Chapter 5 - Damian
“Sophie, my fated mate…” I add with a gulp as I recount the events of last night, my inner wolf murmuring under its breath in the back of my mind, reminding me of the importance of Sophie’s life and her existence in mine.
The pause is to make a mental note to come back to this specific thought, to reflect on more than just the demon’s attack last night. Luckily, everyone’s eyes are on me, like there’s a spotlight illuminating my face from where I’m seated in the council’s cabin.
“…passed out upon seeing me shifting into wolf form,” I continue. “But it was the only way to protect us both out there. The demon went after her first, as if it knew who she was, her importance to the pack.”
Elder Mortimer nods thoughtfully, fingers steepled in front of his face as she turns to my uncle. “If the demons are aware of our plans to find the fated mates of our alphas, we’ll have to be more careful next time.”
“Agreed,” Uncle Joel nods once. “Luckily, the human is here now, and we’ll just enhance safety measures around the pack territory to keep the demons out.”
“Wait…if she passed out,” Conan interjects, leaning forward with one brow arched at me, “it means that she couldn’t stand the sight of you shape-shifting, right? She’s weak. How do we know—”
My blood boils when he says this, and it rushes through my veins like fire, scorching hot enough to send my good hand slamming onto the table. The impact cuts him off, creating an eerie silence in the meeting room.
“Be careful, Conan,” I warn, pointing a finger at him. “That is my fated mate you’re speaking about, and I won’t tolerate any disrespect.”
Conan backs off, holding his hands up in surrender. I proceed with the rest of the update, even when I notice some eyes remain wary.
“The demon attacked then, and I fought it long enough to grab Sophie and run across the river, but not before getting hurt,” I say, gesturing to the arm that was injured in the fight.
The demon clawed my forearm when I was in wolf form, grazing the spot that had been burned during the ritual.
I’m not healing as quickly as I’d like, but I was able to cast a barrier from the river, allowing me and Sophie to get past the patrol line and into the safety of Red Moon territory.
“The demon disappeared then,” I continue, and lean back to signal I’m done explaining what happened.
Heinrich stares at me keenly. “Do you think your abilities were enhanced because of the presence of your fated mate?” he asks, to which I purse my lips in contemplation.
“Perhaps. It is a possibility, though my healing still remains stunted.”
“Has she woken up?”
I nod slowly, almost nervously, at Heinrich. “She has woken up,” I concede, and Uncle Joel steps in.
“Has she agreed to the mating ceremony?”
I wince, the question stinging my insides, stirring my inner wolf with uncertainty. “We will proceed with the mating ceremony, but for her sake, we will refer to it as marriage. I don’t want to frighten her. She will learn of my true nature as time goes by.”
“We don’t have the luxury of time,” Elder Bernard reminds me, and I nod.
“Just trust me,” I say, recalling the look on Sophie’s face when I told her the same thing.
She doesn’t trust me, and she has every reason not to.
I snatched her from her hometown, only to bring her here and demand that she marries me.
Call me a brute, a beast, but after what happened in Hamilton last night, there’s no way I would have willingly walked away if she asked me to.
It’s why I refused her request to go back home.
This is more about protecting her than having her here to strengthen myself and my pack. My priorities seem to have shifted, and it’s my inner wolf that commands this change, knowing its fated mate is in danger, needing to protect her as much as I need the air I breathe.
“Prepare for the ceremony tomorrow night,” I tell Uncle Joel as I stand from my seat, needing to go back to Red Moon territory, where I can only hope that I haven’t made too much of a mess with Sophie.
She has every right to hate me, but there’s no way I’m letting her return to Hamilton when the demons seem to know of her existence.
***
Standing beside James’s bed in the clinic hut, I mull over what just happened, perhaps visiting the unconscious beta in the hopes that he’ll magically wake up and offer some advice.
My frustration stems from visiting the room I’m keeping Sophie in, locked away like a damsel in distress who refuses to accept she’s in danger. She didn’t even speak a word to me, not even when I showed her the wedding gown she’s meant to wear tonight.
