Chapter 4 Home
Whoever picked me up from the ground must have carried me over to this chair and placed me by the fire.
I was finally beginning to warm up which unfortunately made the memories of yesterday flood my mind.
All I could think about was how my family could do this to me?
What had I done to deserve this kind of treatment?
I started weeping, and curled into a ball on the chair I was sitting in.
I heard little feet behind me and then felt a small hand on my hand; I jumped and looked up.
There stood a small boy with eyes that danced like the light of the moon and hair the color of the sun.
“Why are you crying?” He asked, smiling, “I didn’t mean to scare you, but you finally made it home.”
“What do you mean, home?” I asked the small boy, as I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand and sniffled.
"I'm learning all about you in school right now," he said, "Hera told me to come and get you and bring you to her."
Just then Capella spoke to me, “you should follow him Celest, and learn the truth, there is much you do not know,” after hearing Capella’s voice again, I realize that I didn't hallucinate her.
I do as she says and follow the small boy.
As we walked the halls the boy raised his hand to me, and I took it.
He led me down different halls and stopped in front of a door with a moon and stars engraved on the front.
“Go in and speak with Hera,” the boy gently placed my hand on the handle and skipped away.
I stood there for a moment and then turned the handle.
When the door opened the room was full of sparkling lights, and there was a strong pull that welcomed me in.
The door behind me closed gently and I was not scared.
I had never felt more at peace than in this moment.
The tiny stars started shrinking in size and formed into an all-white wolf with large blue swirling eyes.
“Hello, Celest,” she said to me. “My name is Hera, and I am known as the Goddess of the Galaxy. I was instructed to come here and tell you the story of the Lycan people; our people, and the truth behind who you are.”
I bowed my head, I don’t know why but it just felt like the right thing to do, she is a Goddess after all.
She gestured to paintings on the wall with her nose and started talking.
The first painting was a white wolf and a black wolf walking together in a moonlit forest.
“This is Fusion and I. We met when we were just pups. We grew up together and when we turned 17, we were told we couldn’t be together because he was of godly blood, and I was not. We defied everyone. We knew we were to be mated for life and continued our relationship, so we ran away into the forest.
We came across a cave surrounded by red plants. They smelt awful so we used that to our advantage and hid there. The cave was small, but we had dug a tunnel in the back of the cave that led to a much larger den. We were safe there and the plants hid our scents from our families.
When Fusion shifted for the first time at 18, he turned into the black wolf you see in the picture. His fur was so black it shimmered in the moonlight. I shifted one week later when I turned 18, and to our surprise I was an all-white wolf.
Normally your fur color is the color of your hair in human form and mine is blonde. That didn’t matter to us though, once I shifted it confirmed that we were mates. The mating bond clicked immediately. Our families looked for us for over two years and couldn’t find us.
We heard through the many creatures of the forest that both families had announced that the search would finally be called off. We were ecstatic because I was pregnant with our first pup.”
Red plants, I thought to myself, I wonder if they were the same plants from the cave.
“Yes, it was,” she answered even though I hadn’t spoken the words out loud.
“The cave only presents with the red plants, which are called skunk cabbage, when someone needs them most.
When they are stepped on or crushed they will give off a foul odor and disorient people, making them nauseous and sleepy.
The Moon Goddess placed them there to protect you and rid you of the poison in your system."
"Poison? What do you mean?" I asked.
"Celest, the people you thought were your parents, have been poisoning you since you were five years old. They did this so your wolf would not present herself to you. The plants you ran through released it from your system, essentially shocking your body back to normal."
I could feel tears on my cheeks, “I really didn't think they hated me that much.
But the last two days have clearly opened my eyes to the fact they probably never loved me.
I shouldn't feel this hurt. They have abused me my whole life but the fact that they were poisoning me to take away something so essential to my existence is hurting more than the abuse."
After studying my face for a few seconds, she continued.
The second painting was of three black and white spotted pups.
