The Mate I Was Never Meant To Have

The Lost Heir

"Your Majesty, the lost heir at last returns."

Like a thunderclap, the words hung ponderously in the air, echoing off the stone walls.

I first gazed blankly at the elderly man, then turned to Lucien before turning back to the elderly man. I most certainly misheard him. The clear ridiculousness of what was said caused my chest to tighten.

"You have the wrong person," I murmured, my voice hardly above a whisper.

Keeping his gaze fixed on my face, the elderly man gently got up to his feet.

"No," he mumbled, his voice quivering with a peculiar, deep respect. "I doubt I do."

I shook my head and wrapped the thick furs more closely about myself.

"You're wrong. Absolutely wrong."

"I'm not."

My stomach knotted from the absolute conviction in his voice.

Lucien stayed totally quiet all throughout the exchange. Standing close to the fireplace, he stared intently and calculatingly at me as though he were examining the components of a difficult problem that had unexpectedly come together.

With a deep, respectful bow, the old man laid a shaky, weak hand over his heart.

"I'm Aldric. I am Lycan Kingdom's Royal historian."

I frowned. The name sounded utterly foreign.

"Royal historian?"

"Yes, that's right." Aldric moved a little closer, his eyes sparkling with unsaid tears. "You have her eyes, little one. Queen Selene's eyes.

Hearing the name once more made my heart rate speed up. Images from my fever dream in the woods flashed behind my eyelids: the obsidian throne, the silver crown, the dreamy woman with eyes like starlight. Could there actually be a connection, or was the weight of my suffering ultimately driving me insane?

"No," I said loudly, and so dismissed the idea flatly. It was not possible. Aria Nightshade was an orphan, an omega, a nobody who spent her days scrubbed down in the kitchens of Mooncrest. She was not royalty, not a forgotten princess, and most surely not unique.

At last Lucien ended his silence.

"Explain, Aldric." That one word had enough weight to immediately control the room.

Aldric gave a nod.

"As you wish, Your Majesty." He turned back to me. "The Moonborn Dynasty vanished entirely two decades ago."

Though against my will, I listened. Everyone in the territories knew bits of that history. Moonborn Royals were ancient mythology, the kind of bedtime tales moms told their kids to encourage proper behavior. These were not actual history, and they were most likely insignificant.

"They ruled long before the contemporary pack system was ever developed," Aldric went on, his voice falling into the regular rhythm of a storyteller. "The first real royal bloodline, blessed by the Moon Goddess herself. Queen Selene Moonborn was the last one to rule. She vanished amid the heat of the major civil war. Many thought she died, but others whispered she had sneaked her infant child to safety."

"And you truly believe I am that child?" I asked as I crossed my arms.

"No," Aldric murmured gently, his face softening in compassion. "I think you are her daughter. The lost heir."

The silence that came after was terrible. I wished to chuckle at the absurdity of the assertion.

"The Mooncrest Pack raised me. Everyone there is aware of my background."

"You were found as an infant outside their borders," Aldric answered softly. "Am I wrong?"

"What does that prove?"

"It implies nobody truly knows where you came from, Aria." Lucien answered from the shadows before the historian could react.

I knew deep down that he was correct, thus the words hit me like a physical blow. Nobody in Mooncrest had ever given me a direct response regarding my ancestry. There were no birth records, no living relatives, no explanation. Just a nameless baby left close to the border patrol line twenty years ago, whom the pack accepted out of basic responsibility.

For the first time in her life, a seed of real uncertainty took root in my head. Getting closer, Aldric pointed gently toward my hands.

"You saw the symbols that showed up on your skin last night, right?"

I swallowed thickly.

"Yes. What exactly are they?"

"The Moon Sigils," Aldric murmured. "They are a physical embodiment of ancient secrets. Just people bearing the royal line's pure, unadulterated blood can show them."

My chest constricted to the point of discomfort.

"No..."

"Yes, little one."

"No," my voice cracked and waves of panic swept over me. I could not tolerate this. If this elderly man was being truthful, then every single thing I had ever believed about myself—my uselessness, my identity, my complete life—was a lie.

A loud thud slashed the growing anxiety, and a Lycan guard entered the chamber, instantly kneeling before Lucien. "Your Royal Highness."

Lucien nodded tersely.

"Report."

The guard paused, then turned a quick, erratic look toward me before turning back to his monarch.

"Our scouts near the Mooncrest boundary have just sent us information."

My heart skipped a beat.

"What happened? Did the pack survive the attack?"

"The rogue assault was successfully repelled, milady," the guard responded anxiously. "But... the future Alpha recently released a formal, regional proclamation."

Lucien narrowed his golden eyes and crossed his arms across his chest.

"Carry on."

The guard breathed steadily.

"Kael Blackwood has openly announced Aria Nightshade as a traitor to the pack."

The room went totally chilly. I felt as though the breath had been forcefully knocked from my lungs.

"What?" I whispered, gazing expressionlessly at the soldier.

"He claims you worked with the rogue pack to plan the assault on the village square", the guard said, looking very uncomfortable.

My could only gaze at him, my brain totally failing to handle the allegation. "Worked? With the same things that tried to kill me?" I thought to herself. The allegation was totally made up, a cruel lie meant to ruin what little of my life I had remaining.

Lucien's face grew dark; a low, dangerous rumble vibrated in his chest. "Interesting," he murmured.

"This is really terrible!" Aldric flushed with rage, his face red. "A clear effort to conceal his own cowardice."

