Defiance

07.

Chapter 7

A L D R I C

She made my head spin. That's what she did. She made me so angry. It would have been easier if she wasn't the way she was. I couldn't understand it. One moment, she's threatening my wolves - telling Seline that she would raise hell onto my pack and another, she's thanking me? 

And it doesn't help that every word she said matched perfectly with her heartbeat. Elysia wasn't lying. It would have been easier if she was lying. Maybe it was my fault too. I should've known better than offered to take her back to the village but taking her back to the village seemed so easy. Elysia would be alive. At the same time, she would be out of my life.

My wolf sneered at the thought. I needed to stop lying to myself. I didn't want her out of my life. I remembered the way she grabbed my arm. I could seem to feel the resonance from it. My arm still seemed to tingle from her touch. 

Why was having a mate so powerful? Is this what all the wolves in my pack felt when they were with their mate? 

I don't know if you know and maybe this wasn't kindness for you but that was the nicest thing anyone has given me in a very long time - so thank you.

I remembered each word as it hit my heart. What did the witches do to her? She was one of them but it seemed her relationship with the witches wasn't as strong as I thought it would be. What was going on? 

My head spun and I became more frustrated at the thought. I wanted to understand her. I wanted to know her. I wanted to know why she was certain that no one liked her. I wanted to know everything that made her her. Stop. Knowing her would mean attachment. Attachment meant caring. The only thing I knew for certain was that I was going to keep her alive. Whatever the feelings my wolf was feeling, whatever I was seeing, I needed to confirm if my truth was truly the truth. I needed to truly know if she was mate or if this truly was a trick.

Seraphina, the Moon Priestess, stared at me in shock when she watched the blood. I haven't spoken to Seraphina in a while, but she was the pack priestess. Every pack had one; she was the wolf that was a link to the Moon. The moon gives us our powers to transform and gave us the gift of mates. 

Seraphina usually performs mating ceremonies or connects mates to the Moon. She could also tell me if Elysia was truly my mate. Under the oath of the moon priestesses, Seraphina is not allowed to lie about mates or the blessings of the moon. She lives in a different cabin, further away from the wolves. As far as I know, she likes to be alone.

When I knocked on the door, her eyes immediately went to the drop of blood on the knife. It was Elysia's blood, the one I swiped after Ian attacked. I was originally going to ask her for a drop of her blood but there was a cut on her cheek and blood was already there.

"There's witch blood on this knife." She muttered immediately. She could probably smell it or maybe she just had powers as a priestess to know the difference between a witch and wolf blood.

"I know," I said.

"Well? Why is it on a silver knife?" She demanded. The mating ceremony required blood droplets from both mates and the blood would be tied to a silver knife. I had seen the ceremony whenever mates wanted to pray to the Goddess of the Moon.

"Why do you think it would be on it?" I asked. Seraphina was smarter than this. Her eyes were a dark grey colour - the same color as the moon and her hair was the same silver of moonlight. 

She may be turning older but she was still beautiful as I always saw her. She served my father for as long as I know and she served the Moon her whole life. Seraphina had seen the ups and downs of the war; certainly, she was smart enough to know why I would bring a knife with a witch's blood on it.