CHAPTER 2: INNOCENT LOVE

8 years ago

Maya’s POV

“What will you do on your 20th birthday?” My best friend and 18-year-old sister, Remi, elbowed me and then giggled, her long eyelashes lowering suddenly.

Finding the source of her fiery red blush and nervous giggle, I noticed the Beta’s son, Carver, winking at her and joining the warriors for their daily patrol towards the kingdom’s southern borders.

“So?” She insisted, bouncing back to her irksome self once the young beta wolf was out of sight.

I shrugged and tucked two knives secretly in my boots before venturing into the eastern wing of our pack land－the forbidden part near the waterfall, which was as breathtakingly beautiful as deadly dangerous.

“What?” Remi screeched, interpreting my shrug correctly. “You will spend the entire day in the infirmary? You are insane!” She generously complimented my wits and sanity. Yes, ‘complimented’. Little Remi’s mouth was worse than a cursing sailor’s and I considered myself lucky to be let off so easily by the young Alpha.

“I am a doctor and my patients are my number one priority. You surely better understand our priorities and responsibilities, don’t you, Alpha Veneto,” I smirked.

Remi clenched her palms and tried to keep her temper on my birthday. We had fought over this topic innumerable times, both in private and in public.

“How many times have I told you not to attack my raw nerve, Maya,” Remi gritted out, her eyes darkening. “Wait till I turn 21 years old. My first and last command as Queen shall be to repeal the stupid law of only allowing Alphas to take the throne.”

I shrugged and that infuriated the future queen even more.

“Don’t you dare shrug again, Maya. I am serious. You were born to lead our people and you are the kindest and strongest woman I have ever seen. Even more than our mom,” she quietly murmured the last part, unwilling to dampen my day with the thought of the dear departed－the very person who brought us into this world and seemed to have passed almost all her traits to me, including her wolf rank. Omega.

While Remi was the stark opposite of me and resembled our Alpha father and younger twin brothers in more ways than one, only I, the eldest, was bestowed with our mother’s unique healing powers, delicate and sharp features, a willowy build and a heart that couldn’t see anyone else in distress. The last attribute was the last straw that made the Moon Goddess greedy and took the beloved Luna from us in a rogue attack when I was just 10 years old.

I missed her. I missed her so much. Even after so many years. That is why I became a doctor and took it upon myself to save every life possible. No other child deserved to be motherless like us, but alas, the Moon Goddess had sealed our fates as well as expiry periods before dispatching us.

“Quit it, Alpha,” I sternly used my sister’s rank, which enraged her even more. She was not a fan of the title, especially when it meant my demotion and public humiliation at various public events.

“Keep that up and you will pay for it, Omega,” Remi snarled, her almond-shaped, brown eyes glowing to their majestic golden.

“You keep forgetting who wins in every bout, Alpha Veneto,” I teased as we neared the sparkling, silvery waterfall.

“Appearances are deceptive,” Remi muttered under her breath. “I don’t understand where all that strength comes from. Looking at you, one would think that you could be blown away by the wind, let alone take on five alpha wolves on your own.”

I chuckled and shrugged. Again. Much to my sister’s exasperation.

What? There was nothing untrue to what my younger sister said. On numerous occasions, the enemy had grossly underestimated my power and skills, only to be sent to the jaws of death in a matter of seconds. Our parents had been firm believers of gender equality and warrior training. They wanted their children to be strong leaders with magnanimous hearts. However, I had been secretly given the most rigorous and dangerous form of training since my early childhood.

My parents had resolved to hand over the title to me except that the pack and royal lycan wolves believed in the rank system. They held onto it like dear life, much to my parents’ chagrin.

“Take a day’s holiday? Please? I am going back for my Alpha training tomorrow,” Remi pleaded, her voice barely audible over the waterfall’s roaring rapids. “It’s your birthday. At least let your hair down for one night, that’s all I ask for,” the little minx used her softest voice and puppy eyes to sway me into saying “Yes.”

I mentally facepalmed myself the moment I said the mono-word starting with a ‘Y’ as Remi screamed in ecstasy and hugged the life out of me.

However, my heart stopped beating for a moment when a piercing, desperate scream resounded in the quietness of the forest, trumping over Remi’s celebratory ones. Immediately entangling myself from my sister, I ran towards the distressed cry for help without a second thought.

“Maya, noooo!” Remi screamed as she ran behind me while I caught a long, hanging vine and wrapped it around my waist. Throwing the other end towards my unwilling sister, I double-knotted the creeper plant and jumped into the ferocious waterfall.

The waves crashed against the sharp rocks at the bottom of the killer waterfall while silver sparkles jumped around like twinkling stars. If one had to describe ‘deadly beauty’, here was one.

“HELPPPP! HELPPPP! SOMEBODY PLEASE HELPPPP!! HEL－… AHHHH! I AM SLIPPINGGGG!!!”

Throwing both my knives towards the male voice with the accuracy of a ninja, the victim of the slippery rock mishap roared, “DON’T ATTACK ME! I AM HARMLESS!!”

The sharp, silver knives found their mark and the frantic male shrieks turned mute.

