Five long, grueling days had passed. I had been awake into the wee hours of the morning, too stressed out to sleep for the third night in a row. When I finally managed to fall asleep, someone woke me up. My shoulder was being shaken and my name being called over and over. I opened my eyes enough to see Naremi’s fire red hair in my face. “Wake up child, c’mon now!” She said, continuing to shake me. I rubbed my eyes and slowly sat up in the bed. “What? What is it?” I asked in a voice that sounded like I’d been in a desert without water for two days. “Baltasar is on the phone with Azzo right now. Don’t you want to know what’s going on?” She asked before standing up in front of me. “Of course I do.” “Then come on sunshine, let’s go.” Naremi said before heading back upstairs. I pulled the covers off of my lower body and headed upstairs a few minutes after her. Baltasar was sitting on the love seat in the living room still on the phone with Azzo. Enzo, Priam, and G
“When will you marry me, Astraia?” He asked with a lazy smile. “Hm, I don’t know. With the way things have been going, I think that sooner would be better. I had initially hoped that we would have time to enjoy our engagement. You know, plan things carefully.” His smile faded into a serious expression and I began to frown. “Astraia, things are about to get really ugly for my people. I’m not sure you understand how serious the exposure of my kind’s existence is. Our continued existence rests on what the government decides. They could lock all of us up and throw away the key, or even have us killed. We may not have the time that you think we do.” He said. I looked at him carefully for a moment; he had all the right in the world to be afraid of running out of time. I gave myself so many reasons why we had to wait, why I wanted to wait. I never wanted to rush things because we fell for each other so quickly, but it seemed fate had something else planned. What happened with Iericho a
I stopped at home and picked up another change of clothes before heading back to Lio’s house. We both had keys to each other’s houses now; it seemed silly not to since we’d be getting married soon. We had discussed living together but when it came down to who was moving in with whom we hadn’t been able to come to an agreement. Lio doesn’t want to leave his house because he and the other wolves have the privacy and space they need. Besides, he had to be there to defend their territory so I understood his reasons. As for myself, I had grown up in my house. It was my grandparents’ house and they passed it down to my parents, and then of course the house became mine when I became of age and they moved out. I planned on raising a family of my own there as well. But that was when I had a normal life, things were very different now. I cut the engine and grabbed my suitcase from the passenger seat before I got out of the car. I didn’t feel like going all the way around to the other side.
The following day, Lio and I set out to his mother’s house. I was finally going to meet the woman who brought Lio into this world. I was planning on thanking her about a billion times. My stomach was in knots and doing cartwheels the longer we drove. Lio was holding my hand and driving one handed. I looked over at him and he appeared as calm as the seas. He wasn’t worried or nervous it seemed, which should have given me peace of mind, but it had the opposite effect. “How can you be so calm?” I asked. “Because I already know what to expect, in a sense. My mother is looking forward to meeting you and at the same time she’s not very happy with me either.” He laughed nervously after saying that, revealing that his calm façade was easily broken. “What? Is she going to be angry the first time I meet her?” I asked, suddenly worried. “Hopefully not as angry as I think she is. Don’t worry so much, alright? You have nothing to worry about. It’s me that she’ll be pissed at.” He sai
Today was to be a fun filled day for me and Celeste. We were going out with Lio and Baltasar to a spa, then out to dinner. Celeste said, ‘we all need to unwind and spend time together before the wedding since the honeymoon is going to be so long.’ Granted a month for our honeymoon was lengthy, but we had reasons for it that we couldn’t discuss. Lio wasn’t sure how being bonded to him would affect my human body so we were taking as much time as we needed just in case. Lio was trying his best to lay my worries to rest but his uncertainty just made me worry more. The Amarose Spa was located in a large city called Misona. Misona was about sixty miles east of Delwyn so it was a nice, long drive. The Amarose Spa was on a hillside overlooking the city with a beautiful man-made lake surrounding it. It was amazing work for something nature didn’t create. The Spa building itself was a large, cobblestone cabin with pine wood pillars on each corner of the building. The parking lot was off to
