A Decision Made
A Decision Made
Xander POV
The wind whips through the trees as I return to the pack. My body is heavy and battered, and the scent of blood still lingers on my skin. The others watch me as I stalk toward the pack house
They don’t say anything, they heard the alarms, they know what happened. They would have heard me calling out to Serafine and chasing her while the alarms blazed. No one looks directly at me, they keep their eyes cast away from me in
fear.
They all know what happened, they know she left me. She ran away, like the bond was nothing to her at all.
I walk past everyone without saying a word. I ignore the burn of torn muscle and bruised ribs. The pain doesn’t matter, none of it matters right not. Not compared to the hollow silence that lives where the bond should have been. It’s a silence that’s more deafening than the roar of any battle.
The pack house comes closer, but I stop for a moment and stare at it. Killian and Garrick walk to it. My chest tightens as ! stare at the dark structure. My need to avenge my old mate, to get revenge on Giddeon just destroyed everything with my new mate because I was so damn blind. I stop by a tree and sink down. The rough bark at my back gives me something to focus on, even if just for a moment.
I stay out of sight of people, I just need a bit of time to think about this, to consider how much this whole thing is messed up. I need the quiet to think through what just happened. My wolf needs the time as well.
Closing my eyes, I tilt my head back against the trunk, and my fists curl uselessly at my sides.
I still want to run after her. I want to shift back, and track her scent until my legs give out, until her scent disappears. I want to hunt her down and drag her back here where she belongs and demand she stay. I bought her! She’s meant to be mine, only she never was. Not truly.
For her to be mine I had to accept her, trust her fully, let her in. I never did any of that, which mean in her eyes, she was never anything to me. My wolf claws at me with frustration and loss. He’s snarling and pacing, still unable to understand why we let her go. My breathing slows as the battle inside of me shifts to something worse.
Sure, I want to force her back here, make her accept me. Part of me though still remembers what it means to lead, what it means to be a mate and know I can’t force her back. I have never failed like this before. Not as an alpha, not as a male.
I failed her from the start, I never gave her a reason to trust me. Not once did I try to listen as she begged for me to believe her. I let my pride and hatred for her father blind me. Hell, I thought she lied about being untouched, I took her brutally, and she wasn’t lying.
Maybe that was the moment I turned into a monster, into someone who deserved pain? Sure people knew me as a brutal rogue alpha and I did terrible things. Never, not once had I done anything like that.
I stare at my hands and realise I became the thing I was pretending to be. I became the ruthless alpha, I took her virginity in an awful way because I didn’t want to believe her. Then I kept her hurting.
Now, sitting here alone, all I can do is wonder if she deserves better than me? That thought tastes so damn bitter, and unfamiliar, it’s like poison. It twists in my chest worse than any claw wound can. I know it’s true though.
The sound of footsteps crunching through leaves pulls me from the spiral of thought. I don’t move as Killian appears, and just a few paces away is Garrick following him closely. His arms are crossed, his expression is grim. Neither of them speaks at first.
They simply watch me and wait. I know they expected me to follow them straight in, but I don’t even feel like I deserve this pack anymore.
“I failed her,” I say finally, the words scraping out like gravel. My voice is low, and raw. “I hurt her and drove her to run away. I made her believe she was safer with strangers and traitors than she was with me.”
Killian exhales slowly. “You didn’t trust her,” he says quietly. It’s not an accusation, there’s no accusation in his voice. It’s a fact, nothing more than that. “Which was your right. However, you let your anger make the decisions. You reacted without proof.”
“I know.” The words feel like lead. “Every time she stood in front of me, every time she swore she told me nothing but the truth, I refused to believe her, I punished her, and saw someone her father had moulded. And now she’s gone.” Garrick moves slightly, shifting his weight. His expression is thoughtful but tense. “You could still go after her,” he says. ” You know that. You can track her, and bring her back. Yes it would take days to catch up but you can do it.”
He’s right, if I started now I could track her. My head shakes though and I close my eyes. “And then what would I do? Lock her away and force her to stay here? Make her hate me even more for being like her father?” My jaw clenches so hard it arches. “I would be no better than her father then. Actually, I would be worse, I would be forcing her to stay here, locking her up knowing that her father did that exact same for her entire life.”
A Decision Made
Silence falls again. I know they are both weighing what to say next.
Killian speaks first. “We knew something was different the second you shifted at the border. You didn’t change into your wolf. You changed into a Silvermane hound. Maybe it’s a punishment for what you did.”
I tense but say nothing.
“None of us have ever seen that before,” Garrick adds, his voice low and cautious. “That isn’t normal. That isn’t possible But it happened. The guardians protected her like she belonged to them. Some even followed her. That shouldn’t happen either.”
“I know.” My voice is flat. “Nothing about this makes sense.”
Killian steps closer, crouching down so we’re nearly eye level. “You love her.”
I freeze.
“You may not want to say it, you may not even want to admit it to yourself, but you do. That’s why you’re here right now, like this, sitting in the woods like a ghost.” His tone softens slightly. “So what happens now?”
What does happen now? I look at them both and let the silence stretch before I speak. “She has the right to chose her path. I took that from her over and over, and I won’t do it again. If she ever decides to come back, it will be because she wants to Not because I forced her to come back.”
They stare at me.
“What good would it do? If the Guardians are protecting her and responding to her. I could get her back and lock her up and they would just attack and free her anyway!”
Garrick nods slowly, understanding. Killian studies me a moment longer. “We will keep the pack safe. We’ll handle the fallout. But what about you?”
I close my eyes, resting my head once more against the tree. “I don’t know.”
For a change, I don’t know. I had my plan, and now, I’m lost. Getting revenge on Giddeon would feel amazing, but the fact is, even that no longer feels needed. God, I was chasing a ghost for years.
All while my mate was there, waiting for me to attack her.
Neither of them presses me further, they leave me here, sitting along with my guilt and the soft wind threading through the branches. I don’t move, I sit still and listen to the steady sound of my own breathing and the echo of what I have lost.
I don’t know how long I stay here, minutes, hours, I’ve no idea. Time feels meaningless, and I know only one thing There’s no way I will be going after her, not yet, not until I’m the mate she deserves. not until she’s had time to heal from the abuse I put her through. I can’t go to her until I can let go of the past, and not see her in a bad way purely because of who her father is.
There’s only one comfort in this. She’s not alone. She has the Hollowfang Raven and Silvermane Hound. She’s protected, and no one will get close enough to hurt her.
