Chapter 25

I found myself waking up on a lawn, the night sky stretching out above me. Even in the darkness, the world was bathed in the glow of the moon, full and radiant, so close it felt like I could reach out and touch it. The stars scattered across the sky completed the picturesque scene, making it look like a work of art.

A sense of peace washed over me, a tranquility I had never experienced before. It felt as if nothing bad could possibly happen to me. I took a deep breath, letting the fresh air fill my lungs and savoring the sensation.

I glanced around, first to my right where a forest seemed to stretch out into the distance. Then I turned to my left and nearly jumped out of my skin. A woman was standing right next to me.

I should have been frightened, but instead, I felt a strange sense of familiarity, as if I had been here before, as if I knew her. I was filled with a sense of love and peace, and I could feel it radiating from her.

She was tall, and quite possibly the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. Her features were delicate, yet her expression was one of strength. Her hair was long and silver, and her eyes were almond-shaped and a striking shade of violet.

She was dressed in a white tunic, and a necklace with a moonstone pendant hung around her neck.

“Hello, Scarlett,” she greeted me.

“Hello,” I responded, trying to place where I knew her from. “Do we know each other?” I asked, tilting my head to the side.

She responded with a sweet smile.

“Yes, dear, we do. We were here, in this very place, talking before you were born. And we’ve spoken recently through your prayers. I even heard you just now, thanking me and asking for protection.”

Her voice was gentle, and she tucked a loose strand of my hair behind my ear—a gesture that was so familiar, so Christopher.

Could it be? Was I standing in front of the Goddess herself, the Moon Goddess?

“You are…,” I began, but the words got stuck in my throat. How was this even possible? “I must be hallucinating. This can’t be real…,” I stammered.

“No, Scarlett, you’re not hallucinating,” she reassured me, her smile never wavering.

She then looked off into the distance, and a wave of fear washed over me.

If this wasn’t a hallucination, then I must be dead. I had to ask.

“So, I died? Is this heaven?” I asked, my voice filled with confusion.

I looked around again, but the Goddess simply shook her head.

“No, you didn’t die, and this isn’t heaven. It’s a place in-between, where I can talk to you. This is where I spoke to your mother when I sent you to them,” she explained, her gaze still fixed on the horizon.

“You sent me to them personally? So, these prophecies are yours to me?” I asked.

I was curious, but also terrified of the answers.

She let out a sigh and sat down next to me, crossing her legs. She smiled at me again.

“Yes, the prophecy is mine, but the others are too. I just sent the message through other wolves. But this one, yours, I wrote myself. I needed to send you to your parents; you needed to come from their DNA; you needed to be exactly who you are.”

“Their DNA?” I asked, confused.

My parents weren’t anything special; they didn’t come from important families. We had some alpha descendants, but that was it.

“Your father and mother come from different families, from two different lineages of the initial wolves. They were bred specifically to produce you. And did you know that your parents met before they revealed themselves to be mates? And they didn’t even like each other?” she asked.

“My parents didn’t like each other? That’s impossible; they’ve always been crazy about each other,” I protested.

“Not always,” she corrected me.

“I needed to make them meet beforehand. They had a date, and it was the same day Christopher’s father promoted him. That was my doing too, by the way. Your father normally doesn’t brag, but that day he was extremely happy, and even though he had met your mother for less than five minutes, he couldn’t stop talking about his new position.

“His bragging immediately turned her off. She didn’t like him, and she promised herself she would never be like that. They didn’t have a second date. Months later, they discovered they were mates at the ball. They fell in love instantly and laughed about their first date.

“However, your father wanted to take her to work with him. She told him after their first meeting that she’d vowed never to work for the pack. She wanted her own career, and he agreed. It was crucial to the plan for her to become a doctor and for you to choose to follow her career, become a doctor too, and meet Alpha Christopher that fateful day at the hospital.”

My eyes widened as the pieces fell into place inside my head. Everything had been orchestrated to happen exactly as the prophecy foretold.

I remembered what Christopher told me—that the Goddess worked in mysterious ways.

“So, everything happened as it needed to happen? For a greater reason after all?”

“Exactly. Sometimes it’s not clear to you at first, sometimes it’s never clear, but absolutely everything is set up to happen for a reason.”

“Even my first mate?” I asked.

I needed to know.

“You’re wondering why I didn’t set you up with Christopher from the beginning?”

Could she read my mind?

I simply nodded.

“For so many reasons, Scarlett. Firstly, Christopher needed to go through everything he went through with Violet. It shaped his character and made him a better leader. But it hardened his heart and left him cold too. Unfortunately, that was necessary. He needed it to organize the pack.

“The same was true for you. You needed to get hurt first and break the fairy tale idea out of your head. If I had put Christopher straight to you, and you’d gotten pregnant as it happened, you would have freaked out because it didn’t follow what you thought was the typical life plan—to discover your mate, go through the mate ceremony, become a surgeon, and only then have a child.”

“I needed that child now, not in six or seven years. I needed you heartbroken for Christopher to pick up the pieces and for the two of you to heal together. But the truth, Scarlett, it’s always been you two. It was always meant to be you two. You are the love of each other’s lives—in this life and in the others you’ve already had.”

Her final words struck me so hard that I could feel the sting of tears in my eyes.

“And beyond all that, Mathew had to endure this to feel the pain of losing you—to have his ego shattered when he saw you walk into that meeting and sit next to Christopher. Only then could he be prepared for his new family, who will need him just as much.”

“You may think he didn’t suffer, but he was crushed. All of this was necessary. It’s through pain that great men and women are forged. It hurts me to do this, but I take pride in who they become. And all of this was necessary for you to become the leader I need.”

I was stunned. It was as if she had been the architect of everything—each piece meticulously planned and perfectly fitted together.

“Leader?” I asked, confused.

“You’ll understand soon enough. Your people will need you, Scarlett. The two of you—or rather, the three of you. In a few years, it will be Anthony’s turn to lead. He’ll need a strong mother with a leader’s spirit to guide him.”

“Anthony?” I echoed, still trying to process everything.

“The name means ‘of inestimable value.’ In some languages, it also signifies courage, intelligence, and strength. These are all traits he will possess—traits essential in a leader. It’s become a bit of a tradition for me to choose the names of the children in your family, but I think it suits him.”

“It’s a boy,” I managed to say, my words and breath failing me.

“It’s the boy, Scarlett. The future,” she said with a smile, and I felt tears streaming down my face.

“But you’ve been here too long. It’s time for you to go back. Just remember—when the time is right, the whole truth will be revealed. The righteous have prevailed. And when it comes to my will, miracles can happen.”

She smiled again, raising her index finger to lightly touch my forehead. Then everything went black once more.