I know my beta wouldn’t agree with my methods, and neither will my sister.
Locking up the woman I’m going to marry isn’t how I’m supposed to sweep her off her feet with the promise of my eternal devotion, but things are too tense right now.
And as the council warned, we don’t have the luxury of time.
I need to do whatever it takes to protect my people. But more than that, I need to defend my fated mate.
The door creaks as it opens, signaling Dianna’s arrival as she comes in carrying a fresh bouquet of flowers. She sees me and frowns, as if she’s upset with me.
“Damian,” she nods curtly as she walks to the window to remove the old flowers from the vase. “Are you ready for tonight? Uncle Joel said we’re not performing a traditional mating ceremony...”
I take a deep breath, gulping when she turns, her eyes squarely on me.
“Yes,” I concede with a short nod, shoving my good hand into my pocket as I keep my shoulders tight, wearing my injured arm like armor pressed to my side.
“It’s better this way, for Sophie’s sake.
She doesn’t remember what happened, what chased her, or that I’m a wolf.
Or maybe she does, and she just refuses to believe it. ”
Dianna crosses her arms, eyes turning a colder, darker shade of blue. “I don’t blame her. You pretty much sprung this on her, and now you have her locked up in your house like a hostage.”
“Do you think I have another choice?”
“I don’t know.” Dianna shrugs as if a cold shiver travels down her spine. “You could have started with the truth and made her understand why you’re doing this.”
I gulp hard. “It’s not so simple,” I murmur, running my good hand through my hair, not ready to reveal the truth of my history with Sophie. “She’s a human from the ordinary world, of course, she doesn’t believe in our existence. I need your help, Dianna—”
“Of course, you do.” My sister rolls her eyes. “I will try to befriend her, but you have to promise to let her out of that room, Dame.”
“I will. I promise. Tonight, after the ceremony, she’ll be free to roam the valley.”
Dianna nods, but I can see the sadness in her eyes, that softer side of her shining through. She knows that keeping my fated mate captive is no way to win her over.
She just doesn’t know that Sophie and I have history, and that even if I weren’t a wolf, and if the preservation of our pack didn’t rely on this bond, Sophie would never agree to this. She’d never take me back.
Not after what I did.
***
Dianna’s efforts must have failed, because the small log cabin that houses the pack meetings becomes colder when footsteps creak on the wood outside. Sophie brings her resentment with her like the wind, even long before she enters the cabin.
When she does, her eyes are cold, livid orbs of dark brown—eyes that were once warm, chocolate-brown, and welcoming. She holds my gaze for a deliberate second, as if challenging me, as if telling me, without words, that she’s going through with this only to make my life a living hell.
Oh, boy!
I gulp hard, sensing my impending unrest at the hands of the human, and having to remind myself that her feistiness is only the consequence of my past actions.
She has every right to throw daggers at me with her fierce glare, her eyes turning dark crimson as she steps into the cabin, her gaze fixed on something beyond my head.
I frown, because perhaps I’m imagining the fierce glint in her eyes, bushe turns her face away before I can double-check.
Dianna enters behind her, wearing a look of apology as she meets my eyes briefly. But even then, Sophie continues walking toward me at the end of the aisle, marching forward with sharp steps and a hardened expression.
My heart hammers in my chest, a flurry of emotions setting in as I watch her approach me, and I realize just how much I missed her. Just how much I'd been bottling up since the day I left her two years ago.
We were meant to go out that one sunny Sunday, to our special place in the mountains which overlooked the Red Moon territory, where we'd watch the sunset over the valley. Sophie didn’t know what was below, what it signified, or that hidden under the panoramic views was the pack I lead.
I'd kept my true identity a secret for months, and then another demon attack forced me to a crossroads.
Stay with Sophie and put her life in danger?
Or leave, and keep her safe?
