Chapter Eleven

We settled into our fifth night in the Forgotten Realm. The journey since leaving the forest, calm. One could even warn that it was too calm, like the calm before a storm of devastating proportions.

I kept my senses open as we set up the camp. My eyes peeled on every shadow as the sun settled over the horizon and left us in the light of the first full moon since coming to this realm. Yet still, nothing appeared. Nothing gave me pause. The only sounds I could make out were those of the animals and birds which lived here. Completely undisturbed, even by our presence in their home.

"How much further do you think we will have to go before finding Minerva?" Aurora asked as she piled more wood beside the campfire Baer had built.

"Better question is, how do we know we're going the right way? Just because this is the only path in this place doesn't mean she'd take it," Baer said in reply.

I shrugged. "Staying on the path at least keeps us from getting lost. Even with the magic my uncle taught us, we can't navigate a world we know nothing about. Not easily anyway. It's best to stay on the path and hope that we eventually find her."

Aurora sighed. "This is going to take forever." I heard her murmur.

"Don't think like that," Baer attempted to comfort his mate.

"Easy for you to say," she hissed back. "Sasha and I have planned out every detail to our weddings since we were six. And now she may not even accept her mate. If she doesn't accept him, I just can't bear the idea of her being alone forever, Baer."

"Just hold onto what The Fates told us, Sunshine. That's all we can do. It's going to be her choice no matter what we want."

I frowned, listening to the couple's odd argument over my mateship with Sasha. My curiosity rising more as I looked around for the hybrid she-wolf in question as I realized she wasn't within the campground's perimeter.

My gaze seemed to know exactly where to look. My eyes found her just beyond the bushes and trees near the sparkling river we had chosen to camp near.

The water glistened in the moonlight, the sound of its moving waters like a voice calling out to us to come near it. I smiled at the soft sound as I moved to sit on the ground next to Sasha.

"How have you been feeling?" I asked. "You know, since the other night when we talked."

She smiled softly and turned away from the river to look at me, her eyes trailing along my face before settling over my lips for a moment. I could feel my blood begin to burn beneath her gaze, my wolf's pants heavy in my mind. He drowned out any doubt or denial of the feelings we both clearly shared. The bond that had only grown stronger since the night we discovered our connection.

I cleared my throat and forced myself to look away at the river. The sound of its song helping to lull me into a calmer mood as Sasha also turned away, taking with her the heat of my blood.

"I'm doing a lot better. I hate to say it, but I have you to thank. You really knew exactly what to say to get me out of my own head at that moment," she said, the smile evident in her voice.

"Well, if you ever need another pep-talk, I'm more than willing to yell at you some more," I joked, her laughter like a melody in the air.

I had rarely heard her laugh. At least not like this. Not with me.

In school, the only time I'd ever heard her laugh, it had sounded so fake. So, political. It was fake and forced, though not so much that anyone would notice. Somehow, I had always been the one to notice the lack of genuine joy in the sound.

But now, I could hear it. So pure and true. No attempts to impress anyone or to persuade them to join her inner circle. It was simply a sound of amusement at the joke I had made.

"I'll be sure to keep that in mind," she said as she hugged her knees to her chest and rocked to the melody of the river.

"What kind of river do you think this is?" I asked humming along to the sound of the river. "It sounds like it's singing. Given that most of the Forgotten Realm is meant to be filled with creatures and places thought to be stories, or simply forgotten completely, makes you wonder if this river is something special as well."

She looked out at the river and frowned. "It does seem a bit magical, doesn't it? I thought it was in my head that it sounded like it was singing."

I shook my head. "I hear it too."

"What about the River Lethe?" she asked. She turned to me with a smile again. "Isn't it said that it calls the dead to it's waters for them to drink and forget the life they left behind to go onto their next?"

I laughed and nodded. "Yeah, I guess we'd better not drink from its waters then. Kind of negates the reason we made camp here though."

"Why would we have to avoid drinking the water?" she asked, then broke out with a laugh. "We're not dead. It shouldn't affect us."

I chuckled and gave a shrug. "Who ever said it only effects the dead?"

She looked out into the river then and frowned. "Well, I guess it's a good thing we still have water from the last lake we camped near then."

I nodded as I laid back and looked up into the moonlit sky.

"As beautiful as this river looks with the moonlight, nothing can ever compare to the real thing by the ocean's sky surrounded by the stars," I said, not quite realizing I had said it all out loud.

