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Mate, Monster, Memory

Author: Dera's ink
last update Last Updated: 2025-03-26 19:17:20

I couldn’t breathe.

Daniel was here.

Daniel—my Daniel—with rain dripping from his jacket and desperation etched into every line of his face.

“I’m sorry - who are you?” Daniel asked again and Cade grinned although his smile didn’t reach his eyes.

“I’m Ayla’s mate.” He whispered and my heart dropped.

Bastard.

Daniel frowned and looked at me, “your mate?”

I swallowed hard. “It’s not what it sounds like.”

“I think it’s exactly what it sounds like,” he said, trying to smile but failing miserably.

Cade stepped forward, slow and calm, but the tension in his body was barely leashed. “She is my mate. That bond snapped into place the second I saw her.”

“Don’t,” I said, glaring at him. “Dont you dare try to sabotage my life more than you’ve already done you ass wipe.”

“You want me to pretend that it doesn’t matter?” Cade’s tone stayed quiet, but there was steel beneath every word. “I’ve let you run once, Ayla. I won’t let you go again.”

“You don’t own me,” I snapped, loud enough to cut through the night. “You don’t get to show up after seven years and claim me like I’m some prize waiting on a shelf.”

“I’m not claiming you,” he said. “I’m fighting for you.”

“I don’t want you to.”

His expression didn’t change. “I don’t believe that.”

I laughed bitterly. “Of course you don’t. You never listened to me before, why start now? Stay out of my life Cade! I don’t need you in it.”

Daniel stepped in, placing a hand gently on my arm. “Ayla, what is going on?”

I turned to him and the warmth in his touch almost made me cry.

“It’s biological,” I said, voice trembling. “An ancient tie between our kind. It doesn’t mean love. It doesn’t erase history. It’s just… nature pulling strings.”

“Can you break it?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “But even if I can… it hurts.”

Daniel’s eyes searched mine. “Do you want to break it?”

“Yes.” I said it without flinching. “Because I chose you.”

“Daniel,” Cade called his voice low, “are you aware that wolves mate for life? And no wolf would ever be happy living a life with someone who’s not their destined mate? Do you know that it’s never happened in the history of werewolves? Do you know that with the breaking, she loses the desire to mate with any other guy?”

With every word, Daniel’s eyes widened and the urge to punch the hell out of Cade kept growing.

Why was he so hell bent on ruining my life?

“I’m going to say this just once Cade, GET LOST! I don’t care what you say but this was a very big mistake and I’ll give anything I can to get out of it.”

“Ayla you can’t just toss this away like it doesn’t mean anything.”

“It does mean something,” I whispered. “It means I have to fight harder to stay in control of my life. It means I don’t get to have peace without a war first.”

I looked between them.

“If you think that this means I get to forget everything then you are mistaken.”

“I’m not asking you to forget, Ayla. But however you feel…you are mine!”

I recoiled like he’d struck me. “Don’t say that.”

“I’ll never say it like it’s a cage,” he said. “But I won’t lie to you, Ayla. I am not letting this bond go.”

Daniel flinched.

“Stop,” I told him.

“I’m not. I just—” He exhaled. “I lost you once. I don’t want to lose you again.”

“You never had me,” I said. “Not in the way that matters. You were just the loudest voice in a world that silenced mine.”

Cade didn’t respond.

Daniel’s hand curled tighter around mine. “You said nothing has changed. I want to believe that.”

“It hasn’t,” I said, even though the lie tasted like ash. “I still love you.”

And I did.

But it wasn’t the same anymore. No matter how hard I tried to deny it - there was no denying the bond that was taking root between Cade and I.

Cade didn’t speak again. He just looked at me—quiet, fierce, wounded.

I turned away, dragging Daniel with me, because I couldn’t look at Cade another second without shattering.

We were several feet away from him when I heard a soft growl in my head that made me halt mid step.

Then it was followed by Cade’s voice — in my fucking head.

/“I’ll let you have your fun tonight with your human, lil wolf. But you can’t run from me. You are mine - and no matter how you fight I’ll keep coming for you. You are Mine, Ayla.”/

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  • FATED TO THE ALPHA WHO HATED ME    Held like Home

    AYLAAfter days of being holed up inside, I couldn’t take it anymore.The bond was wrecking me. Gnawing at me. Cade had stayed away, and maybe I should’ve been grateful but all I felt was the pull. The ache. It was constant, like something in me was screaming for him. And I knew he was feeling it too. He had to be.I stood at the window, fingers rubbing the locket at my neck. Mae’s locket. Warm, comforting, like a heartbeat I didn’t understand. Something inside me was shifting slowly, painfully and it had everything to do with this bond. With my wolf. With me.“Your meal is ready, Ayla. Come eat something.”Beatrix’s voice broke the silence behind me. I didn’t turn. Just kept running my thumb along the locket’s edge, grounding myself.Beatrix has watched me. Silently. Keeping a very close eye on me. But no doubt, I'm still angry at her. Why the hell would she read my journal? “I’m going to the Palace,” I said quietly, but firmly. I stood, grabbed a shawl, and walked past her without

  • FATED TO THE ALPHA WHO HATED ME    Sera....