The latter was the better option, because I'd found myself falling too hard, too fast, and that meant that I couldn't endanger her life. If I did, if I stayed with her, and something happened, I wouldn't have been able to forgive myself.
I'd never forgiven myself for leaving.
And here we are, two years later, with her walking down the aisle as my bride, wearing a white dress that hugs her voluptuous curves so perfectly, it makes her look like an ethereal creature who's fallen out of the sky.
But my arms cannot catch her. Not when she wears her resentment for me as fiercely as the red painting her lips.
Those lips don't even twitch, as if she's made of steel, her hair—which I remember her wearing in its natural state, bold, dark brown curls cascading over her shoulders—set into a tight bun now, flat and formal, like she's protesting.
When she steps beside me, she turns to me, but doesn't meet my eyes. She simply stands there, in front of the council members, in front of me, with her mouth pressed into a firm line.
Oh, yeah, I pissed her off. If there's anything worse than breaking up with her, it’s capturing her, locking her in my cabin, and forcing her to be my wife.
But fate has left me no choice.
Uncle Joel proceeds with the formalities, reciting words that belong in a church on a Sunday, speaking as if he's some revered priest who's marrying off two humans. We're made to sign a contract, a piece of paper that means nothing compared to the sacred fated mate bond—a contract agreed upon by our souls long before we entered the physical realm of Earth. That’s what the fated mate bond is meant to be, but it’s hardly possible to believe this when Sophie is as detached as possible, even her fingers cold as she holds her hand out when it’s time to put a ring on her finger.
Mother’s ring, a silver band with a teardrop-shaped sapphire in the center. It fits Sophie’s ring finger perfectly—almost too perfectly, like a cruel joke from the universe, because back when we’d been seeing each other, I often pictured what it’d be like to ask Sophie to marry me.
I knew that dream was out of reach, but I clung to it like a lifeline in those months when we’d been together, fantasizing about a world in which I wasn’t a werewolf, an alpha of a pack in the valley, and I could have an ordinary life with the woman I loved.
That's why I walked away. And if what we know about fated mates is true, breaking up with her was no ordinary thing.
I rejected my mate.
I turned my back on the most precious thing that can be gifted to a werewolf.
And here we are, getting married to preserve my pack, when I don't even know how that's supposed to happen. I don't even know if we'll ever get past this, and if she'll say anything more to me than a listless murmur after Uncle Joel pronounces us husband and wife.
I offer her my hand to lead her out of the cabin, but she turns her face away, as if she finds my hand disgusting—a hand that once held her, touched her, caressed her in places—
“We can go back to the cabin now,” I say, and the only response I get is a hum, and her refusing to take my hand.
What was I expecting, anyway? A second chance, for us to pick up where we left off?
So, I lead the way back down the aisle, nodding at my sister as I pass her on the bench.
Dianna wears the same, sad expression she did when I carried James back to the valley, and he wouldn't wake up.
A look of grief, perhaps for the unforgivable situation I'm in now, which has no remedy.
I can only imagine that Dianna tried and failed to befriend Sophie.
I just hope that she doesn't give up trying.
All I can do is lead Sophie back to the cabin, and she follows me in silence, not protesting, not attempting to escape. When we reach the cabin, I open the door and step aside so she can enter. She does, again in silence, heading toward the bedroom where I'd kept her locked away for two nights.
She passes me, leaving a trail of her scent in her wake. Jasmine flowers and sweet honey.
“Sophie…” I call out after her, and she stops, but doesn't turn.
“I won't be locking the cabin anymore. I won't lock you in your room. You're free to roam the valley if you'd like.”
“Free?” A chilling laugh shakes her shoulders, thundering through my already shaky resolve.
That's all she says. That's all she leaves me with, an emptiness that echoes with that sinister laugh.
I hang my head in shame, in defeat.
It's not like I thought any of this would make amends for the past, but if there's one thing I'm sure of, it's that Sophie hates my guts.
And this is just the beginning of her retribution.