I could hear voices all around me but I didn’t recognize all of them. I kept trying to open my eyes but my eyelids felt too heavy. “Astraia? Can you hear me? Astraia its Celeste! If you can hear me nod your head!” She said. Her voice was a little louder than I wanted it to be right now. I thought about moving and tried to come out of the darkness of my subconscious. It seemed like such a struggle to open my eyes but I finally managed to succeed. Lio’s worried silver eyes were looking down at me and I knew my head was resting on his lap instead of Celeste’s now. The body underneath my head had been too warm to be a human’s. Celeste’s shocked blue eyes were staring down at me, as well as Baltasar’s dark red ones. They were standing over me. Two of the spa staff members and two EMTs were standing around us, looking down at me. “How long was I unconscious?” I asked, looking around at them. “Twenty minutes, maybe more. We couldn’t wake you so the staff called 9-1-1.” Baltasar
Me, Lio, Baltasar, Naremi, and Githinji sat outside on the porch. The sun was starting to set now and the air was cool, almost cold. “Who would do something like this? Thank goodness she wasn’t home.” Naremi said shaking her head. “We have a lot of enemies. For example, how about the whole world?” Baltasar said. “You don’t know if everyone feels that way.” I said looking at him. Lio touched my leg and gave me a faint smile before looking back to the others. “Listen to me, the world is changing quickly. The whole world knows we exist now and yes, some people would be happier locking us up forever. However, those people don’t know Astraia or the fact that she’s close to us. There are only a few groups of people who would do this to her and for only one reason.” Lio paused for a moment, he seemed to be thinking. “The Leopards, The Bears, and of course that officer could be the only suspects. The first two are obvious but I don’t think Officer Rollards would risk
The wedding was in two days. I was so nervous I hardly knew what to do with myself. I was getting closer and closer to becoming Lio’s wife and Teman Sejiwa. The mating ceremony would take place on our wedding night and I was still very nervous about it. Naremi had explained the process to me like it was no big deal, nothing to be afraid of. What worried me the most was Lio’s uncertainty; No human since Adel had experienced being ‘marked’ so he didn’t know what to expect beyond what his mother had told us. I had tried to put the whole thing out of my mind for now because other pressing matters had come to my attention. My parents had no idea what Lio was, nor did Celeste. I knew if they ever found out they wouldn’t be able to accept him. Maybe Celeste would, but not my parents. My brother, who wasn’t even human himself, despised him. I still didn’t understand him at all. Today I had to go do some last minute scans for me and Lio’s wedding gift registry. Lio would have come with
There was a highway coming up along with the fields and farms on either side. We’d been running faster than I realized. The wereleopards were still behind us and catching up fast. Some of the other wolves were ahead of us and only a few were at our sides. Every now and then we had met up with the Shifter Task Forces but they weren’t half as much trouble as the wereleopards were going to be. I raised my head enough to look over Naremi’s head and saw a large number of wereleopards heading towards us. It didn’t look like Naremi or Lio planned on stopping so I put my head back down and braced myself. I heard and felt Naremi growl beneath me as we got closer to the wereleopards. Naremi suddenly stopped, making me jerk forward a little. I raised my head again to see what had happened and found that we were surrounded. The leopards stalked towards us snarling. Lio stood in front of Naremi and I baring his fangs at them but they were unmoved. My heart was beating faster than I thought po
Two weeks later, we were still staying at the cabin and everything had collapsed into chaos. It was a war between man and beast with no end in sight. I’d found some comfort in having Celeste around. She and I were able to have conversations without her taking emotional shots at me now, so I was pretty sure that she was trying to forgive me. I unfortunately couldn’t say the same for my parents. I’d told them the truth last week over the phone and they haven’t answered my calls since. I wasn’t too surprised honestly, that’s exactly how normal people should have reacted. On a lighter note, Byana and her people left a few days ago. We’d rescued everyone from one of the containment facilities, but not without heavy losses. Some of the wolves questioned whether or not we should have left them there or not, which had a lot of them fighting amongst each other. The mood in the house was morbid; I could still feel a lot of tension and anger between everyone. We were tired, mourning our los
After a full report from Githinji, everyone did their best to unwind. There wasn’t much anyone could do at the moment, especially me. Celeste and I were lying on a blanket in the backyard close to the tree line. It was night time now and the stars weren’t out tonight. I had never seen the night sky so clear and blue before. We were on our backs looking over at each other, talking. I had gotten Celeste up to speed on everything, but I could tell that she wouldn’t be cozy around the wolves anytime soon. Baltasar was sporting a pretty red handprint on the right side of his face, compliments of Celeste. “How do you deal with all of this Astraia? All by yourself?” She asked. I sighed before I answered. “To be honest I don’t know if I’m dealing at all. There are a lot of things that I have to accept about their world. Even now, I feel like going back to my parent’s house and forgetting about everything I know. Unfortunately, I can’t.” Celeste turned onto her side, facing me.
