Chapter forty four

“Do you think I can run some spells on you dear?” Irene asked as she led Naomi to the west wing of the palace.

“Um…as long as I am not hurt, I suppose,” Noami shrugged, following her.

Irene smiled, “don’t worry, I will be careful.”

As they got to the west wing, she led her into a room. The room was massive and there was a big cauldron in the middle of it. There were shelves, some of them occupied vials of different colors and the others contained little animals and body parts of animals in glass looking containers. At the far side of the room were more shelves but these ones held books, black cover books that looked centuries old. Naomi gulped, she really can’t believe that she had walked into a witch’s spell room even though every part of the room was pointing it to her. “Um…where is Asher?”

“Gone off to find his mother a birthday gift. He will be back soon,” Irene replied.

“Oh,” she nodded.

Glancing at her, Irene smiled, “you know, if you miss him, you can just will him and the mark on your neck will affect him, bringing him back to you. It’s the good thing about mating marks.”

Naomi smiled but even though she was tempted to try, she knew she shouldn’t. she hadn’t forgotten the way Asher looked all day and the way he behaved when everyone was suggesting she could be his mate. He could tell her otherwise but she knew it in her guts, he doesn’t want her to be his mate and no matter how much she feels for him, she can never force herself on him. Heaven knew that last night was only supposed to be a night of passion for them and nothing else, she never knew nature will play this kind of trick on them, making him mark her accidentally. She never knew that was a thing but the way everyone behaved, she guessed it was.

Irene stared at the girl and she could see it as clear as day what she was trying to hide or hoping to hide. “You love him, don’t you?”

“Uh?” Naomi stared at her in shock.

“You love him,” Irene repeated with a smile, “but you are afraid that he doesn’t love you too.” She went to the shelf with books and brought out one, flipping through the pages. “I cannot tell you what you would like to hear and so I will be honest with you. Asher had grown up with supernatural women around him, he doesn’t even like humans because I can count how many times he had ever visited the human realm before the unknown pack wolves issue arose. So I must say that I am surprised he even approached you. Now that things have gotten to this extent, you will need to give him time to adapt and evolve to the knowing that a human could be his mate.”

“You think I’m his mate?”

“I said could be,” Irene glanced up at her with a smile, “the mark on your neck is trying to prove it but we can only know for sure with the blood moon night. Thankfully, it’s in eight days so you don’t have to wait for long.”

“Um, about what his father said, I don’t think I will like to stay here till then.”

“You know he did that for your sake right?”

“No one will know if the news is not exposed. Listen, I know its for my safety and all but this is all new to me too and I would prefer to process everything on my own, with my kind of people. I don’t know if you understand?”

“I do, actually,” Irene smiled and walked up to her with the book in her hands. “You can just tell Asher when he returns but with the queen’s birthday in two days, I will advice you stay here till after the birthday. You know just in case anything happen, you will be close by and Asher or we all can protect you.”

“Do you think anything will happen to me?”

“No, but you never can know, plus, two days is not that much to ask for, right? I will need to meet with your father and I can only do that after the party, so why not wait so that we can all leave together?”

“But my father would be worried.”

“Asher will take care of that. Now, sit down on the floor with cross-legs.” She ordered and Naomi sighed and did as was told. Irene sat opposite her in the same position and smiled. “Give me your hands.”

“What do you want to do?”

“I want to check your potential. I promise, it will not hurt,” she smiled.

Nodding, Noami placed her hands in her eyes and they both closed their eyes as Irene started muttering an incantation in an unfamiliar language.

***

“There you are,” Anita said and Asher stopped his sprint. “Knew I would find you here.”

He turned to her, licking his lips as he walked up to her. “Anita, I have missed you.”

“Did you?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Why do you doubt me?”

“Because you got better and I was not the first person you came to see.”

Asher smiled with a sigh, running his fingers through his hair. “You won’t understand.”

“Explain,” she said with her hands crossed on her chest.

Biting his lip, Asher didn’t know where to begin. At the end, he just dropped, “I marked Naomi.”

“YOU DID WHAT?!” Anita couldn’t believe her ears. “How, when, what were you doing?”

Embarrassed, Asher bit his lip once more and glanced away from her, his fingers running through his hair.

“Wait a minute, I know that look. You had sex with her?”

“It just…happened, okay, I…” he blew out a deep breath, “I saved her from the unknown wolves after killing the ghouls and we went to the manor. We talked, she was hurt about something I said to her in a dream and then, one thing led to another, I kissed her and we found ourselves on my bed.”

“Whoa,” Anita nodded unbelievably, “I don’t know Naomi much but I do know one thing for a fact, she looks like a virgin, sound like a virgin and you don’t like virgins, so how…?”

“I don’t know, listen…” he paused, sighed and shook his head. “It was just supposed to be a night of passion, a one night stand or something. I…” he bit his lip, his eyes closed and opened, “I just wanted to make her happy, wanted to satisfy her or something. Anita please don’t ask me to explain because honestly, I don’t know how to explain this. My fangs were itching to bite her and I thought it was going to be a regular bite, I never knew I would be marking her accidentally.”

“Accidental. Where have I heard that before, that’s right, your parents. But wait, your parents ended up being mate, does this mean…”

“I don’t know. Everyone is suggesting it,” he sat on the forest ground.

“Whoa, you have a big issue. Luckily, the blood moon night is in eight days, we will all know for sure,” she smiled. “If you ask me, I think she is the one, I mean, you have been pulled to her from the moment you met her in the woods. You even went looking for her in the human realm. If that was not the mating mark pulling you, then I don’t know what else,” she sat beside him. “Hey, cheer up, chances are you have found your mate and you and I know how much you have been waiting for her. I wish I have someone I accidentally marked,” she chuckled.

Asher licked his lips but didn’t say a thing.

Anita watched him for a while and sighed before saying, “you don’t love her.”

“I care for her.”

“I did not ask if you care for her. It’s a different thing, you can care for someone without loving them. And this is the case, but if you can fuck her, then you can love her.”

Asher glared at her and she shrugged.

“I’m just saying. Chances are she is your mate, are you going to reject her if it happens to be true?” she raised an eyebrow but he didn’t answer. “Exactly what I thought, so, rather than crying over spilled milk, I think you should use these remaining eight days to get to know her and feel more than care, because you might end up spending the rest of your life with her.”

Asher said nothing but after some seconds, he nodded, “You are right.”

“Of course I am,” she smiled, “so, Queen Aliyah’s birthday is in too days, any gift you have in mind for her?”

“I didn’t even remember,” he chuckled.

“Of course, you always hate the party,” she grinned and stood up, offering her hand to him to help pull him up. “It’s my duty to always remind you and I just fulfilled that, your highness,” she did a dramatic bow and Asher rolled his eyes. “So, shall we go gift hunting?”

“It will help clear my head.”

“Then, race you to the mall,” she said and quickly shapeshifted into her reddish-brown wolf and sprinted away from him. Asher grinned and without a second thought, changed into his sliver-fur wolf and ran after her. Overtaking her in the next minute.

Enjoy ❤💋