“Did he fall to his death or did you kill him with your knives? Why is everything quiet?” Remi shouted, holding on to the weak plant stem with everything she had. Of course, it could hold the weight of only someone as light as an omega like me.

I rolled my eyes, before shouting, “Swing me! Hard port, Alpha!!”

The anger that exploded through the vein, at the use of the hated title, gave me the required torque and momentum to swing towards the young man holding on to dear life. Wildly swinging and holding two sharp rocks with blood-dripping hands, he tried to keep his balance in the air as my two sharp knives kept his shirt plastered to the slippery rock.

“Thanks, sis,” I chuckled through the mindlink and a “Whatever,” huffed back through the same line. Surely, she was rolling her eyes too. They rolled more than a roulette ball in the casinos of LA.

Suddenly, the young man found himself weightless in the air when his white shirt tore from both sides of the knives and his hands lost their fight to keep him steady.

Closing his eyes, he accepted his fate and remembered the Moon Goddess for the last time. He silently prayed, “Oh, Moon Goddess! Hear a son beg you to give my mother the strength to bear the pain of losing her child and fight her illness.”

The tip of his finger finally lost contact with the rock and he slipped down.

“Now I can die in peace,” he whispered.

“Not if I am there, young Sir,” the softest of lilting female voices spoke with a natural melody that warmed his heart. A pair of strong arms clasped under his arms and another pair of lower limbs wound around his waist to land them both back to safety. “Wrap your arms around my neck and close your eyes. You don’t want to see this,” his saviour warned, and that is when the young, handsome man lost consciousness.

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Sebastian’s POV

“Am I in heaven already? I didn’t know I accumulated good deeds on Earth,” I murmured when an angelic face with dark, long eyelashes peered down at me and a beautiful set of dimples indented in her apple-red cheeks to give way to the most beautiful smile I had ever seen on a pair of juicy, plump, red lips.

“He is sooooo cuteeee!” The angel’s companion squealed and my eyes wavered towards the stronger personality. She was a beautiful a****n herself and it was not hard to notice that the two angels were beautiful in their own ways. “The Moon Goddess gave you a gift on your 20th birthday!”

“Remi!” The first one scolded before profusely blushing.

‘How cute!’ My lycan, Titan, mindlinked with a chuckle.

‘Titan?’ I asked in surprise. Was I not dead? 

Before my lycan could answer, Remi placed my head on the other girl’s lap and quickly ran away shouting, “I am getting help! He bled a lot!!”

“But we’ll get in trouble!” My saviour shouted back and then sighed when the receding figure didn’t stop.

I had to leave before I was caught for trespassing in foreign territory. I was a guest on this continent and I didn’t want to give another reason to my father for failing him. I tried to get up but suddenly the world spun around my eyes and I dropped back heavily on the ground.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I took a few deep breaths to get over the pain and dizziness that washed over me. I tried to get up again, but a soft hand cupped my cheek and placed me back on her lap.

“Is someone sick, young man?” She quietly asked. I opened my mouth to refute, but she quickly squeezed something agonizingly foul and bitter between my parched lips, and smiled.

The green liquid trickled down my protesting esophagus, and tears sprung in my eyes when my stomach burned. Did she poison me?

Keeping her soft, inviting hold on my cheek, she thumbed away my tears and whispered.

“The herbs you were trying to get from that rock are bandaged around your hand with my handkerchief. Give it to the patient with warm water every night for a week. These herbs will help to eject the silver poison from the patient’s body. It will be painful but you have to keep cleaning the wounds. Now head northwards and don’t look back. Run!” She urged and, with a clean sweep of her arm, she hauled me－a giant to her frail frame, up on his feet!

“What is your name?” I asked the goddess-reincarnate, my heart beating madly against my chest. It refused to part away from this doe-eyed, black-haired fair maiden.

“Doesn’t matter,” she replied and turned around to leave.

However, I caught her wrist just in time and spun her around, so that she crashed into my bare chest.

Her long, slender fingers slid along the ridges of my hard chest as she stabilized herself. Tingles sparked everywhere she touched and I swear the deadliest lycan on this planet purred in my head.

Her breath hitched when I suddenly held her chin, our lips hanging dangerously close to each other’s.

“I asked you something, omega,” my deep, authoritative voice boomed out.

The delicate beauty shuddered in my arms and whispered, “It doesn’t matter who I am. Save your life and your special one’s life while you can. The wolves will kill you if they find you here.”

At that exact moment, as if to prove her point, a thunderous growl resounded from the depths of the forest.

“Go!” She whispered again.

Torn between staying a few more moments with her and running for my life, I finally conceded to her wishes, but not before placing my royal insignia in her…calloused palms. Strange. How could a lovely she-wolf like herself have such rough palms? Was she a hardened warrior?  

“If you ever find yourself in any kind of trouble, find me. Find Sebastian Longstone, Prince of the Golden Lycan Pack,” I said, and firmly closed her palm over the prized symbol of royalty.

Her soulful black eyes widened in shock and I took that opportunity to place a soft, chaste kiss on her parted lips, “See you soon, Belle (beauty). Don’t forget this beast,” I winked and mingled with the blowing wind to vanish from the spot.

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