Chapter 21- To be or not to be
Watching her werewolf mate easily snap the demon’s head did nothing to her. How could she forget the dead look in his eyes when he rejected her. Not even hesitating a little bit. She refused to get swooned by his kind charms again, werewolves were all same towards the end. Most of them only wanted power and cared about ranks. Primal instincts at the best.
However, she did shiver a little at the words of the second Aamon’s riddle. It might sound perplexing to a foreigner’s ears, but she already knew the answers. The darkness, the seek….
As soon as Dante was faced by the ordeal of the riddle and the self-sacrifice of the demon, he turned around, facing her once again.
She gulped hard, forcing her body to stop reacting to those golden eyes of his. They were deceitful. At first, it lures you in with its golden ambience and silver swirls but the moment you think you could get lost in it, you realised its true intention. And they weren’t good ones.
‘I accept your rejection’, she bravely forced those words out. Jo was not sure if she really meant what was coming out, they were more likely word vomits to save the last dignity of she had left from the rejection the general had proposed.
Dante frowned bringing his two brows closer as if he wanted to protest it. ‘Wh…. I see Jo. To make the rejection official, you need to say your full rank in your rejection’.
It was Jo’s turn to frown now. Rank?
‘Why’s that?’, she asked. ‘I am an Omega and am not really versed in the rejection rules’.
The damn general smiled at her. If he hadn’t rejected her the day before, she would have thought it was a genuine one. ‘Because unless you state your rank or real identity in the rejection, our mate bond won’t break’.
Jo sighed heavily. This was not going the way she wanted to. Real identity? She was not an omega of Dark Slayer pack, heck she was not even a werewolf to begin with. If she really had to use her real identity to reject Dante, that meant she would have to reveal her kind. And she had no intentions in doing that.
‘I do not accept the rejection then’, she proudly changed her decision.
‘Why?’, Dante asked when it hit her that he was standing fully naked in front of her. Her eyes immediately darted away from him as he chuckled at the realisation too.
It was normal for werewolves to be naked around each other, nudity was natural for them. But she still was not comfortable with it.
Jo continued speaking with her back towards him. ‘Because-Because I am an omega and I have a very weak spirit. If I accept the rejection, it will break me completely’.
Guilt spread rapidly through Dante’s body, Theo howling in his mind to claim their mate.
‘You inconsiderate fool. Jo is an omega and you rejected her instantly. Don’t you dare reject her again or I will really go into hibernation and never return!’, Theo cursed at him.
Being a king was certainly not easy. You could not make everyone happy no matter how hard you tried. And Theo making threats at him did not make this situation any better.
‘I see Jo. That’s something I would not wish upon you. Come with me and I will take you to the royal kingdom. We have great healers there who would be able to help you strengthen your spirits. After that, once you are ready, we can make the rejection official’, Dante offered.
Jo fidgeted with her hands nervously weighing all her options. The general must really hate being mated to an Omega after all.
‘Tell me general, can my friends come along with me. And if yes, after we finalise the rejection, can we be escorted to the human settlements?’, Jo put her offer on the table as well.
‘Of course’, he easily agreed.
‘And what guarantee do I have that you will let us go freely after the rejection?’.
“A king always keeps his word, Jolene’.
‘King?’, she heard a familiar voice as she turned and saw a limping Mina ask. She had her arms around Caleb as he was really hunched to give the little fairy enough support.
‘I am the current werewolf king and I always keep my word’, Dante said the second part discreetly to Jo.
She nodded at him as a virtual agreement was decided between the two ill-fated mates.
‘Jo, are you okay?’, she was soon surrounded by her caring friends as she looked in Dante’s way one last time and noticed that he was still looking at her, very intently.
*
The journey to the royal kingdom took several days. Dante gave the girls a made-up story about the demons that attacked them but Jo pretended to believe him anyways. Sometimes, it was better playing dumb.
During the car ride, Jo finally revealed her kind’s identity to Lucy because it was futile hiding it after she saw her casting the spells and everything. Lucy was even more awestruck at Jo now but she swore never to speak of it again.