As I had this inner battle with myself, my consciousness started to shift from where I was now to some unknown location. Whatever I was seeing was sort of blurry so I couldn’t make out the surroundings very clearly. I could see people walking through a wooded area and some were being carried by the others. It looked like some of them were severely injured too. The way I saw them was as if I were walking behind them, so I couldn’t see any faces. The faint sounds of their voices were whispers all jumbled together and nothing made much sense. I was able to look around so I tried to find anything that could give me a hint as to where I was. On the ground there was nothing too distinctive except some orange flowers that seemed to only grow at the bases of the trees. My vision started to clear up a bit more and I could see more clearly, I could even hear the voices better. I looked up at the people walking ahead of me and they began to slow down. There was a red headed woman support
I awakened the next morning feeling fully rested for once. Lio was lying on his stomach next to me sleeping soundly. His jet black curls were half way covering his face, the rest were fanned out on the pillow. I propped myself up on one elbow, my chin resting in the palm of my hand. With my other hand I started softly gliding my fingertips along his spine. The memories of last night started playing back in my head. The ritual was complete; I was his mate for life now. A lazy smile was fixed upon my lips as my fingers slid back up towards his shoulder blades and into his thick mass of black curls. There were many times I would lay in bed admiring him like this; if I were the first to wake up. This time was different, my thoughts and feelings were different. The current situation we were in didn’t fill me with as much anxiety as it did before. For once my uncertainty, worry, and doubts were not present to ruin my happiness. While I continued to watch Lio sleep peacefully, he began
Some might look at me and think, ‘that poor woman’. I thought that I was the luckiest woman alive to have found a man who loves me as much as Lio does. As we entered the cabin, Lio kept one hand on my waist while he held my other hand in his. I was a little unstable on my feet still but at least I could stand now. Githinji opened the door for us before stepping aside and letting us pass. He came in behind us and closed the door. We walked down a dimly lit hallway that led into the kitchen. There were a couple of people eating at a booth style table but I didn’t recognize them. “Where is everyone?” Lio asked no one in particular. A woman with long, dark blue curly locks, deep dimples, blue eyes, and caramel skin answered him. “Some are in the den, others in the basement. Lady Byana requests your presence upon arrival…” She spoke with her head lowered, not meeting his eyes. I took the behavior as fear at first, but I realized that it was something more; respect. Lio simply
I was lying in bed in the spare room of Adel’s house. There were two windows open halfway to let the gentle summer breeze inside. Adel had given me a cool bath to keep my body temperature from rising too high, which helped me relax a bit more. There was a thirty-four inch LG TV on a wall mount ahead of me. The soap opera channel was on but I wasn’t really paying attention to it. I looked over to the right side of the room to see Adel and Githinji sitting on chairs that appear to have been brought up from the dining room table. They were conversing quietly amongst themselves but I noticed them glancing over at me every now and then. I had not even an ounce of energy left in me, I felt so drained and tired. My eyes started to slowly close as I lay there. Before I could let myself slip into a dream state, Adel came to me and shook me. I opened my eyes startled. “Adel? Why would you do that!? You scared me…” I asked, sounding agitated and frightened at the same time. “I’m sorry
This room was different from what the throne room had looked like. Cotton, peach colored drapes covered the bland stone walls and lanterns burned brightly throughout the room. There was only a king sized, onyx platform bed. It was covered with peach, white, gold, and tan throw pillows of all shapes and sizes. A door was open to the right which looked like a huge master bathroom. This kind of custom living must’ve cost a fortune. Teris tossed me onto the bed like a person would a coat before sitting on the edge of the bed. I managed to sit up using one of my hands to keep me steady. I wasn’t sure how I was slowly regaining my strength but I was happy nonetheless. “Oh this is one of the best days of my existence, Astraia. Do you know why?” He asked, looking straight at me. I just shrugged my shoulders. “Today I will finally have my revenge and tear my enemy down to nothing. I will have the wolves as my slaves and their territory will be mine. Your pathetic brother is mer
I was lying on Petros’s lap in the back seat; against my will of course. Petros had been ready to fight anyone who offered to ride in the back with me unless it was my brother. One of the women at Iericho’s place had lent me a dress and a pair of underwear. I respectfully declined the underwear offer. There was no way I was going to wear another woman’s underwear, even in an emergency. Iericho was driving while one other man from his sloth sat in the passenger side. We were on our way to Teris’s mountain chateau. Most of Iericho’s people were there and the rest were following us in their own cars. I knew the wolves would come to my rescue, but I was still worried about what kind of state Lio was in. If I felt this weak and drained, he must feel the same if not worse. For once I wanted Lio and I to live a peaceful life together. Going into this relationship I knew the risks very well. Regardless, Lio had made me happier than I had ever been in my life. “Why are we going to T