~~~~~~I had closed my eyes in hell, giving the rest of myself, all that I was over to the man I knew would fulfill the task that I had set out to do. Lachlan would bring my daughter happiness. He was giving her a family. He had already given her everything she had missed out on in her former life.As I closed my eyes, I felt peace, knowing they were going to be fine. I felt peace, knowing that my greatest accomplishment was finally seen through to the end. I felt peace….because I knew I could finally be with her. I could finally join my love. I had closed my eyes in hell, and I opened them again in the light. The light around me was brilliant, so brilliant I instantly knew where I was. There was no sun. No moon. No definition of time. There was just the light, and all the good the light had to offer. None of the pain and heartache of the mortal world could be felt in this place. My feet pressed into the soft, vibrant grass, like a pillowy carpet and without the harshness of weeds
Elelira POVTonight is the night. It’s finally the night I turn 20. Just 5 more minutes, and my husband, now ex-husband, of the past 2 years will learn the truth. It’s too late to change the past. It’s too late to go back and fix all the wrongs I have had to endure in this forced marriage of the past 2 years. He claimed he was searching for his mate; searching for the one he was fated to, while unknowingly married to her. Neglection, adultery, verbal and mental abuse are just a few of the things I’ve been forced to endure, but that all ends tonight. The treaty agreement is breached. It has been two years of our marriage, and just like he and my uncle agreed, if no child was produced in 2 years, he would be free to divorce me and choose another. I never revealed to my uncle that the man he forced me on had never touched me. In the 2 years living in the coastal, castle-like packhouse, he has brought many women into his bedchambers, but none of them were ever me. I knew. I knew the m
The moment my magic is upon me, I feel as if my entire body is engulfed in light, my hair lifting and twirling with the rush that comes from my inner mana breaking open inside me. It’s flowing through my limbs, to the tips of my bare toes, my fingers, even seeping into every lock of my hair. I am fae, and with my magic unlocked, I know he can feel it. He can feel the bond, but it’s too late. I won’t have him.His eyes went wide, his mouth went to the ground as he sank to his knees. As I get my bearings once again, I quickly scan the room, and see others in a pose much similar to Lachlan’s, scared of the light and the magical aura that emanated from me. Even Nilo leaned against the wall in surprise, shock evident on his face. “You, Elelira, you...you are….” Lachlan stumbled over his words, coming to terms with what had just occurred. I can see the understanding and recognition in his eyes. He feels it, the mate bond, but it’s too late. “I was your mate, the mate you claimed to be
Lachlan POV“Any sign?” I asked Nilo as he walked up to where I'd been standing at the docks for hours now. When my guilt and my sorrow become too overwhelming, this is where I find myself, in this very spot, staring out at the sea. She was gloriously beautiful, from her glowing hair to her broad, translucent fins, glimmering in the setting sunlight. That last sight of her before she dove beneath the water’s surface has been haunting my dreams for months now.“No, Alpha. The ocean is too great. We will never find her, I’m afraid. I am sorry, but I don’t think there is any hope.”No. There will never be hope of her return after the pain I put her through. I can see that now.“I told you,” Killian, my lycan snarls in my mind, “I warned you, begging you to be kind. You ruined everything. She was what we were looking for, but you turned her against us forever. She will never return. And….I don’t blame her. I just hope she finds the happiness she deserves. The happiness that she never fo
I don’t know how, and I don’t know why, but I’m back in time. I traveled back to right before the wedding to Lachlan. I don’t know what I did wrong. I thought I was ending it all. I thought I was finally going to find freedom and peace in death. I guess even that is too much to ask for. Here I am, back at the beginning of my hellish marriage. “You look so beautiful, Elelira, dear,” Mimi coos as the omega doing my hair finishes pinning the last tendril in place. “Ela. You can call me Ela,” I told her with a warm smile as I stared back at her reflection in the mirror. Her soft, wrinkled cheeks glow a soft pink as she smiles back, an all too familiar motherly smile. I loved Niomi, my Mimi, because she always smiled at me this way, filling that motherly void. When I needed support through the first year of my marriage, before I had completely closed myself off to my husband for good, she was there, holding the pieces of me together, then showing me that motherly smile, telling me how
“Elelira? Ela!” Mimi calls out to me, snapping me out of the memory. “Yes?” I met her eyes in the mirror as a look of concern masked her face. “Are you alright, child? Is something not to your liking? We can change the accessories if you-”“No, no. It’s fine,” I smiled at her. I take in my appearance; my youthful face, no longer containing the heavy bags under my no longer dull eyes from all the nights of fretful sleep. My glowing skin, unmarred by the harsh elements that I had to battle daily the last year of my marriage to supply my own firewood, food, doing my own laundry in the stream a mile inland so as not to disturb the maids. Lachlan made it clear I was not his true Luna and could not order his staff as I pleased. I hated that trek to wash my laundry. Without proper shoes to travel across the rocky landscape, my feet would be blistered and bleeding as I came back every time. Mimi would take care of all that for me when she was alive, being able to order the maids and staff
Elelira POVAs Mimi and my escort walk me to the room where my uncle waits for me, I retreat into my shell of numbness, going on autopilot until this whole ordeal is over. I suspect numbness will be a constant for me again, since the pains of my husband’s betrayal will begin tonight. Val whimpers at the memory. She was locked inside my mind, enduring it with me, her heart shattering over and over along with mine. It was his human side having the affair. His lycan had no part, which was the hardest for Val. She could never extinguish that hope for her mate because she could never know if Lachlan’s lycan was in agreement with that action. This marriage right now was entirely to his human side, so she was trying her best to retreat into the darkest corner of my mind and wait in sorrow until it was over. When we entered the room, and my eyes landed on my uncle and his men, I tried to maintain my numbness and not outwardly show my disgust and discomfort. Some of the very men that tort
Lachlan POV“She knows,” Killian whimpers, “She remembers everything. She hates us.”“She can’t. She can’t hate us entirely. We’re her mate,” I tell him, but that doesn’t stop the fear from rising up inside me. She can’t hate me. I can’t lose her again. If she rejects me again, I would rather die than try living without her. I know what life without her is like. I know what living with the pulsating pain of regret constantly residing in my chest is like. I can’t live without her. I won’t. Her hesitation at our vows makes knots form in my stomach, and acid rises in my throat. The bitterness of reality matches its taste. When her father placed all the rules on me, rules I made a blood promise not to break, I never thought he would bring her back with her memories intact as well. This should have been easy. We could have lived blissfully in love for years until the mate bond fully revealed itself, then I could have marked and mated her with no stipulations. Now….I’m going to have to