LOGIN"Fate can only do little"
***
ELMA.✿
"I would like someone kind, soft and nurturing," I began finally finding my voice after the deafening silence that sat between us.
"Kind and nurturing," The moon goddess mused, her voice sounding as though she was jotting it down and taking notes. I could not help but feel tempted to turn and look.
'Be careful, you don't want to push your luck,' I sighed, warning myself
"But at the same time, merciless and aggressive," i mumbled, more to myself, hoping that she had not heard me.
I was fully aware of how contrasting my demands were, but oh, it lit up a fire inside me. I hadn't thought about this properly before. This was the first time I was thinking about my likes and dislikes in a person.
More like I was finally given a chance to voice out my hidden emotions and to a safe person, the moon goddess would not judge me, right?
Otherwise, I generally dated whoever I found mateless, and that was a minuscule population that was constantly vanishing. So I didn't really ever have a choice. I went with whatever I got, and that always ended up in me being dumped and feeling hurt.
"Aggressive," The moon goddess muttered, a strange infliction in her voice. I didn't pay much attention to that and continued.
"I want someone who will treat me like I am the most fragile thing on this earth, but at the same time, I want them to be rough and overly possessive with me.
I want someone who would let me be myself but, at the same time, call me out on my shit and set me straight whenever I cross any line.
I want someone who praises but punishes me, too.
I want someone who burns for me but at the same time cannot live without me.
I want someone who craves me so much that it'll hurt them
to live without me for even one day.
I want someone who sees my best and worst and yet accepts me with an open heart.
I want someone who makes my heart flutter, with thousands of butterflies, and my pussy ache every time I look at them.
I want someone who supports me no matter what.
I want someone who will follow me to hell if that's the place I wish to go.
I want someone who's so damned obsessed with me that their only goal in life is to please me, pleasure me, and make me quiver with need every time they touch and look at me because my need for them is their only source of sustenance.
I want someone who makes me laugh every day and makes me cry with pleasure every night for the rest of my life.
I want someone who is generous and giving, but they are greedy when it's their turn to derive pleasure.
I want someone who worships me like their life depends on my blessings but at the same time ravages me like they own every part of me.
I want someone who loves me so much that I feel so full every fucking time,"
I was still surprised to feel the presence of the goddess behind me when I was done speaking. I thought she might have left in the middle because no one had any time for a crying camilla like me, but she was there, listening, and it gave me some sort of comfort.
It'd be okay if I didn't end up getting what I wanted, but for once, I was glad that I was able to get the all off my chest instead of just burying it down and only wishing. At least now, I knew that I had asked even if I didn't end up with it.
"Hmm... that's quite a lot," the moon goddess commented, a hint of something unreadable in her voice. I tilted my head to the side to listen more closely to her. "But I hear you,
"Thanks for listening," I sighed deeply.
"I will see what I can do," She told me, her voice hardened all of a sudden, "But I am afraid there will be a condition,'
I froze.
A condition.
Of course. What did I expect? That I could just summon a goddess and ask her for a mate, and that will happen all like that? No. Everything came at a price.
"What condition?" I inquired, struggling to get my nerves into a ball.
"It's simple but might not be easy for you.." she trailed off, her voice somewhat unfocused. "Whatever I must give you, you shall accept without a question,"
I found her words strange. Everyone accepted their mates. I had hardly heard of rejections. They happened, but they were quite rare, and for a moment, this made me wonder if I would end up being one of those unfortunate select few who end up getting rejected.
Suddenly, my heart ached. No. I wouldn't be able to take that.
Every relationship I've ever had so far has always ended bitterly for me. Whether it be friends, family or my couple of boyfriends. Everyone always left me. What was the guarantee that my mate wouldn't? The idea scared me.
Why cannot I just catch a break for once? What did I do to deserve such pain and loneliness?
"I will accept my mate," I told her sternly, earning a mocking laugh from her. At that moment, I wondered if I was doing the right thing by asking her to pair me. I didn't miss the cruel tone in her laugh. Was this her way of giving me new sources of pain in my life?
"You must keep your word," She stated darkly, taking a step closer to me. A chill ran down my spine. The energies oozing out of her subdued my senses and threatened to overpower me. I felt so weak at that moment that without realizing it, I dropped to my knees.
"I..I will," I breathed, feeling light headed. In response, she laughed that mocking laugh out loud until the voice echoed throughout the woods. The night air suddenly turned so chilly that it made me shiver. Black dots were starting to appear in my vision while the rest of my body started to feel weaker.
I collapsed on the floor, my head hitting the ground and pain seared through my head. My body seemed to be growing colder with every passing second, but at the same time, it felt like I was burning.
I had never experienced something like this before. As my consciousness continued to fade away, I felt the presence of the goddess lingering around me.
"Sleep my child," I heard her whisper as I swam in darkness,
"Get all the sleep you can before they find you,"
They? Who was she talking about? What did she mean by that? I wish I could ask her that, but it was too late already.
