Chapter 29: *”You’ll have to wait…””
“Zane told me she is our mate, and I know he is right. He said the Goddess had to the Matthew and our Starlight together temporarily.” Damien told him,
Andrew was silent, not knowing what to say to that. Andrew looked down at his mate. Meeting her wide eyed gaze. “You’re absolutely sure?” Andrew asked, but he already knew the answer to his question. Damien would never tell him anything like this unless he was.
“She was always meant to be ours.” Damien said, “I told you the day we met her, she is our most important thing in the world.”
Andrew understood then, Damien’s wolf was a very old soul, reborn multiple times. This meant that his mate had also been reborn multiple times. Even if the human side will forget from death to rebirth, the wolf side wouldn’t. Zane had known from the first moment who Alora was to him and Damien.
Ember looked at Andres, her expression one of wonder. Ember felt this explained so many things about her eldest pup’s behavior when it came to Alora all these years. Ember smiled, becoming excited, she wanted to tell Alora about this, but her son’s next words quelled that thought.
“I don’t want either of you two to tell my Starlight about this. I will let her find out for herself when I get home, that way she won’t have any doubts about our being fated to each other.” Damien said in a firm tone.
Ember let out a disappointed sigh, but her gaze was understanding when it met Andrew’s. Ember nodded her head. “Okay, your mother and I will remain silent.
about this.”
“Thank you, dad, and because I know she’s right next to you, thank you too mom.” Damien said, amusement in his words as he mentioned his mother.
“Good luck on your written exams Damien, I love you.” Ember said, after leaning into Andrew to get closer to the phone speaker.
Damien chuckled. “Love you too mom, and you father.”
“I love you too, pup and wish you luck on your exams.” Andrew said, his voice full of affection for both his pup and his mate.
“Thanks dad, I’ll talk to you later, bye.” Damien said, before ending the call,
Ember let out a slightly mournful sigh that had Andrew wrapping one arm around her shoulder to hold her tightly to him. With a kiss to her temple Andrew said, “Don’t worry mate, soon you will have our eldest pup back in your loving arms.”
With her lips turned down in a sad and a somewhat pouty look that had Andrew wanting to kiss her. Ember said, “I know but I have grown impatient.”
They were back to watching the rank advancement fights when Ember realized there was music going. Curious, she turned her gaze towards Jonathan. “What’s with the music?”
Jonathan was a little startled by that sudden question from Luna Ember, but he did his best not to show it. Sitting up straighter Jonathan cleared his throat and started to explain.
“When a challenge is issued and approved, the one being challenged is able to select up to two songs they would like to have played during their match.”
“Only two?” Ember asked,
“Yes, the fight shouldn’t last longer than two songs, and often ends during the first song picked.” Jonathan said.
“How does this work? Ember asked.
“After the approval, a message will be sent to the mobile phone of the one being challenged. If the student doesn’t respond to the message within a certain time, one of the staff members will seek them out in person and ask them.” Jonathan explained further.
At this moment, while Luna Ember and Principal Jonathan were talking about these messages, Alora had just received hers. Alora read the message, and an anticipatory smirk lifted one corner of her mouth. Next to her she heard the phone notifications of her fellow classmates go off as well.
Looking up, Alora’s smile now stretched across her lips to curl the other side of her mouth. “Were you all asked for song selections as well?” she asked.
“What are you going to pick?” Daren asked.
Alora turned her head and glared at Darien till he backed out of her personal space. With a small almost delicate sounding huff, Alors turned back to look down at her phone.
Feeling particularly persnickety Alora said, “You’ll have to wait till my match to find out.”
Darien gave her a sullen look and complained, “You’re so mean to me.”
Alora looked at Darien, her eyes narrowed and her lips pursed. “Really?” she asked.
Alora’s lowly voiced words carried a warning, one that sent a shiver of apprehension down Darien’s spine. It was then that he remembered one of his opponents would most definitely be Alora. If Darien annoyed Alors now, she would make sure he would regret it later during their battle.
Not wanting to publicly be pulverized to a pulp. Darien let out an awkward laugh and said with forced cheer, “No, no, no you’re the best! The most amazing! The nicest best friend ever!”
Lifting one eyebrow and a way smile lifting one side of her mouth Alora let out a snort and shook her head. The others, having seen Alora thoroughly trounce Darien, laughed at his expense. They all knew very well why Darien was trying to get himself out of hot water.
“Remembered who was to eventually be your opponent, did ya?” Mason asked in an amused drawl.
Darien turned and glared at him, prompting Mason and the others to burst into laughter once more. Darien was about to become extremely annoyed when he heard Alora burst into her own peels of laughter. It caught him off guard, but at the same time it made him smile.
Alora’s peels of laughter could be heard by two others, one was Matt. When Matt heard Alora’s laughter, he thought it was a beautiful sound. Even as his heart „elenched in pain at the loss of what could have been.
The other was Sarah, and her reaction was vastly different from Matt’s. For Sarah, Alora’s laughter filled her with rage and had her screaming internally.
In the parent’s section of the stadium seating. Bettina and Allister were still flipping through the program guide trying to find Alora. They were having no luck. They had scrounged through every fight class under Sarah’s and could not find Alora.
Bettina took out her phone and shot off another text to Alora demanding to know what her fight class was. Bettina was so furious she was no longer able to keep a blank expression. The fury Bettina felt had twisted her expression to something that was almost demonic.
Allister’s expression was dark, and almost expressionless in its stony anger. It was like Allister was cast in a dark cloud, his feeling for the little twat he was absolutely positive wasn’t his were complicated. Allister knew what the DNA results said, but he was sure they had been faked.
Absolutely none of Alora’s features or coloring came from any part of him or his family. However, she did look a lot like Bettina’s paternal grandmother, and Allister had also witnessed Bettina give birth to Alora. If not for these two things, he would think Alora was unrelated to Bettina as well.
As Bettina’s fury mounted, Allister started to anticipate his time down in the basement with Alora tonight, Alora would be punished for every grievance they have suffered that day, and any other she may cause before the day ends.
Allaster and Bettina’s expressions didn’t go unnoticed by Alora, who had returned to looking at them after she received another demanding text message from Bettina. Alora had received the message right as she had submitted the two songs she wanted played during her challenge fight.
Alora chuckled darkly as she read the text again, she was getting a unique thrill out of how angry she was making Bettina. Xena was highly amused as well, Alora had te image of a big wolly grin on Xena’s face, and her long bushy tail waving languidly in the air back and forth. Xena’s tail looked like it had been dipped midway
in the blackest of inks.
Xena’s ears also looked like they had been dipped in that same ink, then used that ink to paint a perfect crescent moon halfway surrounding a star on her left flank. It was when Alora focused on that last unique marking on her wolf that she remembered hers.
The mark on Xena wasn’t only on her, it was also on Alora. It was a birthmark, one her mother had told her was too ugly to be shown. Bettina had claimed that, if shown, it would have her hunted down and killed as a traitor to the Pack immediately.
Alora scoffed internally, thinking what Bettina had said was just another one of her many lies. It was only now Alora remembered her mark would be visible to everyone if she moved her sweater aside. Alora’s hoodie hung down past her shorts, while standing her shorts covered the top half of her mark.
When she sat down though, her shorts rode up enough that the mark was on full display. If Alora had not draped the loose ends of her open hoodie across her thighs, that is