    Human World The whiskey burned on the way down, but not as much as the memory.Ayla’s eyes haunted him, the way she looked at him that day. No guilt. No goodbye. Just silence. As if he had made some mistake she was finally correcting.Daniel set the bottle down with a quiet clink. Around the dimly lit bar, shadows shifted, men cloaked in darkness, murmuring low, silver glinting from concealed blades. This was not a place for decent men. But Daniel had long stopped being one.“She’s not yours.”The voice was smooth, female, too calm to be casual.He didn’t turn. He’d noticed her watching him since the night he went to meet them. She always sat alone, just within reach of the shadows. Dark hair like ink. Eyes far too ancient for someone so young.“She was mine before fate decided otherwise,” he muttered.“She chose you,” the woman said, seating herself beside him without invitation. “And now she’s crawling back to the wolves who broke her.”Her scent was off—neither human nor wolf. I

  • FATED TO THE ALPHA WHO HATED ME    Unsteady Grounds........

    Cade..Something was shifting.Not in the kingdom. Not in politics. Not in the rogues—though their numbers had grown bolder. No… this shift was deeper. Personal.It was her.I hadn’t seen Ayla in days, but I felt her absence like a bruise that refused to fade.And yet, each night, my wolf grew restless. Pacing. Growling in the shadows.Even without the full bond—especially after what she tried—there was still something tethering us.I didn’t know what it was. But it made my blood itch.Riven entered my study quietly, carrying a sealed scroll. “Report from the Eastern patrols. Another rogue breach near Hollowpine.”I took the scroll but didn’t open it. “Casualties?”“None. This time. But they’re getting organized.” He hesitated, then added, “They were targeting the herbal trade routes. It’s coordinated.”Coordinated rogue attacks.A mate I couldn’t reach.And a council ready to turn on me.“How long until the Four Wing alliance meeting?” I asked.“Two days. But Galen’s already stirring

  • FATED TO THE ALPHA WHO HATED ME    The Locket's Whisper

    AylaThe silence in my mind had become a second skin.Days blurred. My body moved, but I felt… hollow. Not dead, not alive. Just here.No presence stirred in the place where my wolf once resided. No growl. No nudge. No comfort. It was like losing my breath and learning to live without air.I barely spoke to Beatrix. Even when she tried to keep things light, to pretend nothing had changed, I knew she could see it too—something inside me was broken.It was on one of those sleepless nights, curled in the chair by the fire, that I remembered it.The locket.Mae's locket. The one she’d left me before she died. I had tucked it into the bottom of my satchel days ago. It had always made me uneasy, like it was humming with something… old.With trembling fingers, I retrieved it from the bag and sat staring at it.Gold. Worn but intact. The surface was carved with unfamiliar symbols that shimmered faintly in the firelight. I should have opened it the day I got it. But something had always stoppe

  • FATED TO THE ALPHA WHO HATED ME    Lines in the Stone

    CadeThe echo of the market still clung to my thoughts as I stood before the grand council hall—an obsidian structure nestled in the heart of the palace grounds, forged to host only the most sacred of gatherings. The Full-Wing Alpha Meeting. The last time this chamber held such tension, I was barely twenty, fresh to the throne, earning respect with every breath.Now, they waited for me again. Not to test me—but to corner me.Riven opened the doors.Four Alphas sat in silence, cloaked in power and impatience.Alpha Tim of the North Wing—arrogant and aged, his eyes cold with calculation.Alpha Maelis of the East Wing—slender, sharp, with a smile that never reached his eyes.Alpha Silas of the West—young, ambitious, always the first to sniff out weakness.And Lady Maerina, representing the South. The only one not an Alpha, but bold enough to sit like one.Elder Galen stood by the head o

  • FATED TO THE ALPHA WHO HATED ME    Crown in the Shadows

    Cade. An impromptu meeting had been called—again. Not because of politics or war, but because of Ayla. My mate. I had told them I would sever the bond between us. That had been nothing but empty words. I could never bring myself to do it. “The East Wing is grumbling,” Elder Galen announced, his tone sharp, gaze shifting among the others. “Perhaps if you had a Luna by your side, none of this unrest would be happening.” I didn’t respond immediately. Instead, I let the silence stretch, watching their discomfort grow. “Arrange a meeting,” I said at last, my voice low but resolute. “I want to see all representatives of the four wings.” The shock on their faces was palpable. None of them expected that. “In the next five hours,” I added. Gasps rippled through the chamber. The elders scrambled to their feet, already making urgent calls as they filed out of the room. “But Alpha,” Elder Galen protested, spinning back toward me, “the North Wing to Bloodhowl takes at least a ful

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