Two Halves of a Whole

Chapter 15

Sattira sat with Lugos for dinner. His parents weren’t at the table but Beta William and his mate Lucy were there as well as Brad and Cara along with some others who’s names she didn’t catch. Sattira was too distracted with worrying about the call with her parents. Lugos watched her push the food around her plate as she half listened to everyone around her talk until his plate was empty.

“Are you almost done?” He didn’t want to be rude but at the same time he wanted to meet with his parents so he could let her know what was going on.

“Yeah, I am not really that hungry,” she told him as she started to get up to take her dishes back to the cart set up beside the kitchen door for the kitchen for pack members to drop off their dirty dishes so kitchen staff wouldn’t have to walk around the dining hall collecting them.

“We can go meet with my father in his office. We have something really important to talk with you about.” He waited for her to ask what it was about but was disappointed as she was distracted and wasn’t really paying attention.

They walked to his father’s office in silence. He knocked on the door and waited for someone to mind link him permission to enter. Once they were inside with the door closed his father started talking.

“What we are about to talk about cannot leave this office. We don’t know if there are spies in the pack or who sabotaged our security systems,” his father started by saying. “Sattira, we have reason to believe the attack on our pack was done by the pack your father came from.”

“What? My father’s pack?” She was shocked. Why would they just happen to attack the pack she was staying in. Was in a coincidence?

“After the attack my son discovered a spy in our pack house. When she was questioned she told us some disturbing things. I sent Beta William and his mate to investigate before we told you because I didn’t want to upset you if it turned out the information was false. He just got back to me with information that backs up what I was told by the spy we have sitting in our holding cell.”

“Who is this spy? What do they have to do with my father’s pack?” She found herself asking.

“She was planting listening devices in the pack house when Lugos realized she was dressed in one of our personal staff uniforms.” The Alpha said. “Since we make it a habit to know all our personal staff and they are the only ones allowed on our ranked members personal living quarters he immediately brought it to my attention and we apprehended her. I recorded the interrogation and I will play it for you but I need you to stay calm.”

He waited for her to give her nod showing she understood and agreed to stay calm before turning the computer screen so she could see the video from where the girl, who was probably her cousin, answered their questions. Lugos watched as the anger started to show on her face as she realized that the girl called her birth mother an abomination. He could feel her anger in the air around him and it shocked him. Though higher ranked wolves could project their feelings this was different. The air around her seemed to crackle with magic. He reached for her hand to comfort her. She held it like it was a life line. The air around her seemed to clear as his touch soothed her and Lugos prayed that no one else felt it.

“So if the people her father killed were my parents and her father was my father’s brother, would that make her my cousin?” Sattira was slowly starting to piece together the things she heard from the video. The hurt and confusion clear on her face.

“I sent my Beta to investigate the Dark Moon Pack. The current Alpha took power when his older brother and his brother’s mate disappeared. They had their newborn daughter with them and it wasn’t anything in the records about where they were headed or why.” Alpha Stephan watched her face as he gave her the information his Beta had given him.

He handed her copies of the birth announcement showing the picture of a woman who had the same green eyes and mahogany red hair she had holding a baby with strands of mahogany red hair atop her head as a man who looked a lot like Sattira held her in his arms. They both looked so happy. Sattira realized the woman was wearing a locket.

“That’s my locket,” she said as she pulled the locket from under her shirt for everyone to see. “It was one of the only things that survived the crash.”

“So then it is fairly certain that you are the rightful Alpha of Dark Moon Pack,” Alpha Stephan told her.

He handed her a copy of her birth certificate. Her birth parents were Russell and Eva Dire. She was born in New Mexico. Why were her parents in Texas? And why did the locket her mother was wearing have her name on it?

“Why did they call my mother an abomination?” Sattira asked.

“I am not sure about that. We couldn’t find anything on your birth mother before she mated your father,” the Alpha told her.

He handed her a copies of pictures of her parents taken from different events. There was one of her father at his Alpha ceremony. She thought he was such a handsome looking man. There was one with a sour looking man who looked like her father and was about the same age. The caption beneath the picture in the article claimed the sour looking man was his brother, Eric Dire. There was an article announcing that the Alpha and Luna of Dark Moon were missing, it showed a picture of Eric Dire and his mate Vallorie. Sattira noticed that they didn’t look too distraught over the fact his supposed ‘beloved brother’ was missing. There were copies of articles showing Eric Dire taking over as Alpha and his mate’s Luna ceremony. The announcement of the birth of their daughter, Michelle. The party they held when their daughter, who they now called Shelly, when she had her first shift.

