XAVIER'S POV "What?! Why?!" Chorused the four people with me.I was looking at no one in particular as I wondered to myself why I had blurted that out in the first place."Has the devil finally bought over their Alpha?" I heard Tim ask."But that is impossible! I stayed in the Black River pack for a while about a decade ago and I know Alpha Faustus! He is a good man and a great leader. He would never join an alliance with a tyrant!" Peter protested."Well, it could be that Lartes has him in a chokehold. We know how dubious that man can be," Tim said.I was quiet hearing their debate and considering whether to let them know the truth or not."So what is it? Do you want to recruit her as one of us?" Henk, who had been quiet through the debate, finally spoke.I turned my head to face him sharply as if a tear had cut through my skin."Of course not!" I spat out of my mouth as if I had tasted something disgusting."I don't know why she is in the palace," I lied and I hated myself for look
ANNA'S POV I soaked in the huge bathtub far longer than I should have. But my plan to delay in the bathroom proved fruitless when they came for me."Ma'am! We have a lot of preparations to do before time and we are running late," A maid said after knocking on the door.The voice sounded strange and unlike that of the maid who had earlier woken me up.I drew in a deep breath and went under the water. My aim was to drown. At least that would save me the shame of attending the feast in rags as I would be in recovery or maybe in hell.In less than a minute, I came up for air gasping hard.I could not do it. My wolf had been thrashing inside of me in fear —She hated water so much.After catching my breath, I sighed.I had no choice but to attend the party after all.But I had a new resolution in mind. I would wear my old, raggedy clothes and walk into the feast with my head held high.I was the princess of the Black River pack and no one should have the power to make me feel less than I w
ANNA'S POVI stared back at a totally different person in the mirror.Had it not been for the jet-black hair which I inherited from my mum, and the piercing green eyes which were a souvenir from my dad, I would not have recognized my reflection in the mirror.I turned my face from side to side as I admired myself.While I was sleeping, my makeup was done in the most simple, delicate yet elegant style that brought out an innocence to my face and my hair had been styled into an intricate braid down my back.The problem was that, now, Lartes and Xavier were going to think I was truly enjoying being with them.And now, there was nothing I could do. If I requested that they cleaned it up, they would think I was crazy.In the reflection of the mirror, I watched as one of the maids brought forth a beautiful dress from one of the gift boxes laying on the ground.It was an off-white dress, with the bodice made of silk and the full skirt made with the finest chiffon."Ma'am, please get up," the
XAVIER'S POVI had lost track of time and when I arrived at the front of the bar to meet my carriage, it was almost ten p.m and I was so late.My uncle had informed me of the welcome party and engagement announcement he had planned for the green-eyed witch today.And I had promised him I was not going to attend and he had threatened to lock me in the dungeon.Not that his threat scared me, but I knew if I was locked up, I would not have the opportunity to oversee my affairs of taking back my birthright and I currently had no time for delays.Quickly, I jumped into my carriage and I didn't have to say a word, my driver knew what he had to do."Yah! Yah!" The voice of the driver called out on the cold night as he whipped the horses urging them to run faster.I would have preferred to run in my wolf form, the air coursing through my grey fur, my paws slapping and lifting off the bare Earth, easing my mind and connecting with my true form but I had no time to clean up lest I mess myself u
ANNA'S POVI felt guilty as I ate.I was sure my father had eaten his daily ration of the boiled dried corn which had become our staple meal for years now.With every bite of the roasted venison and deep-fried chicken, my heart grew heavy with guilt but I tried to fix my mind away from the sweet food to stay in control.Naturally, my eyes went to Xavier. My supposed husband, who had come late for the engagement. I was disappointed.I had expected him to be more of a man. I hoped he would refuse to show up to our engagement. But I was not shocked. He was a coward after all.He hated me. I saw it in his eyes as he walked in and I was the least bothered, after all, the feeling was totally mutual. Yet he came.Fool.Moreover, he did not hate me yet. After I had left his pack in ruins, then he would know how much he should have hated me.My eyes returned to the party and a smile lingered on my lips.The party was actually splendid even though I had spent it with mixed emotions –happy that
ANNA'S POV "We will see about that," Alpha Lartes finally answered me and I only smiled bowing my head slightly in answer.I turned my face back to the party in a bid to avoid all conversations and to not further add to the mistake.I had made myself vulnerable in the eyes of the Alpha. My interest in the affairs of his pack was uncalled for and had definitely raised suspicion toward him.The more I commented on the matter, the worse the situation became. So, I strained my focus on the party.We spent the rest of the party totally oblivious to one another and it was a relief for me when it finally came to an end.I was escorted back to the chambers I shared with my betrothed by two armed guards.I knocked on the door to the room but I got no response. I knocked a second time and still got no response.I then opened the door and stepped into the room.It was dimly lit with the lights turned off and the only source of light was from the fireplace.My eyes fell immediately on the figure
XAVIER'S POV I knew something was totally wrong even before I opened my eyes. I woke up to find that I was stripped of my clothes and laying on a bed.I was shocked. This was not the way I had fallen asleep last night.The intense banging in my head and the foul taste in my mouth, including the foul breath, reminded me of how I fell asleep last night."No!" I heard someone beg beside me and I turned to see the scared face of my supposed bride to be beside me.She was so frail and small on the bed that it had been hard for me to notice her under the blanket.I watched as she suddenly jerked up from sleep, panting and filling me with disgust. Not just that the sound of her beating heart was just too loud and it was irritating my wolf's ears.She looked scared and confused but I did not care as I suddenly realized she must have been the one who moved me."What the fuck did you do to me?" I asked her.She swiveled her head sharply towards me and I watched as the fear on her face quickly
XAVIER'S POV I walked out of the bathroom with a towel around my waist and a clear mind —the exact opposite of how I had walked into it earlier on.I could think straight now and I felt the confidence course through me. My shoulders were squared and my legs moved with purpose and strength.My evil roommate was still on the bed where I had left her. I could feel her eyes follow me as I walked around but I totally ignored her and I went straight to the vanity table.But my decision to ignore her went down the drain as soon as my eyes settled on the vanity table."What in the world is all of this?" I bellowed rhetorically in anger as I saw the chaos on my vanity table.I remembered leaving only a handful of skin care products there earlier and I was shocked to find the entire place swarming with a lot of products and to make it worse, I could not even catch sight of my products.My wolf growled with anger inside of me. I became livid. How dare she waltzed into my room and start claiming
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