5. Mirage Island

Chapter 5

Mirage Island

NIKA

"What do we do with the latest shipment?"

"Put it with the rest of the stored goods," I informed Janella. The poor thing had been abandoned to Mirage Island since she was just a pup. No one knew how she ended up here, or even when she came to the island originally. As Janella explained, anytime men came in search of their mates, she hid. The women, who were on the island when she had been dropped there as a small child, had either since been taken in by their own second chance mates or had passed into the realm of the souls on the other side of death.

It was hard to kill a wolf shifter who wanted to live, but those who had no reason to go on, especially after having suffered the loss of a mate or rejection, were easy enough to kill. Some of them over the years had chosen to take their own lives. There was a perpetual watery graveyard of lost souls that surrounded the island as a result. Most were female shifters who had been so distraught and heartbroken that they chose a different way out of this life instead of waiting to see if anyone would come and claim them. For that reason, I would not put a single toe in the waters surrounding Mirage Island.

There was a freshwater lake in the middle of the island that we used for purposes of drinking, and then we ran off irrigation channels to the land we started to farm, as well as to the area where we bathed, so as not to sully our only source of fresh drinking water. Sure, there was the lake, if we grew desperate, but it was exactly that, a last desperate resort.

"These are technically your supplies though," Janella argued. My name was on the boxes that Aiden sent to me once per month. They never failed to come, so I knew he hadn't forgotten that he had a mate on the island whom he had rejected. Instead, it just worked to make me angrier. If he hadn't forgotten about me, it meant he was still doing his own thing, sleeping with however many females would have him, and all the while thinking that he could just come back and fetch me to be his mate when he was done. He might even wait until the signs of madness set in before he came to collect me. Then again, if he built a large enough harem, he could potentially hold the madness off for a good long while.

Pack Alphas channeled a lot of power. It was never a burden meant for one person to possess. That was the reason why our Sky Gods gave each Alpha a moon-blessed Luna to help balance the power allotted to rule the pack. They were supposed to share the burden. Some Alphas never learned the lessons of their predecessors, and they thought they were above the Sky Gods' decrees for some reason.

Aiden had become one of them, and he would relearn that lesson the hard way. Unfortunately, his pack would also bear the burden of his choices. As much as I wished I could spare them that outcome, sometimes more than just the pack leaders needed to be reminded that there was a cost for angering the Sky Gods.

"Lissette says there is a large party of men coming from the west," Janella informed me after I remained quiet for some time.

"They sent seeds this time. It's as if someone might realize we don't have food here if we don't grow it ourselves." I rolled my eyes as I took inventory of the last box that was dropped onto the island. Sometimes, the boxes drifted in the wind and landed in the waters of the lake. They were lost to us when that happened because there wasn't a soul on the island who would brave the waters, and the dead they held, to rescue even much-needed resources.

"The boxes have had more in them lately," Janella commented.

"They have. Almost like he's telling me that my stay shall be indefinite."

"Do you think he found another mate?"

"Not unless he's settled down his ways. Females might tolerate that harem crap in the hopes of maybe becoming his favorite later on, but there's no way one of them would share willingly if they were given mate status." I shrugged my shoulders. "Besides, if he doesn't take his moon-blessed, he will require a much larger harem to balance the power it would take to run his pack."

"What if he chose to do that?"

I turned to Janella then and smiled sadly. The poor thing didn't know a whole lot about how the Sky Gods ruled. No one bothered to educate her beyond the basic skills that meant she might survive alone on this island.

"He has a moon-blessed mate. He won't settle for less than me when he's ready. The pack won't allow him to settle for less either, since they know of my existence. Besides, the men will revolt if he takes many more of their intended mates."

"A moon-blessed mating is more powerful than the chosen kind, right?"

"Yes, in a way. A stronger bond is created of a moon-blessed pairing, since Selene herself has seen fit to make the match."

"Selene is the Goddess of the Moon, right?"

"That's right, she is one of the Sky Gods." I smiled knowing Janella had been soaking up all the knowledge I had to share with her. "Alphas need their moon-blessed pairing to keep their packs healthy, since they channel so much power. If they choose a weaker mate, they risk dooming their relationship, because their bond will be too weak to withstand the demands of the pack, especially larger packs. The mate's themselves can suffer, as the chosen Luna sometimes withers under the pressure of the power share. The Alpha can weaken too, as he will become sick and unstable mentally if the power keeps getting pushed back at him when he tries to share the load.

"Their whole pack then suffers, because the Alpha's chosen mate can't channel the level of energy that an Alpha throws off. The packs that aren't very prosperous are the ones who have chosen mates as their Alpha pair rather than moon-blessed mates. They are also far smaller because they have worked out the limits of what their power balance will allow them to control. My original pack was rather large. There is no way Aiden can keep that pack together with a chosen mate unless he were to find another Luna who would forsake her moon-blessed pairing."

