The Alpha's Lost Mate [Completed]

Chapter Three: The History Lesson

I felt a scream bubbling at the back of my throat, but I was so shocked it came out as a mere squeak. The wolf stepped around the breakfast bar agonizingly slowly while I stood, frozen on the spot. It came to a stop right in front of me and lay down on the floor, avoiding the mess of broken china and coffee and holding my eye contact the whole time. At full height its back came to my waist and head was pretty much level with mine, but laying on the floor it felt much less intimidating. Its eyes were the exact same shade of greyish green as Jamie's and it's shaggy, messy fur was the same as his hair. The wolf whined softly, it looked scared, and I cautiously reached out and stroked between its ears. It surprised me by licking my hand, leaving a slobbery trail from my finger all the way up my forearm.

"Oh!" I yelped, wiping myself dry on my shirt. If wolves could laugh, I swear this one was laughing at me. While I was preoccupied with that, the wolf stood back up, morphing back into Jamie as it did so. A very, very naked Jamie. I threw my still-slobbery arm up over my eyes. His deep chuckle echoed in the sparse kitchen and resonated through my body. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever heard.

"You can look now," he whispered, gently pulling my arm down. He intertwined his fingers with mine and I instantly felt at home. I couldn't explain the pull I felt toward him. I knew it wasn't normal, and I wanted to fight it, but my body just wouldn't let me. All I wanted at that moment was to melt into him and feel at peace. There was just one small matter to deal with first.

"Ok," I mumbled to myself, feeling my grasp on sanity slipping away. "Wolf."

"Uh, yeah, wolf. I promise you there's nothing to be afraid of. I would never hurt you, could never hurt you," he insisted. "Are you ready to hear the rest?"

"There's more?" I asked, my head spinning. How could there possibly be more?

He chuckled again, leading me around the mess on the floor to sit on the sofa. He busied himself making a fire as he spoke.

"There's definitely more. You're about to get a crash-course in the best-kept secret of the century. Werewolves have been around since the beginning of human history; we're obviously part-human. The Moon Goddess created us by taking the soul of the wolf and combining it with the human. She made us to be protectors for the whole of the human race. We're considerably faster than normal humans, and much stronger too. Our sense of smell, sight, and sound is better, even in our human form. The human and wolf side aren't the same though, I'm made up of two souls: a man and a wolf. When I'm in my human form, my wolf is like a passenger in my brain. I can talk to him, and he guides me when it comes to leading the pack and making decisions. When we're in wolf form, it's me in the passenger seat. Sable, my wolf, is in full control." He finished lighting the fire and joined me on the sofa.

"I... I really don't know what to say, this is a lot," I admitted nervously, struggling to piece together what he was telling me.

"I know it's a lot, and there's more. I just need you to listen and try not to get too freaked out by it, okay?" He asked. I nodded, and he continued with his werewolf history lesson.

"Werewolves and humans lived side by side for centuries. Humans knew we existed and looked to us for strength and guidance. Each pack has an Alpha, that title is passed to the eldest son of the family. When initiated on their 18th birthday they choose a Beta and a Gamma as second and third in command. That's who Evan and Finn are. Every pack controls a territory of many miles, and in the past, they were responsible for the humans who lived within their borders. Wolves are required to obey their Alpha, we can speak to them through our minds and command them, and they have no biological choice to obey, it's ingrained in our DNA. It wasn't like that for humans, they were never strictly a part of our pack, but they treated the wolves with kindness and respect and, in turn, they gained our protection," Jamie explained, his hand still stroking through my hair, gently releasing the tangles that had grown in the last 3 weeks strand by strand.

"What happened?" I asked. That sounded worlds away from what I instinctively felt about the world we were in.

"In the 15th century, around the time the great witch-hunts started happening people became uneasy of our strength and power. Our ancestors knew that it was only a matter of time before they started hunting us, so we retreated. Every pack across the world now lives in private. Pack houses were built in rural areas that provided protection and privacy, like this one on the island, and wolves never revealed their true forms in front of humans. For the most part, we still live in harmony among humans. Most of my pack live on the mainland, in and around the town of Keswick which the pack is named after. They go to school there, they have jobs and homes there, many of their friends are human. They visit here often for pack meetings, for training or social gatherings, but the only ones who live here permanently are the Alpha, Beta, and Gamma families as well as the pack warriors and some of the younger single adults," he said. "Very few humans know we exist, it was forgotten over generations and we've become nothing more than a fairy-tale."

"Okay," I said, after a long pause, considering everything he'd said. "Is that all of it?"

"Witches are real too," he supplied with a slight chuckle.

"Ok," I breathed, witches barely even registering on my weird radar. "Vampires?"
Jamie chuckled lowly. "A work of the human imagination, as far as we know."

"Is that... Is that all?" I asked, barely able to keep myself from freaking out.

Jamie's body tensed and his eyes darkened. "Well, there is one more thing."

Panic began to build a little inside me and I stared at him, unable to muster the strength to put words together.

"Werewolves... Every werewolf has a mate," he said carefully, considering every word before they came out of his mouth. "The term soulmate is something humans used to refer to a love they felt was like a werewolf's love for his mate. You see, the Moon Goddess assigns every werewolf with a mate at birth. It's a very difficult relationship to explain, but the first time a wolf lays eyes on his mate, they know it. It's love like you couldn't imagine; in the very second they lay eyes on each other nothing else matters. They would do anything, be anything that their mate needs. They're created by the Moon Goddess as two halves of a whole, biologically tuned to love each other. If one of the wolves dies or rejects their mate, the physical pain is unbearable and the emotional pain often drives them insane."

I continued to stare at him, watching his every move as he spoke, watching the fear flash in his eyes as he explained rejection, as he went as quiet as me for a long time, awkwardness suspended in the air between him. The fogginess returned slowly, washing over my mind like a protective blanket, trying to cushion me from the point I knew somewhere in my subconscious be was trying to get to.

"I know, it's difficult for humans to understand. Humans centuries ago who were surrounded by it often didn't quite grasp the concept, so I can only imagine how confusing this must be for you. There have only been a handful of cases in recorded history where a human was the mate of the werewolf, and only one case where a human was the mate of an Alpha," he said very quietly.

His face was contorted with confusion and stress as he battled an internal debate. He refused to look me in the eye and was playing with the strings of his hoodie nervously.

Eventually, he looked up and met my silent gaze. His eyes were filled with doubt as he reached towards me, and gently held my hand in his.

"You're my mate, Gracie," he whispered, barely audible. "The future Luna of the Keswick pack"