Unusual Mate

History Books

Athens POV

It had been a week since I had found out I am a witch. I had discovered my dad is a werewolf and I am something similar.

I had been having many conversations with Azriel and understanding her. She is very caring of me.

Apparently, she has all my same memories. She knows about Aleksandr's father and everything that had happened. She's very protective of me. She explained how incredibly useless she felt back then.

I felt her regret, but I explained to her that it made me stronger.

I think.

Today, I am with my mother in her office. I had never been allowed in here before. It isn't a regular office though. She has spell books, candles, herbs, and so much more here. It is truly a witches room.

It had taken me three days to convince my mother to teach me about being a witch. She was really reluctant at first, but soon I was able to convince her.

Mostly, my learning consisted of reading and studying the history of my bloodline. There wasn't any hands on learning. Just a lot of dusty pages.

I was getting frustrated.

"When do I get to do some real learning?" I asked my mother like a whinny teenager.

"When you have learned all the histories," she stated in a mater-of-fact tone.

I rolled my eyes. I wish I had learned this all a long time ago.

"Maybe I would already know this all if you had never hid this from me," I mumbled to myself.

"What was that?" she asked.

"Nothing," I said perking up.

If Aleksandr is like me, I promise to never hide this world from him.

Then that made me think. I turned back to my mother who was now pulling down more books for me to read.

"Is Alek like us?" I asked her.

She stopped in her tracks. I could see her expression. She looked like the thought was hard to decipher.

"I have no idea honestly, Athena." She went back to grabbing books.

"How would we know?" I was now curious.

She brought me a stack of books. "When he reaches his sixteenth birthday," she said and turned to walk out of the room.

Witches and warlocks received their powers on the night of their sixteenth birthdays. All except for me. Which was still a mystery.

I looked at the titles of the books she handed me. All of them were more about the histories. A few were books on the origin of practice. I had already read these books. I felt like I had read everything there was on this subject.

I looked toward the door. Closed.

I got up and started looking around the room. I wanted something more interesting to read.

'Beginnings of Practice' was a book I found while looking around. It was a wornout blue book with silver writing. I took it and sat down.

I was reading the book when my mom entered the room with lunch. I jumped from my reading.

"I did not give you that," she sounded angry.

"No. I got it for myself. I am tired of reading the same books over and over again. I am older than most witches that already are practicing!" I was shouting.

"Oh are you? How do you know that? You know many witches?" she was being sarcastic. This fueled my fury.

"You have me reading all about this stuff. It is in the books. Eighteen. Most are eighteen. I am twenty-two!"

"You're not ready."

"I don't think you get to decide that anymore," I was now flaming with rage.

"I get to choose. You know nothing of this. When I think you're ready, then you will start practicing," she said.

That was it.

Suddenly the books stacked on the desk caught fire. We both turned towards the flames. I was shocked. My mother, she was visibly freaking out.

"Put it out Athena!" she shouted at me.

I went to grab a bucket of water. As I stepped to go, my mother stopped me. She grabbed my arm, not looking at me.

"No. The same way to u started it," she said.

"What?" I asked. I did not understand what she meant.

"With your mind. You were angry with me, correct?"

I nodded my head in response.

"Then you started the fire with your anger. You can put it out. Just focus on the flames and put it out," she said.

"How?" I asked.

"Think about the flames dying down. They will go out," she said.

I looked at the flames. My mother let go of my arm and I focused while closing my eyes. I imagined the flames getting smaller and smaller until there was only smoke and ash.

When I opened my eyes again, the fames were gone. Only ash and the smell of smoke lingered.

"I did it," I said excitedly.

My mother walked to the window to open and let the smoke smell out. "Yes."

"I can't believe it. My first power!" I was now jumping in joy.

My mothered sighed and just glared at me.

"You need to control yourself. Your feelings," she said.

"I am sorry mom. I did not mean to do that," all key excitement was gone. Out the window with the smoke.

"No need to apologize. I guess since your powers are showing faster than I expected, we can start practice training. Besides, you burned the histories," she said a bit annoyed.

I felt my cheeks burn with embarrassment.

"I am so sorry mom," I said.

"It is fine. I will go to the library for more," she said.

"Library?" I was confused.

I had never seen books like hers in the library. They had books on the lore of witches and the human history of witches. There just was not anything as detailed about the truth.

My mother exited the room and I followed her. She locked the office door and we went to the kitchen to eat.

My mother continued the conversation, "The elders. They have a library with our books. You will come with me. They may have answers for us about you."

"When will we go?" I asked nervously.

"Two days from now. I must set up a meeting with them,"she said.

I was glad to have time to mentally prepare. I had read that the elders were ruthless and merciless when punishing witches and warlocks.

Many stories mentioned stripping of powers. There were stories of torture and burnings of witches that misused their powers. That was not even the worst.

One witch used her power for pure evil. She had consumed the world in darkness and had planned on wiping out humans forever.

She was now locked in a cavern full of enchanted water. This water kept her from dying, from using her powers, or freeing herself. She would drown eternally.

No one can release her except a power stronger than the elders. As far as history shows, that kind of power has never existed. It never would.

I did, however, want answers about my powers. About me being a hybrid. My mother said it was unheard of and there were no stories about hybrids in the books. It was my main mission to learn when reading.

I still didn't know what kind of shifter I was. Even Azriel did not know. She said we would find out when we shifted and that would happen once we found our mate.

I still was not sure what that meant.

My mother said her and my dad were mates but not by the goddess. They were mates by choice.

My dad had a mate that died a long time ago. He never found another one. He met my mother shortly after she had me and they fell in love. He had stopped searching for his mate and married her. He had decided to protect us. That was now his only mission in life.

Because he had chosen this life, my dad was marked as a rogue wolf. Banished from his pack.

I had learned so much about my family and their past that I had never known.

I now knew more about werewolves and witches than I did about myself.

My life was now a fully complicated mess.