Sasha laid back beside me, her chestnut hair fanning around her head like a halo of honey against the green grass. I watched her from the corner of my eyes, my attention completely pulled from the beauty of the sky by the very beauty that was her.

The bond drowned out the babbles of the river, its song long forgotten as if I drank of its waters. Though nothing could be as potent to my mind than just looking at her. She was the most deadly and beautiful creature in this land when it came to me. No matter how much I tried to fight it or tried to deny it, she was under my skin.

"It is beautiful," she finally whispered. It had felt like a century since I began to look at her. My mind not so much noticing the silence as it had just enjoyed being lost in fantasies I'd long forgotten.

"How do moon witches treat the moon? Don't you have some special rituals or something?"

I chuckled, peeling my eyes away from her and back up to the moon in the sky.

"No," I said. "We treat the moon like any other witch. We have a gathering under the full moon and the new moon for every cycle just like any other coven. We just happen to be able to get a little more magic from the moon is all. Especially my family line with the moon eyes."

She sat up and looked down at me, her eyes sparkling like sapphires as she stared into my eyes. "I always thought it was a coincidence, or the reason why you were called moon witches. Do all of you have the same-colored eyes?"

I shook my head. "No, my mother and uncle both have their father's brown eyes. It wasn't unusual for the eye color to skip a generation. Not common, but not unusual. Mostly, only my family's direct line has the color. Allegedly from the days that Alkmene would stare at the moon with longing for its power. The day she finally gained it, because her eyes had been so filled with the moon's reflection, they took on it's color and shine as its power filled her body."

"Haven't you asked her if that's what happened? You said that she appeared to your uncle and gave him those trials, right." I could see the genuine interest in her eyes as she asked.

I hesitated before answering, a small voice still rebelling at sharing anything more with her about my family. History and secrets we had long kept within our family only. Why I was so willing to share it with her now, I couldn't explain.

‘She is family,'my wolf growled in my head. ‘She is our mate; therefore, she is family.'

I sighed, unable to argue with him. The bond was deepening, its grasp clawing away at any of my resistance.

"Alkmene hasn't appeared to any of us again. My uncle had had a one-track mind when he met with her. At first, he was focused on getting his magic back. Then, after Alkmene took Otsana, his priorities shifted. Either way, he didn't exactly think to ask questions of our history."

Her eyes widened. "Alkmene took his magic and his mate?"

I laughed and nodded. "Yeah, she takes tough love to a whole new level. Which I guess makes her not visiting anyone else as a good thing. Because when she's not teaching us lessons, she's loving us from afar."

Sasha smiled. "Still, it is amazing to be able to track your family line all the way to the beginning of magic."

"Well," I said, tilting my head from side to side. "It's more like the beginning of witches. The magic was already there. The creatures that we encounter here, all of them, had magic long before we did. The Fates and those like them had their magic even longer. No mortal can claim lineage to the beginning of magic."

She frowned. "Well, still. To be able to know your family history that far back. I gotta admit, I'm jealous."

I smirked and sat up, nudging her with my shoulder playfully. It was hard not to notice the shocks of electricity as they ignited from such an innocent and simple touch, even harder to ignore.

"There were three sisters in the beginning. Who knows, maybe you have some lineage you don't know about to one of the other two."

She smiled brightly. "You think so?"

I couldn't help but smile back at her as I nodded. "Yeah, there is no way a line as strong as the Crete family isn't related to one of the three sisters."

Her eyes softened with her smile as she looked back at me. "You've never admitted that my family is strong before."

I bit the inside of my cheek as I saw how much that straightforward comment had meant to her. The memories of all the days in our school years when I denied her power and refused to acknowledge that she was a match for me, as we competed every year for top marks. A time when I thought that it would somehow undermine my own power and family to acknowledge that someone was just as strong as us. Just as in tune with their magic and shifter lineage as myself.

It had always been the one thing that she demanded me to acknowledge, to just admit that she was just as good as I was. Just as strong and powerful, but I never gave that to her, until now.

"I'm sorry I couldn't admit it to you sooner," I finally said. "I always knew, though. Like I said before, you're not a damsel in distress. You're a god damned warrior princess."

She smiled widely at me. "You're god damned right I am."

We both laid back on the soft grass and looked up at the moon. I could hear the lulling song of the river again, like a serenade. The moonlight gleamed down on us like a spotlight, sparkling the lightning bugs as they floated in the air around us.

It was all too perfect of a scene. Far too tempting to resist.

I looked over at her. My finger brushed along her cheek as she turned and looked back at me, our eyes locked and reflected the same burning desire. And the same unwavering resistance.