in my ears. I fea
XAVIER’S POVAs the vessels landed on the shores of the island, a war cry was let out and everyone took position.At first, everything seemed perfect. The people in the town were packed away from the scenes. They were led to a safe location. Our aim wasn’t to kill them but to liberate them from the monster who was growing under their noses.As the people got cleared, we proceeded straight to the palace entrance with full attack, but it wasn’t met with force as the few guards present in the town were not even expecting what awaited them nor were they prepared for war.They were easily whisked away, leaving the gates bare. But as soon as we got to this point, that was when I realized that Kelvin knew we were coming. This wasn’t a surprise attack; it was a well-precedented attack.His men appeared from all sides of town as if they had been waiting for us to finish clearing the people away so that they would attack. They were more than we had anticipated and to top that up, their arrival
XAVIER’S POVLeaving Anna behind made me stronger. The further I got from the room, the more determined I became to end this war and curse once and for all.“Xavier, the men are ready,” Edna said as she joined me on the corridor as we headed out of the palace through the warehouse, which led us straight to the vessels.“The men are yet to be addressed and they are all waiting at the beach,” Charles said, and I nodded at him.“But there is one problem,” Nico’s voice filled the space and all three of us stopped to stare at him.There was a frown on his face as he joined us. “What is the problem?” I asked as he got closer.“We will have to do your coronation before you leave. It needs to be official before the realm’s flag can be raised.” Nico explained and I could already feel Edna’s hesitation beside me, but I had the perfect solution to this.“Call the elders, they shall be going with us,” I said and started walking away but Nico ran after me, stopping right in front of me.“But Xavi
ANNA’S POVAs I got to Xavier’s chambers, I went straight to the bed, hoping I could get some rest but as I lay on it, there was nothing relaxing about it.Every scenario and circumstance kept playing into my head. My father’s kidnapping. The change of the details of the curse. The probability of Edna being Xavier’s half-sister and then Xena wanting to place her life on the edge of danger…How could I rest?Xavier’s plan was a full-on attack but what if… that one question held the key to the outcome of so many lives. It was true that with a perfectly planned attack with everyone’s support, we could win it, but would Nico change his mind?Unable to calm my head as the thoughts came moving in and out of me, I got up and walked to the window. Watching as the men outside, sat gathered in groups.It was Nico’s men and Xavier’s men too. They were sitting together in groups as if they had not just been enemies a few hours ago.A small smile danced on my lips. It was a good development and ma
XAVIER’S POVThe room fell into perfect silence as they stared at me with shock in their eyes. My eyes narrowed especially on Nico who was trying to play me here like I was a fool.“So, according to you, it isn’t a crime for me to mate with my half-sister and also, it is perfectly fine if we go against what the elders said?” I said shaking my head and watching their reactions.While Nico had a defiant frown and I could guess that he was already scheming for the next words he was going to say to frame me up into his selfish wishes, Edna could no longer look at me in the eye.It was funny because the idea of her being my half-sister was still very strange to my head but nevertheless, as I said it and they were reacting like this, then it could only be true. The problem now was how they birth to her.“Xavier, listen to me,” Nico started up and I raised my brows ready to listen to his trash for a second time. “I know all this information is a little overwhelming but none of these stories
XAVIER’S POV“What?” We all echoed out in the room in shock.Our voice was of different intensity. Where Charles had the gentlest of them, I couldn’t control mine.“This is unbelievable. How can it be possible?” I cried out. I couldn’t believe this. “Edna can’t be an Octavian, from who? We all know that Uncle Lartes was never even into women to begin with! The man preferred men!”My eyes were narrowed, and my temples were squeezed into a tight knot as I tried to unravel the truth or even basic idea about the information that Xena had given me.“She is not from Uncle Lartes,” she whispered and the cloud of confusion in my head got even thicker.“How then?” I growled. “If she isn’t from Uncle Lartes, who then birthed her?”My father had just one brother and that was Lartes. If he didn’t have then whose child was Edna— as soon as the thoughts crossed my mind, I froze. This meant one thing, if she was an Octavian, then she was…“She is our half-sister?” I whispered, unable to say the word
XAVIER’S POVHer question left a ringing in my ears and the way she collapsed to the ground, caused a panic to start within me. I knew what her argument was based on was the right thing but why did loving her also feel right? Why did fighting for us, feel right?Haven’t we been through enough already?I left my position and went to her with a troubled mind of my own, but I was certain we could figure it out together. I reached out my hands to her and as they came into contact the flame spreading between us was the assurance I needed. This couldn’t be wrong.“Anna…” I whispered with a blank head but at least it was a starting point.She raised her sad tears filled eyes to me and I was about to start cooking up the first plan that came into my head when the door opened and Charles, the vessel captain, stepped in.He bowed before us and held the position. “My king, I have news from your sister, the queen of the island,” he said, and my brows rose instantly to my hairlines.“What about my
ANNA’S POVThe hours on the journey back were ridiculously cold and silent. Every man was to himself, and I couldn’t help but begin to wonder if there was something I missed while we were all there.As the water danced around its waves, I seemed to be the only one rational enough to notice. It got to a point that I became worried for the men as they could fall or worse could happen to them.But the goddess stayed with us. We got to the shores of Black Moon safely without any casualties. Yet the mysteries surrounding the men didn’t stop. Rather it seemed to spread even to the others as we got down.Even the men in Black Moon all seemed to carry around them a strange dark aura that felt wrong.“Let’s go see the King,” Charles said and we picked a representative from the two teams of soldiers we carried along with us.We were going to the head to the throne room but we were redirected to the conference room where we found Xavier, Edna and Nico all seated with long faces.My wolf was itch
ANNA’S POVI tried to think of an explanation to what I heard, but there was none.Everything around me started feeling off, and my heart was no longer beating in the normal way.I pulled out my walkie-talkie, and I wanted to dial Charles, but with no idea where he was or how it was in there, I decided against it.I returned my device to my pocket and moved the one I got from my father and his diary into my backpack, then I did a double back to the vessel.There was nothing I could do but wait, hoping that he would have more information when he returned.“Princess Anna, we got an interception from Black Moon but the connection was not stable enough for us to pick up anything,” the man we had left as a scout on the vessel said.“Oh, we will try again later in the night, connection is always better then,” I said, based on what Xavier had told me when he handed the devices to me.It was what Lartes had used to pass information from Black Moon to the island. It worked, we just had to fin
XAVIER’S POVI wasn’t even the one to reject it. Edna herself slapped her palms to the table and jumped to her feet.“No, uncle Nico. I am not going to be mated to him!” She cried out like I was some sort of plague but surprisingly I felt no hate towards her because it was a mutual feeling. I didn’t want to be mated with her either. I already had Anna.“Sit down Edna and listen to me,” Nico growled and for the first time since I have come to know him, I saw agitation in his eyes.But Edna had gone wild.She stepped away from the table and shook her head like she had suddenly become possessed.“Why should I listen to you?” She spat out and Nico narrowed his eyes and he searched for the right words to say but before he could even come up with them, edna continued.“No way! I have listened to you all my life. I have done everything you have wanted.” She beat her chest and pointed in my direction. “But you see this particular one, I am not going to do it. I am not even going to sit here a