My Forbidden Mate

Aaron’s POV She wasn’t supposed to be here. I did everything I could to ensure this would never happen. But now, she was lying on my dining room table, her body on display to showcase that very failure. Her fair skin stained with the same blood that matted her usual loose waves of dark umber. My eyes were at war with what was left behind on a soul undeserving of anything but bliss and happiness. My wrath focusing on remembering each and every tear of her skin to make whoever left it behind know pain twice as deep. All while the more submissive side, the side she always brought with any involvement in my life, could not bear to stomach the sight. Not when I could hear the silent winces of her heart and how it altered between consciousness and a need for reprieve. “Aaron, you should go…” “I’m not leaving her.” I spoke as my voice broke, my feet desperate to pull forward and join her side in order to hold her hand through this. Yet I knew if I had, I could never release her again. I was only strong enough to do this once. To have to do it again would be death. I would gladly take it to know she would be alright. Even if it was without me, just as I thought it was when I left the first time.. THIRTEEN YEARS AGO I didn’t want to die. It was simple and as complicated as that. Of my existence, I was destined to an expiration date written within my blood before I could truly understand or comprehend the reason why. It was told to me as being a sacrifice with he who held the blade acting as martyr, eradicating a blip in the line of succession of my conception that was never meant to be. Today was the day I was supposed to die… But the second I came to that clearing, those who called themselves family ceremoniously set in wait for my execution, my feet ached to sprint. My peripheral vision taunting each and every possible exit I could try to grant myself this temporary upper hand. The grips wrapped around my shoulders reminding me how I wouldn’t get far. But I could still try. Every inch of my body vibrated from the tremors of needing to act promptly or risk losing the ability to do so at all. Each step acted as cement of the literal chopping block stained with those who came before me. Those who were not brave enough to run. Or perhaps those who were smart enough not to.  In my survey came a single moment of clarification. An ally, my one and only, supplied a single nod of permission that cued my feet into action. Low branches and fallen trunks created an obstacle course of sorts as I began to question my destination. The charge to survive already in place, but an unwise motivation leading more questions than answers as I carried through my sprint. A sudden pain seered into me as I fell to the forest floor in agony. A set of canines sunk into my skin, penetrating the hull of my calf and well into muscle as I was defeated.  “You can’t run, runt!” My brother’s voice charged behind me as I turned to face him. “You are an abomination that has already lived a day too long…You never should have been born…” The words were cruel but not enough to merit tears. For the last six years of my life, it was all I knew with the exception of my advisor’s kindness. The desensitization was enough to silence any coming emotion. Everything but the need to survive, anyway.  “It is your destiny to die, Aaron…Forgotten like the mistake you are…” He explained behind a growing smirk, breathless and carnal for the bloodlust behind his eyes. His arrogance existed as a perpetual downfall as he believed these words of intimidation would be enough to keep me still. I curled into my secondary form. Although prohibited from doing so for a multitude of reasons, my life meant more to me in that moment than their promise of threats made against broken rules and consequences. Some unknown purpose calling me forward to keep from submitting to their supposed destiny for me.  He stood in awe as I faced him, my skin now coated with the same sable hair I had inherited from my father along with his eyes, a contrast to Troy, who had an alternate blue glare from his mother. He continued to analyze me as I discarded humanity at my heels and ran as the wolf I was. The one they failed to kill. And I didn’t stop for anything. Not when rain called upon me as a deterrent. Not when mud caked and cracked my nails until they ached down to the bone. And not when shots grazed my shoulders and waist from the hunters at my back. I only came to rest when my body failed to remain in this form from exhaustion alone. Not even a second to assess the damage done to my more fragile existence before I collapsed somewhere in the woods. My body failed me as it had been exerted well beyond what it could withstand. The cold kiss of death rushed from my ankles upwards, a poetic victory in knowing I did not die as they had intended as their bastard alpha.  I didn’t expect to wake up here. Or anywhere at all. Especially to the sight of a young girl. A beautiful but naive young girl approached me with fresh cloth. My wounds stained the ones left abandoned on the table beside the bed. My eyes adjusted in just enough time to realize I found someone more prohibited than me.  A human.  The tales of their brutality and greed against us was what kept us frightened within our territories. But she was helping me. Without gaining anything in return as she was the only one to look at me the only way I ever wanted to be. Normal.  “It’s okay…” She spoke as I shifted beneath the attempt she made to wrap my hand, a monster to the image I’m sure she’d been made used to. But she didn’t falter to me. She didn’t tremble as I did to her. The irony set in the unspoken words between us of how I should have frightened her, and yet, I was the one pulling away from a touch I felt so very unqualified for.  “You were bleeding a lot so I used a lot of band-aids, but they didn’t work so I used this…” My eyes watched as she pulled old shirts. “What even happened to you?” She couldn’t have been more than four years younger than me, but held an innocence I fell in love with at that moment. Blissfully unaware of how cruel the world could be without the comfort of any love and protection. At least the kind a child should have when they make the transition from infant to adolescent.  “I saw you…change…” My stomach suddenly felt weightened in place. We were taught never to trust humans. They would exploit us and reveal us for financial and scientific gain. It made sense at the time. But now, I just wanted to be honest with her. Feeling as though I could never repay her for what she’d done for me but honesty was a good start to try.  “I’m a-” “Werewolf…” She slowly nodded while answering my confession for me.  “I know. I mean I didn’t actually know until you told me, but I know now…” “You’re not…scared of me?” She shook her head, a wide and brilliant but toothless smile making up her entire face, even reaching to her eyes.  “You’re a puppy…I mean…bigger, but…I love puppies.” I couldn’t help but grin at her comparison. Our claws were three times the length and our bodies larger than any ‘puppy’ I’d ever seen. But her chaste reaction was enough to make me feel human for the first time in my life. Making it easier to trust her, more than even my own blood.  “I’m Alessandra…” She offered her name with pride, something I hadn’t been able to do as it linked me to the scandal of my conception. But when I offered it through a hoarse explanation, she gave a smile of approval. As if she was waiting to hear it. As if it was some piece to a missing puzzle.  “So, Aaron,” My heart clinched as she spoke my name. The last time I heard it addressed to me with care had been the day I lost my mother. And yet hearing it from her gave it life again. Gave admiration again.  “How did you become a werewolf? I watched a movie with my brother once and it showed being bit…is that how it happened to you?” I hesitated again. The secrets of our legacy were sealed for hundreds of years behind the lips of our elders. It was a promise when we were of a responsible age that we’d learn the details. Because of this, I knew only a fraction more of what she had deduced.  “I was born one…” I confessed.  “That is so cool! Sometimes I wish I was born like a unicorn. It’d be so cool…” Again, the way she spoke with such virtue when my words were all stained with pain, made me addicted to every time she spoke. And as easily as I found this comfort, the truth to her finding me came out just as effortlessly. Her eyes wide as I kept from explaining the more graphic details as I didn’t want to taint her beautiful mind. She didn’t have to know of how I was imprisoned and beaten, left days starved and nights in the cold. I wanted her to keep that cartoonish version of me if it meant I could be somewhat responsible for her continued innocence and that brilliant smile.  She spent a month with me this way. Keeping me concealed within a shed without a care of judgment. Always compassion coming with the food she would make from her novice hands, ones she had yet to grow into. Unsteady edges of burnt toast and runny eggs that I’d suffer the taste just to see her. The promise of protein in cold bacon, a welcome atrocity, to know I’d have her company as compensation. And the conversation of my life in the woods and hers on the other side of the barrier making up our own version of a reality into a bond we were too naive to understand could never last.  Every day would be spent without her, hidden within this shed at the edge of the woods. My entertainment came in the mementos of her life stored within these boxes. All until I could see her again when darkness came. I used to loathe sunsets as it meant that cold stone room and shackles too tight for even my boyish wrists. But she made me love the stygian rest. Not because of the darkness, but because she taught me to look at the stars that existed within it. And when she would come to me, I would watch her speak of her day and her friends, living vicariously through her in the life I could never have. The pain twinging at my jaded heart was worth the uncomfortability to see her content to share herself with me in the only way she ever could.  But the day the full moon had returned, making its full cycle, they’d found me. My scent was not lost to hers as I hoped it would be. That sweet scent I contributed to belonging to the doughnuts she had brought to me, strawberry and vanilla, forever resonated with me. Even as I looked to her to prepare myself for this silent goodbye. Knowing she would never be safe as long as I remained. Until she relinquished herself to someone else and their scent took over hers and ultimately mine.  The thought pulled my heart to shreds as I prepared myself to make the sacrifice my parents never could. I had to leave to protect her. And as she lay asleep in the tent we’d made of old sheets designed with constellations we made up our own names for, I leaned down to her peaceful rest. As innocent a thought it had been then, I simply needed to touch her once. To know her warmth was not simply a mirage within my head from a lovelorn heart. I brushed a loose hair behind her ear, concealing it still, before observing her. Within this moment I had wondered if my parents had sent her to me. To save me. So it was only fair I allowed the same to her.  “Thank you, Alessandra…” Her name was bittersweet in my whisper as I longed to stay. I longed to share my every moment learning of her and being immersed in that sinless existence I envied as much as I’d loved. But with the same instinct that came to leave my camp earlier that month was the same that explained that I had to leave now. That haven found in her touch would forever be held in a silent and unacknowledged crevice within the heart she made live again. Something she awoke that they believed they took, but she gave back so easily.  Humanity. Purpose. Sympathy. Determination.  