2. Unforgiven

Chapter 2

Unforgiven

AIDEN

My gut clenched at the sight of Nika in the cell. It was the only place that was secure enough for me to put her, so that I could convince her to be with me. Instead of giving me time, the decision to put her there was another shit call on my part.

She was angrier than ever with me. When she turned to show me the wound on her head that still weeped blood into her hair, I wanted to go back to the Grassland’s Pack and throttle the woman who had attacked her with such a heavy hand. The bitch offered to help me out the moment I got close to pack lands.

Word had already spread through the packs that I had been Nika’s original mate and the gods had, for whatever reason, given her a choice of another moon-blessed mate or me. My harem had also become common knowledge, so no one thought she would pick me given a choice. It was why it was important to get her away from Thorin Fucking Greywolf before he could claim her officially.

I needed the time to talk some sense into her. We had grown up together, my pack was her birth pack. We were meant to be together. I could admit that I screwed up with the harem. I compounded things when Nika was sent away to the island. All that was true enough, but so was the fact that we were meant to be and Thorin was never supposed to have a moon-blessed mate.

For that reason alone, Nika should understand that I am the better choice. We were meant to be from the beginning.

I left Nika in the cells, so I could collect myself and not dig a deeper hole with her than I already had. When I made my way back to the throne room, Kyla was there.

She wasn’t just there, she was seated on the Luna’s throne.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

She startled as my voice boomed through the vast space and echoed back to us. The guards that were stationed around the room were drawn by my loud voice and witnessed as I yanked her out of the seat and threw her to the ground in front of me.

“You have no right to sit upon that throne!”

I stared down into her startled, wide eyes, and felt nothing. There wasn’t an ounce of guilt at manhandling her. As far as I was concerned, Kyla was the reason I had lost the chance at my moon-blessed mate - the true Luna for our pack. Ultimately, it was my fault, but I never would have thought about a harem if not for her.

“Aiden!” Kyla gasped as she tried to sit up. “I didn’t mean anything by it.”

“You were told certain places were off limits to you, just as they are to everyone else in this pack. That throne was one of them. It is only for the Luna of the pack.”

“Oh! Do you mean the Luna who doesn’t want you?” She purposely made her voice carry to everyone who witnessed her humiliation. The sneer she threw my way as she stood drew her lips down and narrowed her eyes. Seeing her like that made me wonder why she ever felt like a choice I should make. She was nothing compared to Nika.

“If you keep it up, you will find yourself in one of those cells.”

Kyla’s laughter grated on my nerves. “That’s where you keep the people who are important to you,” she suggested with a shrug of her shoulders that was supposed to appear indifferent. The tension in her muscles gave away just how frightened she was by the prospect. When you were placed in the cells, you were at the mercy of whoever tended to you.

That made me realize exactly how badly I had fucked up with Nika. She had been down there for almost a full day and I hadn’t even thought to send medical attention to her, give her the basics so she could clean up, or even food.

“Fuck!” I yelled into the echo-chamber of the throne room. “Lock her in one of the guest rooms until her attitude improves.” I commanded. Brennan, one of the shifters who came forward, grabbed her arm and everyone in the room could feel the energy as a bond snapped into place for Kyla and Brennan.

He immediately dropped her arm from his grasp and pushed her away. “Someone else take her.” He called out. When no one moved he stood there are stared the woman down.

“Brennan?” She questioned softly.

My guard responded with a firm shake of his head. “Never, in a million years, would I willingly link myself to the woman who caused the downfall of our pack.”

“Brennan!” I shouted his name. “That is your mate!”

“And you would have known it this whole time, while I had the pleasure of remaining ignorant until just now.” His eyes narrowed on mine before he turned his attention back to his mate. “I formally reject the mate bond with you. I do not want you to come near me, though I would never banish someone to Mirage Island.” His eyes came back to meet mine again as he continued to speak.

“I think it is a horrid practice, but if anyone deserved to be dropped there, it would be you. You selfishly chose to try to climb the ranks in the pack, beyond your station, and you did that while disrespecting me, the pack, and the sacred bond our Goddess, Selene, offered us. You got what you wanted. You sat on the throne and now you can deal with the consequences of your choices.”

“Brennan, you can’t reject me.” Kyla tossed her head back and forth in disbelief. “The harem was for the Alpha’s benefit, since his mate wasn’t here.”

“I was here, in the throne room, when Nika came home. The only one of the Alpha’s harem who stepped aside for Nika to take her rightful place was the one person who no longer had a mate of her own to worry about. Maybe, I’ll go see if Ashton wants a second-chance mate. She was the only one who cared about the pack and her own family.” Brennan turned on his heels and walked away.

The other guards in the pack turned and walked out of the room as well, rather than follow the order that had been given to lock Kyla in a room until she could come to her senses. It seemed that having been rejected by her mate took the wind out of her sales though.

“May I leave and go back home?” She asked me in a meek voice that was unusual for her.

“If they’ll have you.”

Her eyes came up to meet mine and while there was a flash of anger in them, I could also see the devastation there. It was one thing for her to put off telling her mate who he was to her until she could see if I could be convinced. It was another entirely for her mate to tell her that she wasn’t worthy of him and he might seek out another mate instead.

That was beyond her choice.