It was weird but Jo trusted her friends enough to know they would not expose her true identity.
Besides, she still hadn’t given them the full story and told them about her true enemies. Her enemies were dangerous and could be anywhere. It was best to leave them out of it.
The long black car came to a halt before a long gate which was fashioned from black iron. As the gate opened, it revealed surreal block of houses, each more modern than the other. However, the car kept driving straight on.
‘Omg, we lived to see the royal kingdom’, Daya squeaked as she looked out the window, admiring the beautiful footpaths and modern houses. ‘Everyone here must be hella rich’.
‘The royal family runs the famous Vanslord company chain in the human world’, Lucy added. ‘We had to learn it all in the history class. They are practically billionaires and a royalty even to humans’.
The two fairies gaped even more as Jo sat there unimpressed by all the facts Lucy was throwing at them. She simply did not care.
Their car finally entered a long driveway that had red coloured foot path, signalling that they were getting closer to the royal mansion.
And she wasn’t wrong. The royal mansion was unbelievably enormous as several tall looking buildings were connected to each other, surrounded beautifully by the nature’s serenity.
A small wow escaped Jo’s mouth before she could stop it. The mansion could easily be home to thousands of pack members, the distant Dark Slayer’s mansion merely looked like a kid’s playground compared to the royal one.
It was more fascinating that the enormous mansion only housed the royal family and highly ranked pack members. Lucy’s little royal car podcast made that clear to her.
As they were escorted out of the car one by one, Jo stepped on to the white marble floor. She was not foreign to big mansions and luxury lifestyles. If anything, she ran away from it. But her poor friends all looked out of place as they nervously stood next to each other.
The fairies bright coloured hair made them stand out more as some of the pack members stared at them freely, wondering who they were.
‘Oh my, what do we have here?’, an energetic, little girl hopped over the new arrivals. She had a unique look to her because of her half silver and half dark hair.
‘Evelyn, stop’, Dante’s voice thundered but it was too late.
She was already sniffing the girls. ‘Oh fairies’, she said as she got unreasonably close to Mina and Daya.
‘A weird smelling werewolf’, she pointed at Lucy but she paused completely when it came to Jo.
Evelyn took Jo’s hand as she tried making sense of what she was. ‘I can’t tell what she is’.
‘I am just an Omega’, Jo quickly replied retracting her hands.
‘That’s enough, Evelyn. Excuse my sister, she has been gifted with high senses and likes sniffing everyone’, Dante coughed as he tried removing her sister.
‘Can I stay with them please? I am getting good vibes from them unlike the other meanies’, his little sister begged as Dante firmly declined.Content held by NôvelDrama.Org.
‘Let them rest first and we will see later on’.
After Dante vanished with his sister into the long white corridors, the girls were finally shown their rooms. Even though the rooms were separate, they were close to each other.
Jo stepped into her assigned room as she sat down on the big fluffy blanket. It felt good to finally have some space to yourself. Travelling in a car with several people for days tested your sanity on a different level.
Even though, Dante and Caleb were in a separate car, the fairies’ chattered none stop in the second car. Moreover, with Lucy introducing the vampire’s novel to them as well, it only brought on more heated discussion. They were divided between #TeamDrake and #TeamZackery.
Jo shook her head just thinking about it. She had fully masked her true scent again, especially after the encounter with the demons. Feeling tired, she rested her head on the soft feathery pillows which sunk into the silky sheets.
‘Mmm, this feels like heavy’.
*
-Knock knock-
‘Huh, uhghh’, Jo grunted, half-awake as she tried to orient herself to the current time and place.
‘Its Evelyn’, a chirpy voice sang from the door.
Jo dragged her feet and opened the doors, only to get instantly yanked up and down by the devilishly strong little girl. Nothing less from a royal princess.
‘I know what you are’, her eyes brimmed as Jo gawked at her confused.
‘You are one of these, right?’, she handed Jo something trying to hide her eagerness.
‘How did you…’, she began to question but the little girl quickly ran away.
Jo stared at a little siren figure in her hand as she heard the grand clock in the hallway chime with its melody.