Whatever it was, it was intoxicating, but a reason to leave, reminding me how selfish I would be to remain. And I would not make the same mistakes as my father. Falling for a human, resulting in a child that would endure what I had. And for that, I bowed my head to her hand for one final piece of contact, struggling away in knowing it would be my first, only, and last touch before disappearing with the feeling seering into my skin as well as my memory until the day I ceased to exist.  And that was ten years ago.  Every detail engrained and replayed every second my eyes closed. Not that I would have to imagine it in reminiscence alone as I ventured back to her whenever I could. Watching from the treeline to ensure she was safe. My feet tiresome from the lengthy journey at full speed, just for a moment to watch how she’d blossom before my eyes. I’d have traveled the world twice over to know she was safe. From them. And especially, from me.  But tonight was different. She came into her room, her heart a million miles against her fragile chest. Her eyes as wild as her passions and her breath as sporadic as my own as I heard the steps follow her. Aggressive steps with a matching hammering to the opposite side of her door that became the cause of tears split down her cheeks. “Open the f*****g door!” The voice raged as my eyes narrowed. My teeth aching to the same degree as my fingers to beckon my transition forwards. To filet and permanently alter whoever would dare speak of her that way. Yet, she was not set to grant him access. Instead, she began piling everything into a single bag stuffed and thrown over her shoulder before climbing out of her window at the very second her door sprung open. That dainty lock obliterated as pieces flew in every direction and he came to the window she rested beneath. Her hands wrapped over her mouth to silence her breathless sobs as she trembled beneath him as he cursed into the night.  “And stay gone, you little b***h!” My stomach churred to know he meant these words, my mind bewildered at how he could. Those worries and anger shifted as I noticed she was crossing into the territories. My territory. Wolf territory… It was fair game for any human if they came to that invisible threshold. Missing hikers and campers made the mistake recently, prompting an investigation and warrant to ‘kill any wolves on sight’. But she couldn’t possibly have known this. Or perhaps if she did, she simply chose the lesser of two evils. A beast to a wolf.  I followed close behind, enough to remain unheard, the stealth only worsening her paranoia as she faced me in the darkness at least a dozen times before it was no longer just the two of us. Another scent. One I knew all too well as it had infiltrated that sweet scent I was offered with her. This infiltrating scent of mahogany and mayhem.  My brother.  The sight of his brunette fur and piercing icy stare from across the space she advanced towards pulled me to the floor in my own lycanthropic submission. Teeth bared as I rounded to him and nudged him with warning. I never wished to use my abilities beyond that of a man to bring pain to anyone. But for anyone who dared place her in harms way, I made no apologies for my methods to defend her.  We twisted in the mess made of our shared forms, coming before her as she stilled. A gasp left her lips as I took a stance before her, claws and teeth in her defense as she remained in place. A hellhound appeared before her, defending her against his own kind. A traitor to the eyes of those sharing his likelihood. A glare made through his canine eyes, his already bloody teeth in full view, he lunged in her direction. Before I could understand the trial this would leave, I struck. Ravaging against him with every ounce of hatred I possessed for everything I was. The irony worn on my own teeth as the crimson stain I never wished to wear.  “Aaron…” The way my name still sounded from her lips, even after nearly a decade and a half returned me mortal. Even if my form kept to this beast, she whittled me back down to the boy that met her thirteen years ago. I turned to face her, prepared to take the hatred and fear in her eyes. But once I saw her, I knew she recognized me completely. It was enough to know that if I returned to myself, I couldn’t leave her again.  She reached forward to me, stroking my fur as thanks, as I stiffened to her. Just as I had the day we’d met. Only this was not in fear of the unknown. This was in knowing what would come if I stayed. So I shifted into the darkness that surrounded us, convincing myself it was simply best this way.  My gait only managed to travel so far until that sweet scent was enough to dizzy me. Informing me she was injured. My paws were not fast enough to the hearth before I found her. Cut and left in the cold autumn night, her heart a mere whimper to the strength I heard just moments prior. Any belief she would have been safe without my embrace eradicated as I pulled her towards me, her body at rest, as I offered myself only one minute to her. A reward for the time I’d spent away and at a distance. My soft hand to her cheek.  “I’m so sorry…” Was all I could confess before I charged home. A cabin hidden from even the most trained of trackers seemed too far to recall as I burst my way inside.  “RONAN! RO!” His name was in repetition before a hurried set of fumbled motion came from the slanted steps leading to the loft above.  “Jesus, Aaron, are you trying to have every wolf in every territory to hear you-” He paused, disdain behind his eyes and rejection reserved behind a clenched jaw littered with disappointment and disagreement.  “Is this…” “Please…Just save her…” “You know she shouldn’t be here…It isn’t-” “I’ll do whatever I have to after…Just please…Ronan…” I was never a desperate man. Not when my own life was left on the line as I believed somewhere it was half deserved. But not hers. I was willing to do anything and everything for her to exist in this world that needed her. I needed her. Even if doing so would always be from the shadows. But may hell have mercy on whoever was responsible for this. For they wouldn’t live to see another dawn unless it would be their last.