In order to survive, Darius, the Alpha King, requires his mate. He will perish if he does not unite with her by the next full moon. After searching for days, Darius finally finds her but she is not who he thinks her to be.
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EXHALING HEAVILY, the Queen Mother resisted the urge to smack her son once more, and replied, "Darius, you are not cursed. The Goddess would never punish one of her offspring on purpose."
"What then, Mother, will you call this? A good omen? Two weeks from now, I shall turn one thousand. I'm about to enter my prime as a werewolf, and I have yet to found my love.
"If I don't find her by my thousandth birthday, you are aware of the consequences just as well as I am."
Darius clenched his jaw as he felt the cold sweat bead on his forehead. With a savage howl that shook the walls of his mind, he pushed back against his wolf's insistent demands to be released to find his mate as it fought to overcome Darius' mental cages.
The tension mounted with each sunrise, and the beast within grew increasingly difficult to contain and control. It was a relentless force, consuming her from the inside out.
"Have you honestly exhausted all possibilities in your search for her?" The Queen Mother inquired, motioning for her ladies to lower her gown.
"Are you simply being snarky right now, or are you actually attempting to crack a joke? Is it not true that I've spent nearly my entire life trying to find her?" He was about to continue speaking when he decided against it.
Turning away from her to stare at the moon instead, he deadpanned, "Let it be, Mother, my time has come to an end."
"What would happen if I told you that I might have figured out how to help you locate her? Would you then get up from your behind and go look for your mate?"
The Queen Mother's face was stoic; her eyes remained focused and unwavering as the Alpha King examined her expression for any trace of levity. But there was none—her countenance was impressively solemn.
He raised an eyebrow.
"Let's say I decide to play along with you, Mother, what other magical methods can you think of to assist me in finding my mate?"
Darius looked away from her again and said, "Believe me when I say this, Mother, I have attempted every one of them.
Alice turned to glance around and noticed that they were completely surrounded by the other wolves.
"Come along with me, Darius."
Without looking back to see whether her son was following or not, the Queen Mother paused and motioned upwards with her finger, and her ladies stepped forward to lift the heavy fabric of her gown before she began walking away in long strides down the marble hallway.
Darius slowly rose off the velvet-cushioned throne with a heavy sigh and trudged towards his mother, with his feet dragging along the polished floor, and his hands thrusted deep in the pockets of his robe.
In his waning days, he didn't want to be remembered by his subjects as a feeble King. So, despite the pain and weariness, he pushed his body to work. He felt that if he could not have a lasting legacy, then at least all of his years of hard work and sacrifice would be remembered by his people with respect and admiration.
As he stepped onto the cracked linoleum of the long, dimly lit corridor, Darius remembered how he used to race down it as a child, his bare feet pounding against the cold floor. He recalled the echoing laughter and delighted shrieks, and for a moment, was brought back in time.
Little Darius ran back and forth, as he tried to beat his own record for how quickly he could get from one end to the other. Despite the frequent scoldings from his father, the thrill of sprinting full speed was too strong of an urge to ignore, nor to resist.
Darius throat tightened. He dreaded passing through this part of the castle ever since his father passed away. Determined that his eyes wouldn't meet the eyes of those painted faces, he averted his gaze away from the wall.
On the walls hung numerous portraits, each a cherished moment captured in time. Self-portraits of past Werewolf Kings and Queens stared out from the frames, always candidly showing strength and nobility.
The final image was of Edward Julius Lucian, Alpha King for many years, who stood tall with a matching expressions of pride.
Darius stopped and wiped his sweaty palms on the sides of his garment as he stared up at the looming mahogany double doors. Taking a deep breath, he slowly opened the doors, where he was immediately drenched in a warm amber hue, and the faint smell of parchment and sandalwood. His mother sat at a large wooden desk, engrossed in her documents, her fingers occasionally tapping the surface as she read.
"I was aware of Edward's efforts to help you locate your mate prior to his passing, but I was unaware of how far along he had progressed in those efforts.
"So when rummaging through your father's belongings today, I discovered some scrolls and a section from a book. They all mentioned a page with a title and incomprehensible instructions on it.
"I sought out the page and discovered that it was a lost chapter from the book "The Mate-Bond" that had been missing for a very long time until one of the Elders recently found it... Well the first page of the chapter, anyway.
"I made a startling discovery when reading the page." She stopped and waited, looking intently at her son.
But sadly for her, each word she spoke seemed to evaporate into thin air as the Alpha King—unmoved by her words—stared straight ahead, expressionless and silent. The only sound in the room was the faint tick of a nearby grandfather clock.
The Queen Mother proceeded with a heavy sigh. "I discovered that our mates share a spiritual connection with both our human and wolf sides, uniting the three parts, just as the human and wolf sides do in a werewolf.
"One mate can locate the other and build a bond thanks to that connection. This same link was found by Alpha King Anton Barton Lucian during the Great War when Luna Queen Eliza was abducted by the rogue Alpha."
