The Witch and The Shifter

Their Meeting

"What do you mean that history is repeating itself?" Baelick asked her, still confused on the whole story that Aileen had just told him. He was even more confused by her last statement. 

"Did the young man in the story not call to you?" she asked him, intent on watching all the emotions on his face. Still he did not understand her line of questioning. "Has your father ever told you how strong your features are in your DNA? He's never once mentioned that you look like his great grandfather? Alarmingly so?" she asked, and he shook his head. She sighed, rising once more to walk to her table and when she came back she brought a picture frame back with her. 

"This is your great great grandfather!" she plopped the image down in front of Baelick. He glanced at it and knew what she had been trying to tell him. He could've been his twin, if it weren't for the fact that time had separated them. "I have to tell you the rest of the story, but I wanted you to know this first. You are your grandfather reincarnated, the spitting image, the exact mirror. You're almost like his doppelganger, and I'm assuming that your little witch mate is the twin of the woman that he loved." she snapped her fingers and the last image of his grandfather fleeing from Katiya shifted into something else. 

Her wild curls were first, full and chestnut brown. They framed her oval face the slant of her eyes re imagined on paper, her small nose coming to a delicate point above her cupids bow. The aquamarine blue orbs formed and starred back at him and her plump lips formed a smile that was true and gleeful and it was a picture of perfection. He was awestruck, Baelick couldn't look away, it was like he was seeing a thousand stars up close. She was the sun lighting up the world that he did't know had been dark, the moon that calmed the storm over his waves, the missing piece that he had no idea was missing. 

"That's her." he whispered. 

"No, that is Katiya. Your mate looks just like her as you look just like your ancestor." she waved again and the image of Katiya was gone, he turned to Aileen ready to growl his disapproval but she gestured to the pages before him instead. The image of his ancestor appeared again and he seemed to be spying on something. In the far distance he could see the form of a woman in the fields, working to gather the crops that had grown and laughing with others around her. 

"Roe didn't return for many years to look for Katiya, fleeing because he was mad he was cursed over her, too afraid to return to her for the fear that she would turn from him for leaving her at a time when he knew that they were both hurting. When he returned he was devastated at what he beheld."

The images swirled till it was again Katiya that was displayed, but she was held in the arms of another and they were both embracing her round tummy, pregnant with child and from the looks of it almost ready to give birth. It was not Kane that was in the image with Katiya but another man that Baelick didn't have the hopes of recognizing, but he knew then that she had moved on when she was left by his grandfather, she started a family who had grown and prospered and given life to his mate now, Kairen.

"Why does all this matter though? I don't understand why showing me this is in any way going to help me, or in any way show what relevance there is to history repeating itself." he waited, for her to gather her words or for some dramatic effect he didn't know. 

"Roe left for many years because of his anger initially, but he stayed away because he had found someone, a mystic-" she paused and glanced at him cattily "that had helped him to learn how to call upon his true form, his human form and shift between human and panther freely. With that came the strength and agility and pack loyalty that we now know today is part of our heritage. However, when both forms coincided inside of Roe's body, it inherited something that is apparent in all forms of shifters, the mating gene. When Roe thought of Katiya over and over again his panther would purr or feel such sorrow at seeing her face that he had gone to see her and the mating gene kicked in. Too late he had waited for she was with child, he left to never be with his mate, he had gone after Kane to seek revenge for what he had done, but when he found him he was already in the grave thanks to Katiya. No further reason to stay he left and had a fulfilled life with the mystic that he had met, bearing children and continuing his line.