Chapter: The Day the Mountain Came SouthElma’s POVThe summer arrived quietly.No grand announcement.No storm breaking over the hills.Just warmth settling into the land one morning and refusing to leave.The orchard was heavy with fruit. Branches bowed beneath olives and figs. Bees drifted lazily between wildflowers. The grove hummed with life.I should have been happy.Instead, I was restless.I noticed it first in the mornings.I would wake before dawn and sit on the porch with a cup of tea, staring at the road.Not waiting.At least that’s what I told myself.Just looking.Just thinking.Just remembering.The lie became harder to believe with each passing day.Because every time a rider appeared on the distant path, my heart betrayed me.And every time it wasn’t him, I felt foolish.I was old enough to know better.Old enough to understand that people built lives elsewhere.Old enough to know that love—whatever shape it took—didn’t always mean proximity.Yet some stubborn part o
Elma’s POVThe first thing I noticed that spring was how the orchard did not ask permission to survive.It simply did.The trees that had once stood bare and skeletal were now filled with stubborn green, their branches thickening again as if the world had decided—after everything that it was still worth continuing.I stood at the edge of the grove with my hands buried in soil that smelled alive again.Not healed.Not whole.Just… alive.Behind me, the cottage creaked softly as Harlan moved inside. He had grown quieter over the months. Not sad, exactly. More like someone learning how to live inside a memory without letting it consume him.The girl no, not a girl anymore , had left for the northern settlements three weeks ago. She said she wanted to “see what the world looks like when it isn’t filtered through books.”I told her she would come back changed.She smiled and said that was the point.Everyone was leaving.Everyone was becoming something else.Except me.Or so I thought.The
Chapter: The First Winter Without HerKaelen’s POVThe wind in the Western Crags did not whisper—it judged.It came down the jagged slopes like a living thing, cold and sharp, cutting through wool and skin alike, testing bone and breath. Kaelen felt it the moment he crossed the High Pass, when the last scent of olive groves faded and the air turned thin with stone and memory.He did not look back.Not because he didn’t want to—but because Elma had taught him something simple and unyielding: A man who walks forward carries more than a man who lingers behind.Still, he felt it.The weight of the bundle in his pack.The iron key against his ribs.And something else—something softer, harder to name.The memory of a woman who had remade the world with quiet hands.---### The Council of HornsThe Western Crags rose like broken teeth against the sky, their peaks crowned with ice that never melted. The settlement itself clung to the mountainside in layers—stone upon stone, built not with gra
Kaelen’s POVThe wind in the Western Crags did not whisper—it judged.It came down the jagged slopes like a living thing, cold and sharp, cutting through wool and skin alike, testing bone and breath. Kaelen felt it the moment he crossed the High Pass, when the last scent of olive groves faded and the air turned thin with stone and memory.He did not look back.Not because he didn’t want to—but because Elma had taught him something simple and unyielding: A man who walks forward carries more than a man who lingers behind.Still, he felt it.The weight of the bundle in his pack.The iron key against his ribs.And something else—something softer, harder to name.The memory of a woman who had remade the world with quiet hands.---### The Council of HornsThe Western Crags rose like broken teeth against the sky, their peaks crowned with ice that never melted. The settlement itself clung to the mountainside in layers—stone upon stone, built not with grace, but with endurance.Kaelen’s arriv
Elmas povThe transition from autumn to winter in the south was a subtle thing, marked not by the arrival of snow, but by the sharpening of the wind and the deepening of the shadows in the grove.Kaelen had changed. The boy who had arrived with a stolen coin and a heavy heart had become a man of quiet, deliberate action. He spent his mornings with Harlan, learning the language of the stone and the timber, and his afternoons with me, learning the language of the long-game. He was no longer just a pupil; he was a bridge.But a bridge is only as strong as the banks it connects, and the Western Crags were calling for their son.The Departure"The letter came this morning," Kaelen said, standing by the hearth. He held a piece of parchment sealed with a wax stamp I hadn't seen in years—the twisted ram’s horn of the Western Elders. "My father is failing. They want me to return to the Crags. Not as an Alpha, but as a Counselor."I looked up from the bowl of olives I was sorting. The oil made
The years had taught me that peace wasn’t a destination; it was a maintenance project. Like the irrigation lines or the stone walls that bounded our grove, it required constant tending, or the wild would find its way back in.Kaelen had been with us for three months. He was a quick study, his hands losing their soft, aristocratic pallor and taking on the rough, stained texture of the earth. He didn't ask about the brothers often. He watched. He watched how Harlan and I spoke without raising our voices. He watched how we shared the harvest with the neighboring farms, not because a law demanded it, but because a hungry neighbor was a threat to everyone's stability.But the mountain had a long memory, and it seemed it wasn't done sending messengers.The Shadow in the GroveIt happened on a Tuesday, when the air was so still you could hear the buzz of a cicada from three fields away.I was thinning the peach trees, the sweet, fuzzy skin of the fruit cool against my palms, when the dogs st
Chapter 3: The Empty Grave[Lulu’s POV]I didn't wait for the bus. I didn't wait for Jules to finish her interrogation in the locker room, and I definitely didn't wait for Benny or Caspian to catch up to me. I ran. I ran all the way to my dad’s car in the parking lot, and I sat in the passenger sea
The descent from the High Pass was a journey through a graveyard of clouds.The air was too thin to carry the weight of what had happened. My lungs burned, not from the cold, but from the emptiness of the silence behind me. I didn't look back. I couldn't. If I looked back, I would see the two broth
The cave at the High Pass smelled of ancient stone and the metallic tang of fresh blood. Outside, the wind howled—a predatory sound that seemed to be hunting for the survivors huddled within.We had made it. Barely.Roshan lay on a bed of furs near the back of the cavern, his skin the color of parc
ElmaThe ascent was a slow, rhythmic torture.The High Pass was less of a road and more of a jagged scar across the face of the mountains. To our left, the rock rose in a sheer, unforgiving wall of granite; to our right, the world simply ended in a vertical drop that swallowed the mist of the valle