"That's harsh. What if you fall in love with someone else before you learn of your moon-blessed mate?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "Who knows? We only have to go by what everyone else tells us. For those who don't have to worry about the power balance, I supposed it is an easier choice. It is also probably why so many females end up on this island. As for me, I know that there is no hope in hell I would ever mate Aiden willingly after he left me here on this island. We might not have issues with sharing power, but we would have far too many with his pack not respecting our authority. Imagine being one of the men who willingly chose to be one of the many women servicing the Alpha, and then you're supposed to mate that woman and be led by the male who disrespected your future bond." I shivered at the thought.

"Imagine being one of those harem girls and fighting for dominance when you get back and boot them all to mates who no longer want them," Janella offered.

"Exactly. There are so many reasons why the harems were done away with. It creates an awful environment for the pack. Plus, I would appear to be weak-willed indeed if I went back after the disrespect I was shown." As I mentioned that last bit, my anger burst free, in a near physical manifestation that caused a disturbance of wind that pushed the water out further from the island on the northeastern side where we found the last box.

"I thought you were a moon wolf, not an elemental?"

Again, all I could do was shrug. "I don't know why that sometimes happens when I'm angry. It isn't something I can consciously control."

"Make sure I'm upwind before it happens again, okay? I don't want to be blown into the water." Janella teased me, but I didn't miss the shiver that crept over her body at the thought of that happening.

"Are you going to see if one of the men is your mate this time?" I asked her in order to change the subject. Janella was the only person who kept me sane. It felt like a sacred duty to care for the other women on the island, but Jan was special. Her innocence and naivety made me want to keep her close and look out for her. I also wanted to hunt down whomever had left her on this horrible island when she was just a pup, so I could exact some revenge in her honor. It was a tragedy that she had grown up around so much sadness and despair.

Janella shook her head. Having been here most of her life, and remembering next to nothing before coming to the island, she was afraid to leave. Frightened of the unknown was more like it. Still, whenever boats full of men showed up to the island, she made herself scarce.

"Do you think it's your mate coming to claim you?"

"No. I had the dreams already and I don't meet my mate here on the island."

I nodded but didn't understand how Janella was supposed to leave the island to find her mate if she didn't ever come out of hiding when the med came to the island. "The western shores lead to the grasslands and a different forest beyond that. I think Johann Graywolf still runs that pack, but who knows? I was in university, and mostly cut off from the shifter world for a couple years. Then I was dropped here on this island. Things might have changed."

"Are they a good pack?"

"They were. Johann was a great Alpha. I remember Aiden's dad seemed to like him a lot. They were able to work well together when it became necessary. I'd like to say nothing has changed on that front, but everything turned upside down when Aiden took over my old pack, so who knows what has happened with the others."

"That is why I hide when they come. Who is to say whether it will work in my favor? What if I was abandoned here because my parents knew the type of shifter who would one day become my mate?"

"I doubt that's what happened." When Janella gave me a funny look, I explained. "If Selene blesses someone with a vision of their mate, it's usually the female half of the future mated pair who receives a vision of the male half, so she can find him easier. Others may have a god guess as to who your mate will be, but I've seen that go awry. Take my case, everyone always thought Aiden and I would be mates-"

Janella cut me off to say, "You are moon-blessed mates."

"Yes, we could have been, but Selene saw fit to give me the choice between two. So, technically, everyone might have been wrong. There was a female a few years older than me that swore on her life it would be the boy she had crushed on for years who would one day become her mate." Janella's bright-eyed stare asked the question she didn't bother to form into words. "He wasn't her mate. The male shifter who she always bullied, to get in good with the shifter of her dreams, turned out to be her mate."

"Oh my! Did he reject her for being a mean brat?"

I shook my head. "Not that I'm aware of, but it was shortly after that revelation when I went off to college, so it would have happened after I left."

"My mate has never come for me, and I've never received a vision that he might. I always see him in some far off place, but he is never alone. There is a female who is with him in all my visions." Janella glanced worriedly over her shoulder toward the western waters of the lake. "My greatest fear is that I will find him only to realize he has chosen another and I will end up back here on this island." Her voice took on a sad tone and then she huffed in frustration. "I want to hide like normal, but there's something calling to me from beyond the waving grass on the western edge of the water."

"It could be your mate," I reminded her. "Just because things didn't work out for the other women here, doesn't mean that it won't for you."

"I guess."

"Promise me, if you have a chance to leave this forsaken island, that you will take it."

"I can't leave you behind," she insisted.

"What about all the others who had no problem leaving you behind, even when you were just a pup?"

"Exactly. I know what it feels like to be left here and rejected over and over and over again by everyone I meet. I couldn't leave you to that fate."

"Oh, Janella!" I threw my arms around the woman who had quickly stolen a piece of my heart. "I promise, if I ever get to leave here, you will come with me, or I will refuse to go."

"You say that now," she lamented.

"And I mean it. I know you can taste the truth of my words."

She nodded her head and then ducked before I could see the smile on her face. Janella would not be left behind again. If she thought that her mate was out there, somewhere on the western horizon, I would make sure she found him before it was too late and she wasted away on this horrid island.