The Alpha's Lost Mate [Completed]

Chapter Sixteen: The memories

**Content warning: non-graphic descriptions of trauma, grief, self-harm, drugs, alcohol, abuse, sexual assault and imprisonment**

That evening, Jamie and I strolled hand-in hand towards the beach. We had watched the sunset from the packhouse deck before making our way down to meet Myfanwy.

"Are you nervous?" He asked, gently stroking my knuckles with his thumb. The warmth radiated from his hand and was a welcome relief from the cool spring air.

"No, I actually feel a really weird sense of calm, like some part of me just knows everything is going to be alright no matter what happens," I explained.

"That's probably the mate bond, everything will be alright even if you can't recover your memories because we will still have each other. As long as we're together, everything really will be alright, I can promise you that," he said, smiling gently at me. His eyes sparkled in the starlight as they met mine and stared straight into my soul, and I believed him.

He looped his arm around my shoulder and squeezed me tight as we reached the sand and Myfanwy stepped forward to meet us.

"Alpha Jamie, Luna Grace, it's a pleasure to meet you properly," she said, her lilting accent making her simple words seem more song-like.

"Please, Jamie and Gracie is just fine," Jamie insisted.

"As you wish," she said simply. "Gracie, are you ready to get started?"

"As ready as I'll ever be!"

She cracked a small smile as she reached out and took my hand in hers. Jamie gave me a quick kiss on the side of my head before she led me away across the beach to a small clearing in the sand dunes. She was unaffected walking on sand, floating across the surface with much ease as the shifting sands I'd seen the day before. I, on the other hand, was as graceful as a newborn puppy on kitchen tiles.

"We're going to start with some simple meditation tonight Gracie," Myfanwy explained as she gestured for me to sit in the sand. "It's important that we do this in the evening. As the Moon Goddess explained last night, you are born from a piece of her soul so you are part Goddess. Your powers and your memories will come to you much easier in the moonlight."

We talked a little about the memory that had come to me the day before and Myfanwy explained how the olfactory sense was the strongest so it made sense my first memory was triggered by a smell. She walked me through some deep breathing and meditative exercises until I felt a complete calm and stillness come over me before she helped me really lean into the small flashes I could remember.

Spinning. Blonde hair, messy blonde hair. The smell of doughnuts in the air. Spinning.

Focus on the smell, I told myself, hearing Myfanwy's earlier instructions in my head. Where's it coming from?

The right. The doughnut smell is to my right, no left, no right, no left. Right? I can't see past the masses of blonde hair all around me and the world is spinning so violently until it isn't, and the noise descends on me. Old traditional music, piano, fast and uplifting and cheerful. Shouting and screaming, but with no trace of malice. Mechanical roaring and groaning and the clicking of wheels on a track. Too much.

My hands flew to my ears and cradled my head briefly before Myfanwy gently and silently removed them. She didn't need to speak; her advice was already planted in my thoughts. Allow the next senses to come as they will and focus on them, so I sat with the overwhelming cacophony of noise until it became less overwhelming and I could focus on just one.

Laughter. Peals of joyful, childish laughter on either side of me. A teenager to my left, her arm wrapped around my shoulders tightly, with the weight and warmth that could only come from an older sister. Faith. It was Faith's blonde hair flying out of control, tickling at my face as I laughed. A younger girl to my right, her face buried into my side, only another mass of flyaway blonde hair visible. She curled into me the way I curled into Grace, the way a younger sister does. Hope.