“As you can guess, these are our children. We thought we were having one but were blessed with three” Hera’s eyes sparkled with happiness, and she gestured and said, "Vega with bright grey eyes, Rigel with swirling blue eyes, and Regulus with golden honey eyes.
When they all shifted at just five years old, we knew something was different about them.
The Moon Goddess appeared to us that night and explained that our pups weren’t werewolves, but they were Lycans like you, Celest.
My birth parents died when I was an infant and I was placed with a different family.
I was nobody to them, just some orphaned pup.
They had no idea what or who I was going to be.
So when I told them about Fusion, they believed I could not be his mate, I don't hold that against them.
I was hurt of course and no one knew the truth of who I was going to be.
Once our pups were born the Moon Goddess told me I was the Goddess of the Galaxy, and I was created to protect our people and to bring forth a new type of werewolf, the Lycan Wolves.
There were also 10 more couples made by the Goddess who were also tasked with the creation of the Lycan.”
The third painting was of 32 humans standing together.
“These are 16 of the Lycan pairings, before all the babies were born.”
Hera gestured again to the painting, “Vega married Altair, Rigel married Sirius, Regulus married Cassiopeia, and the others found love within the Lycan people.
They claimed that they were pulled to one another and shared a bond like werewolves.
As the years went by, more Lycans started showing up.
Over one hundred years the lycan numbers grew, there were around three hundred lycan people.
Though the years had past, the oldest of the lycan still looked young and healthy.
We knew nothing of this race so each day was a new experience as to what they could do, or how long they would live.
One thing you will not find written Celest is that each Lycan possess a power.
One they find within themselves, many keep their powers hidden, in fear of other races using them as weapons, so not even I know everyone's true gifts.
She pointed to the fourth painting with her nose.
The fourth painting is of a battle between the werewolves, and the lycans.
There were men, women and children painted here.
The painting had so much blood and death in it that it was hard to look at.
Fathers and mothers trying to protect their children, while others lie dead on the ground.
Both wolves and humans were fighting with weapons, claws, and teeth.
“This is the Lycan war which happened 150 years ago.
The Lycan people turned out to be the stronger race.
It caused tension between the werewolf people and the lycan people.
The Moon Goddess tried to speak to those who would listen and told them the lycans were to save the werewolves when the time was right.
But the werewolves wouldn’t listen. They decided to attack the lycan people.
They chose to attack at night, on the night where the moon was smallest.
Which caused the lycans and werewolves to be less powerful.
Unknown at the time, the werewolf people had obtained the Moon Shard.
An item thought to be a myth that allowed werewolves to remain powerful no matter what the size of the moon.
Unfortunately, this would allow the werewolves to win this battle unknowingly leaving one lycan alive, Rigel.
Rigel, who could see into the future, saw the battle coming and warned Sirius, but he told her that the vision needed to happen so the birth of the Lycan Queen would not be altered.
Sirius told her to run and keep their baby safe, so she ran into the night.
Rigel would later birth a male pup who would be named, Aylin.”
At the mention of that name something in my chest stirred.
Like I had always known him. I placed my hand on my heart and Hera smiled at my reaction.
The fifth painting is of the most handsome man I had ever seen with blue swirling eyes, and jet-black hair.
He is staring up at the sky, and a white wolf looks down at him.
“This is a painting of Aylin praying to the Moon Goddess for his mate, and Luna. When an alpha finds his mate and she accepts him, she becomes Luna of the pack. It is said that The Moon Goddess promised, when the world needed healing,
she would send her heir and legacy to the people in the form of a white wolf born from the noble blood of the galaxy. Her name would be Celest, Queen of the Cosmos.”
I turned to face her, “Me? What am I supposed to do? I hadn’t even heard of werewolves or lycans until today and I have been treated like trash my whole life. How am I supposed to even find Aylin, let alone be his mate. Hera, what is all of this? A Queen? I am nobody. Are you sure it’s me?”
Hera looked over to me and turned into the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.
She was tall and had long blonde hair full of curls.
Her skin was bright white like the moon’s glow and her lips were full and red.
She took my face in her hands, and I felt so peaceful, like this is where I was meant to be.