After Kyla left, I called the pack doctor and my brother to the throne room. Once they both arrived, I got the doctor to go down and see Nika immediately. Then, I turned to my brother. “I need your mate to do something for me.”

Avery scoffed. “Good luck with that.”

“I need her to see to Nika’s needs.”

“Nika?” Avery questioned as I winced. My brother had been unaware of my trip to go retrieve my mate. Once another Alpha called me up to bestow his condolences on me losing my mate to Thorin Greywolf, I got the date of their ceremony out of him and took off.

“She’s downstairs in the cells.” An inadvertent wince graced my face as my brother looked on in horror.

“The cells? Your mate is downstairs in the cells right now?” Avery turned as if he was about to go down there to verify, but I grabbed hold of his arm.

“I need your mate to take Nika the things she needs to get cleaned up and food and water. It has to be your mate because she respected Nika enough to stand up for her before.”

“Have you already lost your mind?” Avery yelled at me. “How is she here?”

“I took her before she could be mated to Thorin Greywolf,” I admitted. “She was still knocked out when I got her back here and I didn’t want to take a chance of her leaving before I could explain things to her.”

“You knocked out Nika Mayweather, stole her from her mating ceremony, and then locked her in the cells meant for criminals?”

My brother’s shock over my actions made my gut clench. It hadn’t been the best plan, but it was one of desperation. Surely, everyone would have to understand that.

“It was the only way.” The admission came from me in a whisper that my brother again scoffed at.

“You don’t know when to quit, do you?” Avery paced back and forth a few times before he stopped right in front of me. “You have brought war to our doorstep. You realize that, don’t you? He will come for her. No Alpha in their right minds lets their Luna go without a fight.”

“Why is it so bad that I refused to let her go then?”

“Because you already threw her away, asshole! She won’t accept you now, no matter what you do, and throwing her in the cells won’t endear her to you either. How in the hell did you convince her to come here?” He huffed and then shook his head, as if the circumstances surrounding how Nika got here finally sank in. “You said she was knocked out. What the hell did you do?”

“A woman in Thorin’s pack hit Nika over the head and knocked her out. I took my mate and then drugged her to keep her from harming herself for the duration of our trip. She woke up in the cells earlier today.”

“You-” Avery cut himself off and stood there quietly as if he had shut down. I could tell by the glazed, faraway look in his eyes that he had simply opened a mind link, presumably to his mate. “Tessa is taking supplies to the cells. You have today to make things right, Aiden. If you do not manage to stave off a war with the Grasslands Pack, then you will have to deal with the war you created within your own pack as well. Make things right and step aside quietly, or the first challenge you face will be issued by me.”

I left the throne room and went back down to the cells. As I made my way down the doctor stopped me. “She will be fine, but would heal better if the poor thing was allowed to shift.”

I shook my head. “That can’t happen right now.”

“She’ll have a scar on the back of her head. The wound has gone too long without treatment for me to close it with stitches. It has to heal on its own now. If she was allowed to shift, it might lessen the amount of scarring.”

“No. She can’t be removed from the cells yet. It’s for her own good.”

“Then I am afraid she will have quite a scar on her neck and the back of her head. It will impact her hairline and cause a balding line. It may be able to be covered by hair from further up on her head, so long as she keeps it long. It would also help if she was allowed to clean herself up. Having filthy hair sitting on the wound is not helping the matter. In fact, it is slowing her healing down because her body is fighting off infection rather than working to heal the wound as it should.”

“Supplies are on the way, so she can clean up.”

“This is not the way to treat a Luna,” Doctor Palmer added. He had come to our pack five years ago in search of someone who wasn’t found, and my father had convinced him to stick around.

“I will fix it.”

Dr. Palmer offered me a scathing look and turned to walk away. I couldn’t blame him. I had done everything wrong where my mate was concerned.

“Nika,” I called out as I stepped into the space before her cell. “I have someone coming to deliver supplies to you, so that you can clean up, put on some fresh clothing, and get some food in your system.”

“How gracious of my captor,” She snapped. I couldn’t blame her. It wasn’t like I expected gratitude.

“I could release you,” I offered. She said nothing, just continued to stare at me from behind the chunky, greasy lengths of her unkempt hair. “You only have to agree to be my mate.”

My words were met by silence. When several moments ticked by and Nika turned her back on me, I lost my patience. “I offered you the chance to be free.”

“The only freedom I will welcome, when the choice is to mate you or waste away in this cell, is to die where I stand. I will find freedom one day in death. That isn’t something you can deny me.” She laughed then. “I can, however, deny you by refusing to mate. I will never accept your claim, your bite, or you.”

“I will check back tomorrow. My brother’s mate will be there soon with supplies for you.”

“Avery has a mate?” She asked, curiosity having gotten the best of her.

I nodded my head. “He found her on Mirage Island when we went in search of you.”

“Tessa,” she whispered.

“Yes, Tessa.” I wondered how she was able to guess, but didn’t bother to ask because there was no way Nika would humor me with the answer.

“She will be along shortly.”

Nika said nothing, so I left. I would ask her the same question the next day, and the one after that, until she finally relented and accepted my proposal to mate with me. Eventually, she would wear down. I just hoped that it was before my brother lost his patience with me.

Unfortunately, I forgot about the other looming threat. Thorin Greywolf would not forget that I stole a mate from him, even if she was mine first. He would come for her eventually.