I could hardly hear them above the buzz in my ears. Kael had finished this. That he had turned me down in front of all was acquaintances was insufficient. He was now methodically destroying my reputation, transforming me into an outlaw so I could never come back.

A sudden, sharp heat started to show itself in the middle of my chest. This was something else completely; it wasn't the excruciating, empty pain of a fractured mate bond. It was raw, unstable, and blindingly hot. It was rage.

I genuinely despised Kael Blackwood for the first time in my life.

"Alright," I heard Lucien say to me.

I blinked, briefly breaking out of my rage.

"What?"

"Anger is good. It shows you're still yourself." Lucien said in his deep voice, with a hint of humor. "It suggests you still want to fight."

The statement surprised me totally. Anyone else in Mooncrest would have urged me to apologize, stay modest, or suffer my fate. Lucien, however, did not regard me as a shattered omega.

He turned back toward the great windows, his hands clasped behind his back,

"The real question we should be asking is not why Kael turned you down."

My jaw squeezed.

"Then what is it?"

Lucien turned his head, his sparkling golden eyes fastening onto me with total intensity.

"The question is, why is the future Alpha of Mooncrest suddenly so terrified of you?"

I stopped moving. Afraid? The notion appeared rather upside down. Kael hated me; he didn't fear me. He looked at me with disgust.

Lucien didn't seem bothered by my unbelieve.

"Think about it logically," he urged, moving toward me. "He publically embarrasses you, dismisses you, then, within hours of your disappearing into the woods, he builds a huge, territorial-wide lie to brand you a traitor. Aria, those are not the determined actions of a confident leader. Those are the desperate, crazy things a guy will do to get rid of a threat."

Slowly, the understanding sunk strongly in my stomach. Is Lucien correct? Was Kael keeping something much darker than a hatred for an omega partner?

Before I could ask the question, a strong electric shock shot across my right forearm. I gasped and grabbed my wrist as a bright, searing silver light shot across my skin once more.

The geometric symbols appeared right away, shining so brightly that they lit up the whole bedroom. Suddenly, from nowhere, a strong gust of wind appeared and whirled across the room. The thick velvet curtains flew furiously, furniture clanked against the stone floor, and the glass in the enormous windows vibrated violently.

While Lucien's eyes widened in real surprise, Aldric instantly fell to his knees and buried his face in his hands.

And then the unthinkable occurred. The silver markings really flew off my skin, separated from my flesh and drifting around me like a galaxy of live stars. One particular glyph sprung to a stop in the middle of the room, displaying a vivid, three-dimensional image into the air as they circled slowly and hypnotically.

I ceased breathing.

A lady appeared out of the light. She was gorgeous, with a regal, commanding presence and subtle silver crown crowning her dark hair. She was the same lady I had seen in the woods. It was Queen Selene.

As if the twenty-year gap between us counted utterly nothing, the projection of the old queen gazed straight at me, her starlight eyes filled with a deep, terrible melancholy.

"My daughter," the queen whispered, her voice having a eerie, ghostly quality.

Tears dropped over my lashes and ran down my cheeks. I was unable to move or talk. The whole castle seemed to vanish, leaving only me and the mother I had never known.

The queen gave a weak, agonizing smile.

"If you are seeing this recording, then I have fallen short in my last obligation to protect you." The projection moved just a bit, the silver light flickering like water. "My name is Selene Moonborn. You have been hidden away in the hopes that you would live a quiet, unremarkable life, free from the bloodshed of our family. However, one cannot reject the blood indefinitely. I love you, my sweet girl."

I reached a shaking hand toward the light, heart shattering for a ghost. Suddenly, the queen's expression turned incredibly urgent, the image distorting with static.

"Listen carefully to me. You are under extreme threat. Your power seal has fractured, and they will follow the surge. You have to trust nobody. Not even—"

The room was broken by a brutal, loud bang. The picture broke fiercely into a thousand beams of light, the old symbols fading back into thin air. Darkness fell back into the room.

With my hand still floating in the air and my chest heaving, I gazed at the empty space. 'Trust no one. Not even who?' The warning had been stopped at the most important moment.

"Not even Kael? Not even Lucien? Not even the ones right here?" I thought within myself.

A deep, resounding horn from the fortress's outside walls had interrupted the queen's last words before anybody could grasp them.

Three drawn-out, excruciating sounds shook the stone foundation.

Suddenly the room's atmosphere changed. Lucien became totally stiff, his nonchalant attitude disappearing as his whole presence sharpened into something deadly and predatory.

"What is that?" I asked, my voice shaking.

The massive wooden door flew open and a Lycan sentry stumbled into the room, his face totally pale and covered in sweat.

"Your Majesty!"

Lucien kept looking ahead, his voice falling into a lethal growl.

"Report."

The soldier gulped heavily, grasping his sword's hilt.

"The northern border defenses have just been breached."

Aldric panted, his hands flying to cover his mouth.

"By Whom? Who would dare assault the Lycan capital?"

The sentry paused, his panicked gaze drifting over to me before he at last pushed the words out.

"Sir, the Crimson Order."

For the first time since I had seen him, a flash of real, unadulterated fear flashed across Lucien's face. He stared at me, his golden eyes wide with a terrible, quick realization.

"She's been found."

My heart fell into my shoes.

"Found whom? What is the Crimson Order."

Not one person responded to me. They were not obliged. The room's deep, frantic silence clearly revealed the truth. The invaders were neither attempting to dethrone the Lycan King nor start a war against the city. They were coming for me.