An article claiming that the Dark Moon Pack was cursed (although it was buried in the back of a paper that covered numerous packs in North America. The person covered Shelly’s first shift and called it ‘the least notable moment he had ever covered’ as he claimed, ‘though her wolf was larger than an omega it was shamefully small for the child of an alpha.’ He went on to insinuate that maybe her father wasn’t truly the alpha of the pack. He didn’t clarify if he thought her father wasn’t Eric Dire or if he thought Eric unworthy to be the alpha but there were other things in the article that were definitely a jab at Eric Dire. The article talked about the misappropriation of pack funds and the decline in numbers of pack members and a whole list of acts Alpha Eric was accused of over the years that he mysteriously never had to answer for. There were also claims he didn’t have an alpha aura and that his wolf hadn’t been seen in years.

When she had looked through all the articles and information she looked to Alpha Stephan, Luna Lilly, and Lugos. “What does all this mean?” Though she had a lot of thoughts about what she had read and seen she wanted their opinion on what she was seeing.

Lugos, who had looked over the articles with her, was the first to speak. “Well, after seeing your wolf and reading these articles plus having been there for the interrogation of your cousin, I think that your uncle killed your parents and thought he killed you. Most likely he thought he would be the only candidate for alpha and is probably very disappointed to not have received the alpha aura because it probably got passed down to you. He probably believes killing you will give him the alpha powers but anyone who knows anything about it knows that unless an Alpha is unjust, killing them doesn’t give you their alpha aura. If it did there would be a lot more power hungry wolves trying to kill alphas for their power.”

“We won’t know for sure until after we find out why they called her mother an abomination, son.” It was the Luna who spoke up next. “It is a rare thing for some wolves to have children with those who are not their mate but it does happen. If her mother was not the child of a mated couple she might not have been a full blooded werewolf. A lot of narrow minded people used to blame the child of mixed species for their parents actions. They used to insist that they be killed at birth but as the moon goddess seemed to punish wolves who took those steps to get rid of wolf mixes the practice disappeared. Some narrow minded people still call wolves mixed with other species all kinds of horrible names.”

“And it might explain why we don’t know anything about her mother. If she wasn’t from a mated pair she might have grown up in an orphanage or been hidden from others to keep the truth of her parentage a secret from others,” the Alpha added.

“If my mother wasn’t a full blooded werewolf what else could she have been?” Sattira had no idea of what species were real and what ones were myth. Up until she shifted werewolves were only a myth.

“That is an interesting question but there are a lot of possibilities. They are rare, as I have said, but there have been crazy crosses between all the species,” Alpha Stephan told her. “Sometimes cross breeds that grow up in the orphanage together end up mates or having children when they are not mates so there is even the chance of being more than just two species. Have you tried asking your wolf what she found in your memories?”

“If it were in my memories wouldn’t I remember it?” This sounded odd to Sattira. “And I was curious about what species were real. I thought werewolves were a myth until I turned into a wolf.” She giggled at the thought.

“Our wolf can sometimes see memories from before we remember things and can call up things we forget. As for other species,” The Alpha explained, “Vampires, elves, sprites, nymphs, mages, fairies, elementals, merpeople, sirens, shifters, and gnomes are the ones that we are aware of. There could be more that are so few in number that they have gone into hiding. Until recently we didn’t know of nymphs because so many of them were killed by humans who cut down their trees or drained their ponds that they had gone into hiding. Then a young mage befriended one and they got a seat on the Council of Mythical Beings so we can help protect them.”

“Wow, what is the difference between a shifter and a werewolf?” It was an innocent question but her wolf growled in her mind as if she said something unforgivable.

“Werewolves are created by the goddess and only turn into wolves where as a shifter can be any living creature but a wolf. There are different kinds of cat shifters and bear shifters, basically if you can imagine a creature it has a shifter race somewhere out there. Shifters were the sun goddess’ answer to the werewolf.” Lugos tried to keep the explanation light but Sattira could see that he didn’t like the question anymore than her wolf did.

“Do werewolves not get along with shifters?” She had to ask.

“It isn’t that, it’s just for years everyone has tried to lump us in together because we both shift but we were not even created by the same goddess. It would be like saying we were merpeople because we both have a human form. I actually have shifter friends and we all get along well,” Lugos tried to clarify for her.

“Ok, if that is settled maybe we can discuss more of why we brought her in her and explained everything to her,” the Alpha tried to get the conversation back to its purpose, “well, other than because she had a right to know. We talked it over and Lugos thought maybe you should talk with your cousin. They have her medicated so she can’t link to any of her pack that might be near by or access her wolf so she shouldn’t pose a threat but she will be restrained and we will be watching just in case you need us. Ultimately the decision is yours though. We will let you know what we would like to learn. And you can ask anything you feel you need to know. I already contacted the Council and they will be holding an investigation into your parents death and taking into account what we got from your cousin it doesn’t look good for your uncle.”

“What will the council do if they find out he murdered my parents?” Sattira wasn’t sure how things were handled among werewolves.

“He will be stripped of his title and possibly put to death depending upon what the council finds. Talking to Shelly can only add to what we know.” The Alpha watched her consider before giving her answer.

After a moment she got a look of determination on her face. “I will do it.”