Alpha Ultima

Chapter 6

"First things first, I would like to introduce you to the men sitting here in front of you today." Xander says and lifts his hand to gesture towards a large, dark haired man with very pretty blue eyes.

"I trust you remember Alpha Jameson. He is our closest neighbor and the Alpha of the Broken Canyon pack, and this here is his Beta, Bradley." The Alpha nods his head politely while his Beta, a light haired man with green eyes smirks wickedly at me.

I try to ignore the looks Beta Brad is giving me and pay attention to the rest of the introductions.

"This here, is Alpha Cameron. He is the Alpha of the Black Moon Pack and his Beta Skyler. And last but not least, this is Alpha Christian of Twisted Maw Pack and his Beta, Mason." Xander finishes before turning and looking at me with so much love in his eyes it takes my breath away. "This , my fine gentlemen, is our beautiful mate, and your queen, Carter Silver-Thorne."

I hold my head a little higher, remembering for the first time today that I am not just mated to two high positioned Alpha's, I am a queen and need to act like one. I smile politely and swiftly tuck my hair behind one ear.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Alpha's and Beta's, and it is a pleasure to see you again as well Alpha Jameson. I trust you've been well."

"You look ravishing, my Queen." Alpha Jameson purrs as he bows his head towards me.

"Now then, introductions have been made, let's move on." Xander clears his throat, throwing a stern look to Alpha Jameson.

"Little Wolf, first things first. You need not apologize for your discretion with your doctor appointments. Xander and I understand and I hope you know that we are here for you." Quinn grasps my hand and lifts it to his lips, pressing a soft kiss to my knuckles.

"The Alpha's you see in front of us today, are here for a similar reason-"

"Though it runs much deeper than that." Alpha Cameron says, cutting Xander off.

I cock an eyebrow at him, lifting my hand to stop him from speaking further and focus my attention back onto my mate. Though he holds a high ranking status of an Alpha, this is his king he is disrespecting and I won't stand for it.

"Go on, My Heart. Please continue." my voice is soft but stern and Xander throws a wicked smile my way before regaining his composure.

"As you well know, we have not yet been successful in becoming pregnant." He says softly.

"Though it is not for lack of trying I assure you." Quinn grumbles and I have to force myself to remain sitting and not smack him upside his incredibly attractive head.

"Anyways," Xander grumbles. "It has come to our attention that not a single pregnancy announcement has been made within our pack for quite some time. The Alpha's have come to bring to our attention that the same issue is happening within their packs as well. Looking back, it has shocked us all to discover that it has been about six months since the last she-wolf has become with child."

Six months? How is this possible? Shouldn't we have noticed this? Why haven't any of our pack members brought this to our attention sooner?

"Maybe for the same reason we didn't talk to mates? Shame." Lupin whispers to me.

"How long have you been keeping an eye on this?" I question.

"We began looking more into it about two weeks ago." Alpha Christian responds, his voice low and gravelly. "There's more to it than this as well, unfortunately."

My eyebrows fly into my hairline as I watch him carefully. His light brown hair is styled in the "I just got out of bed" look, though it suits him perfectly. His dark green eyes watch me back just as intensely.

"When was the last time you remember someone finding their true mate?" He asks me and my heart sinks into my stomach.

"Oh my Goddess." I whisper and my hands fly up to cover my mouth. "How have we not noticed this? What is happening?"

"I'm sure we can all understand why the pack members have not brought up the fertility issues, and nobody except the Moon Goddess knows when somebody is destined to meet their mate. It was not until we met to discuss everything that the correlation was made." Alpha Christian says.

My heart clenches painfully in my chest as the bile in my stomach threatens to burst up into my throat. How could we have been so blinded by what was going on in our own lives, that we have missed something so unbelievably catastrophic?

The wolves trust that their Kings and Queen will protect them, love and support them, to fucking pay attention to something that is going horribly wrong right in front of our eyes. We have failed them.

The clearing of a throat beside me, knocks me from my thoughts and I turn to look at a concerned Sam. His brows are furrowed deeply and he is looking to the middle of the wooden table, not meeting a single eye around him.

"Can I please speak freely?" His voice cracks and alarm shoots through me.

For the time that I have known Sam, he exudes confidence and surety. I have never seen him look so unsure of himself since the very first day he was in this room. Even then, he stood as tall as he could and addressed me directly in how he was kidnapped and the tortures they had endured before he was turned into the Lycan he is today. For him to look so completely shook, sends shivers down my spine and I know that something is seriously wrong.

"Of course you can, Sam. You are always free to speak your mind, I should hope you would know that." Quinn assures him.

"Thank you, Alpha. I have spoken to others over the past few months, I wanted to make sure that I was not the only one to feel this way and I was relieved though terrified to find I wasn't." He whispers so softly that without the hearing of my wolf I would have thought he were silent.

"What's happening, Sam? I don't understand." I place my hand over his tightly clenched fists as I try to comfort him.

"As you know, Lycan's are forced to shift every full moon. Without your command, Luna... My Queen... we would be nothing more than the beast within. Our base instincts used to take over and we would wake in the morning with no recollection of what we had done." He shuddered hard and I squeezed his hands tighter in my own.

"Thanks to the bond we have with you, when you commanded our human minds stay in control unless we allow our wolves the freedom, we were able to breathe freely on the full moon. Though the shift was still forced, from moon rise until fall, we finally had a say." Sam looks deep into my eyes and I am shocked to see they are surrounded by wet lashes.

"Sam, sweetie... What are you trying to say?" I shake my head.

I can't figure out where this is going. I knew that he was grateful to have control once more, but to see the tears in his eyes is a hit to the gut and I wished I was capable of doing so much more. The forced shift was not something I could control, though I wanted to more than anything. The bond for the shift came from the moon and the moon alone. Not even the daughter of the goddess could change that.

"I'm saying that for the past several full moons, the need to shift has not been as severe. Yes, the pull is there, but it is something that we can fight. The last full moon I hid in the trees so no one could see, but I fought the shift and I won. I stayed human, Carter." He sobs and I throw my arms around him, holding his shaking body to my chest.

I look to my mates in alarm and I am not surprised to see they share the same look as me. Something is happening that is completely beyond our control. The only thing I know is that we need to fix this, and soon.

"It's like the Goddess has given up on us. Have we lost her grace?" Sam's broken voice tore through my heart when I remembered something I haven't thought about in months.

I look over to my mates with panic stricken eyes and swallow thickly as the bile from my stomach fights it's way up. How could I have forgotten about this, how could I have been so stupid!

"My vision." I whispered and the room sat silent.