Lost Lycan's Mate: The Finale

Jameel

Nahta would never entertain this. So, why was I going to the lycan castle, determined to find answers?

That’s all I’d been doing the last few times I tried to get her to talk, ever since finding out we were mates.

She didn’t want it, but hey, I wasn’t enthusiastic about being mated to an unwilling female either.

What was in it for me anyway? I didn’t really know her.

At least, I didn’t know much except that she lost both her parents in the aftermath of the attack of the Foresters on the lycans. And her sister, too.

She was joined at the hip with our Alpha, Kieran. Everyone believed Nahta had an unhealthy dependency on the alpha and was in love with him. I was no exception to this belief, but I held out hope that I’d get her to stop kidding herself.

“A bit difficult,” I muttered to myself as I trudged up a flight of stairs. “Considering you keep getting bullied, and she has to come save your sorry ass.”

“Hello,” a throaty, deep voice remarked as I entered the upper floor. A long hallway stretched out in front of me, lined on both sides with rooms. The man in front of me observed me with interest in his eyes.

“You are Nahta’s mate,” he remarked slowly.

I nodded at Sitka, Alpha Hakota’s beta. He knew Nahta better than I did. He’d been around when the Foresters attacked the lycans. He had lost his own mate in that attack.

He sighed heavily. “Walk with me.”

I fell into step beside him.

“Nahta, huh?” He sighed once more. “Look, kid. I won’t sugarcoat anything. She is tough, cold, and stubborn. And she doesn’t think you deserve her. It’s probably the last thing you want to hear, but right now is a bad time for you to show up.”

I couldn’t help the twinge of annoyance in my words. “I know it is, but I also know that no time will ever be a good time if she doesn’t want it. And I need to know why. I thought lycans adore their mates.”

Sitka grimaced visibly. He paused and turned to me, scratching his neck thoughtfully. “My pack has proved that notion very wrong,” he muttered under his breath.

Why would he say that? Was it because of the rumors about some of the pack members playing around with multiple mates even though lycans were supposed to be loyal to one? I’d heard stories about Terrin, and even Alpha Hakota.

But I wasn’t like that. I believed in a singular love.

“Kid.” Sitka read my face. “Finding Nahta would be a mistake. She’s working through her feelings right now.”

“And what about my feelings?” I countered.

His lips curled into a benign smile. “Of course, they matter, just not to her. She has to come to terms with some things before she can be ready for you.”

“You mean she’s in love with someone else,” I replied slowly.

Sitka shook his head. “I wouldn’t say that. But she’s blinded by what she thinks she wants. Until the curtains lift, she will not see your value.”

“Who will lift the curtains, Sitka?” I remarked, an edge of desperation making my words come out in one jumbled heap, all too fast. “I need her to admit things. If she won’t, people here will keep making my life hell.”

The sting of unfairness cut through me, sharp and searing like red-hot embers against my skin. I hadn’t requested, nor did I want a mate so much older and worldly than myself. Lune, in her wisdom, had paired me with a female who had no room in her heart for me.

As if this wasn’t shitty enough, the other city guards wasted no opportunity to remind me that I was a joke. That someone as reserved and introverted as me could never be blessed with a mate as fierce and formidable as Nahta. To them, I was a clown.

“Don’t question Lune’s motives, kiddo.” Sitka had perched on a windowsill at the end of the corridor. He examined me from there, that mild curiosity still on his face. Moonlight lined his features, highlighting how old he had become since returning to the castle.

“You’ve been through a lot,” I remarked, expecting him to say nothing.

“I have,” he said, running his hand absent-mindedly on his neck. “But the things I went through brought me into the presence of the greatest love of all, even if it was for the shortest spell in a very long, long season.”

He jumped down the windowsill and turned his back to me.

“Kid,” his voice floated back. “Trust me. Whatever you are going through right now, whatever it is you are experiencing, will seem like nothing if you keep pushing it. It will be worse if you confront her now.”

I sulked. “But I don’t really even know her. How can I keep persisting if I never get answers?”

“Oh, you’ll get your answers.’

“What if she’s not the one?” I mumbled. “What if it’s a mistake? How can my mate be so different from me?”

Sitka shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. Lycan mates don’t need to be reflections of one another, but they need to accept the things they feel. She doesn’t. Not right now. If you see her now, she will break your heart.”

I kept telling myself the only reason I wanted to meet Nahta was so she’d stop lying to the guards and tell them we were actually mates. After that, she could do whatever the hell she wanted. We didn’t need to be together.

“This is ridiculous,” I uttered. “I’m not in love with her. Besides, even if what you say is true, that’s better than what I’m going through right now. I have to at least ask her. Where is she, Sitka?”

He’d know which room belonged to her. His back stiffened.

“What will you ask her?”

I was momentarily stumped. Honestly, I had no clue. I’d just ask her if she could stop with the lies. I’d tried to be her friend. I’d tried to be a sounding board. None of it had worked.

This was all that was left.

“I can’t let you see her,” Sitka intoned quietly. “She will reject you, and Lune does not tolerate such disrespect for her bond. Her atonement methods are dangerous.”

“Like you’d know,” I mumbled, regretting it almost immediately.

Sitka left no room for doubt. He abruptly pivoted, his steps determined and unwavering, closing the distance until we were mere inches apart.

As he did so, his grip on my shoulder tightened like a vice, sending an electric jolt of tension coursing through my body.

"I do know," Sitka declared, his voice carrying a frigid edge. His countenance underwent a remarkable transformation, shedding its former neutrality and blossoming into something far more sinister and unforgiving.

The lines on his face etched with a newfound severity, his eyes gleaming with an icy resolve. “My own mate paid the price for mistaking Fate’s bond with Lune’s. She betrayed me in Lune’s eyes and paid with her life.”

I felt for Sitka. I wanted things to be better. He was trying to help me.

But if things went on like this, the city guards would never let me live out my days in peace. I balled my palms into fists and shook my head belligerently. “I'm sorry, but if Nahta doesn't help me fix this misunderstanding, then losing my life really doesn't matter.”

Sitka released his hold on me. “Then, I’ll help you. Tell me what Nahta has to fix, and I’ll do it instead.”

He couldn’t gauge the severity of my situation, or how miserably I was being bullied. “You can't. They all think I lied. If I bring you into it, they'll only—”

A feminine voice cut through my words, its richness oddly contrasted with the sharpness of its pitch. “Sitka, what are you doing here?”

I wheeled around to see Nahta standing in the courtyard, her lips curled in disdain.