Curse of the Moon Goddess

The next few days drifted by as the summer clouds at midday. Aleina and I spent almost every waking moment together. We would train most of the day together. When we weren’t training, we would go have lunch with my family or go hunting to let our wolves out. It was a stunning sight to watch as she would bite into the neck of a rabbit and nearly prance over to where I’d be standing. It was obvious her wolf approved of this arrangement as much as Duncan did. He had been acting so strange the last few days. Always throwing romantic ideas into my head, trying to convince me to act on them. Neither Aleina or I knew what this was that we had, but we agreed this was a far better arrangement than with our mates.

Surprisingly, during this time, we hadn’t heard anything from them. Aleina and I hadn’t told our parents about them either. Or cared to explain our sudden friendship. They all attempted multiple times to pull information out of me about that night, but I was locked up tight. All they knew was I no longer hated Aleina and she was coming around more often. This made my parents extremely uneasy. I understood why. They were afraid something would happen when we found our mates. Well, something did happen. And it was magical.

Then, on day three, I finally listened to the love-sick Duncan and followed through with one of his romantic schemes. We went out and caught a young doe, smoked her over a fire, picked some fresh flowers, baked a tart with the help of my sister, and picked a basket of fresh berries. We made the area more attractive by clearing away all loose branches, rocks, and any other less than romantic item in our path. We laid a blanket down and set up the spread next to a fire. We then left a note for Aleina to find telling her to meet us here at sunset.

Right as the sun’s rim touched the edge of the valley, we caught her scent as she climbed the hill towards us.

Uncertain if I should run down and help her, I shifted between my left then right foot awkwardly until her head popped into view.

I was instantly grateful we had stayed put. I’m certain the moment I spotted her I would have tripped over my two legs and hurtled down the side of the hill. She was drop dead gorgeous! She had braided a portion of her hair back out of her face. She wore a simple light blue dress. She had a single white flower tucked behind her ear that she subconsciously kept reaching up to to touch. Her smile was delicate and shy. Even her cheeks were slightly flushed from either the climb or something else.

“Wow.”

Though it was barely a whisper, she heard it. Her face turned a deeper shade of pink. I guess that answers my original question.

“Don’t you think this looks weird? I feel so awkward. I hate dresses,” she confessed, having stopped at the lip of the hill. She was too far away. I wanted her closer.

“Then why did you wear one?” I asked, unable to break old habits.

She glanced down shyly. It was so refreshing seeing her blush. She never blushed when I or any of the other guys went shirtless during training. Yet, here she was looking like a girl who couldn’t stop blushing.

I closed the distance between us, wanting to bring back the confident Aleina I knew so well. I carefully brought my hands to her cheeks. Without warning, I gathered the skin between my fingers and pinched her cheeks hard.

“Ow!” she exclaimed more in surprise than hurt. She quickly smacked my hands away, causing them to sting a bit.

“Ow!” I cried back.

She gave me a dirty look, “It’s your own fault for pinching me!”

“Well,” I shot back, “you shouldn’t have been acting so out of character.”

We both let out a laugh. I would never be able to mess around with Vanessa like this. She would probably blush even harder or excuse herself to go cry in her room. This is why I love Aleina.

Love? Do I really love her? I had always thought of her as the enemy, someone to be hated. Yet, at some point, it had turned into something so much more. And it was growing. As I experimented with these feelings foreign feelings, they seemed to continue to grow with each passing day. I guess I really do love her.

“Why are you looking at me like that, pup?”

Her question snapped me from my reverie.

I shot her my most charming smile, “That’s for me to know and you to never find out, mutt.”

She punched my arm, then linked hers through indicating she’d like us to go sit.

I guided her to the setup feeling proud of the work I had put in.

She sniffed the air curiously, “Wow. This smells amazing! Did you do this all by yourself?”

I nodded, then replied, “Mostly. I had quite a bit of help from my wolf and sister.”

She snorted in an attempt to hide her laugh, “I did not pin your wolf as the romantic type.”

“You rarely pin me anyway,” I shot back. Duncan’s embarrassment in my head was making me a little defensive. No one should know what a softy that puppy was.

Aleina snorted again as she replied, “I could pin you any day or night.”

My cheeks involuntarily flushed at what her words unintentionally hinted at.

Her eyes went wide as she protested, “T-that’s not what I meant!”

“You’re the one who said it,” I pointed out.

Aleina stuck her tongue out, plopped onto the blanket, then proceeded to stuff her mouth full of whatever she could get her hands on.

I chuckled.

“Save some for me!”

I gingerly sat behind her, staring at her back. I snacked mostly on fruits as they were closest to me, but pretty soon that smell of meat, which happened to be blocked by a certain moody person, made my stomach ache for meat.

An evil grin creeped onto my face as an idea popped into my head. I inched closer and closer to Aleina. She tensed; most likely sensing my movement. When I was centimeters away from making contact, I reached my right arm around her.

“What are you…”

She turned around quickly, our lips so close to touching you couldn’t fit a twig between them.

“…doing?”

“Just getting some meat mutt,” I replied, still wearing my troublemaker smile, “What are you doing?”

“I-I’m just… I’m… I.”

I leaned forward. She leaned back. We kept going until I finally made contact with the deer and grabbed myself a piece.

Once the meat was in my grasp, I pulled away.

“I didn’t realize you had such a dirty mind, Ms. Aleina,” I mocked.

She shot me with a deadly glare, and I was instantly grateful I had moved all of the branches and dangerous rocks far from her grasp.

She moved to another side of the blanket, her back to me. I was definitely enjoying seeing her like this.

After the silence continued for too long, I decided to move on to step two.

I stood, making my way to stand in front of her.

“Ms. Aleina.”

“What?” she snapped, not bothering to look at me.

I held my hand out, “May I have this dance?”

Her head shot up, “There’s no music.”

I started humming the tune from the other day. I had worked on perfecting all day as I prepared this event.

A smile, at last, graced her features as recognition glowed in her eyes. She reached her hand up and placed it into my hand. I pulled her to her feet, continuing to hum as I spun her into my arms.

The sun slowly set as we swayed back and forth to my humming. I repeated it over and over again. After about the eighth time, Aleina stopped me.

“Jake.”

“Yes?”

“I have a confession.”

I pulled back just enough to see her eyes.

“I love you. At first, it was a crush when we were little. As we got older, it was obvious you hated me, but for some reason this made my heart want you more. I wanted to train with you as it was the only way I knew to keep your attention. When I saw my mate at the youth gathering, I thought I’d finally get over you. But when you came through that clearing to help me, my heart exploded in relief. Even in the arms of my mate, all I could think of was you. I’m a horrible person, aren’t I?”

I didn’t answer for some time, trying to wrap my head around this idea that Aleina had liked me for all of these years. It was unheard of for a wolf to develop feelings for anyone other than their mate. Yet, here we both were. Completely and totally infatuated with one another.

“No. You’re the farthest thing from being horrible. In fact, I’d say you are the most incredible person in the entire world.”

I leaned closer.

“And,” I paused to rest my forehead on hers, “I love you too.”

I could see a smile grow on her lips as they tilted upward.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

An electric shock stronger than any lightning strike could generate coursed through my veins, starting with where our lips attached.

The reaction was so powerful that the only thought able to push through was, how is she not my mate?