Chapter 214: Love's Price 1
Chapter 214:
Aurora’s POV
I couldn’t remember anything after I took the hit from Lena’s knife.
All I wanted was for Alessandro to be safe. I couldn’t bear to lose him.
I’ve had people leave me alone, hurt and heartbroken for years.
My father, who banished me from the pack because I was a girl and therefore unfit to rule in his place.
My mother, who constantly told me I wasn’t pretty enough for my father to keep me, or that I was rude to her different husbands.
And then, when I thought maybe, just maybe I had finally found someone who would understand my pain and stay with me, he ended up hurting me beyond words.
He believed the lies others said about me. He never stood by me when I needed him to.
He rejected me countless times, saying it was for duty. He promised to stand by me, but his words never matched his actions.
Then I met a man, cold, ruthless, who claimed to hate me as much as I hated him.
We never got along. But when I needed saving, it was always him.
When Marcus tried to rape me, and others pointed fingers at me including Leonardo and my mother, he stood up for me.
He declared in front of everyone that he believed I was telling the truth.
When I almost got killed by a beast sent by Lena, it was Alessandro who saved me.
When Lena kidnapped me and tried to kill me again, it was Alessandro who fought to bring me back.
When Leonardo worked alongside Uncle Raymond to kidnap me and to dethrone Alpha John, it was Alessandro who risked everything went through lengths I can’t even begin to describe to rescue me.
I couldn’t bear to lose him. Not him. The only person who made me feel I was enough.
But now, as I took what I thought was my last breath, all I could do was stare into the eyes of the man I love.
Wondering if I’d ever see him again.
As the darkness pulled me under, I prayed if not for myself, then for him.
That Alessandro would find comfort. That he would find peace, even after I was gone.
****
I opened my eyes and found myself in a bright place.
It looked like my former pack’s territory but different.
The air was lighter, the sky impossibly clear. I walked, passing faces of people I had never seen before. They all looked at me with soft, knowing smiles.
Then I heard a voice from behind me.
“Welcome, Aurora.”
I turned.
A young woman in a white dress walked toward me. Her steps were graceful, her presence radiant.
“Who are you?” I asked, my voice small.
She smiled, her eyes locked on mine. “I am Valeri. Your aunt.”
I froze. My heart stuttered. “Aunt Valeri?”
She nodded gently.
“Why are you here? And… where is this place?”
She raised her hand, gesturing around us.
“Well, my niece… this is a place beyond the veil of life and death. A place where lost souls rest before the Moon Goddess decides their fate.”
My breath caught. “You mean… I’m dead?”
Valeri’s expression softened. “Not yet. But you stand at the crossroads.
The Moon Goddess has brought you here because your journey isn’t over… unless you choose to let it be.”
Her words sent a shiver through me.
“What do you mean?
Choose?”
Valeri’s expression shifted. She stepped closer, taking one of my hands in both of hers.
Her touch was cool and solid.
“You were carried here because you still have work to do, Aurora. Some souls come through to linger. Others come through to choose.”
“Choose what?” My voice broke.
“To return,” she said simply.
“Or to cross.” She searched my face.
“Those the Moon spares are given options. But nothing without a cost.”
I thought of Alessandro in the infirmary, of his hands full of my blood, of him shouting my name.
My chest hurt so badly I thought it would split.
“I have to go back,” I said.
“He’s….he’s hurting.
He needs me.”
Valeri’s eyes softened.
“He needs you because you keep him tethered to a reason to breathe.
But the path back is not free. The Moon tests those who would return for love.”
“Tests?”
I echoed. Anger and shame rose in a hot wave.
“Tests?
He’s the one who, he fought, he risked everything. If there’s a test, I’ll pass it.
I’ll—”
Valeri’s hand lifted, halting. Her fingers hovered an inch above my shoulder, unsure whether to touch or to let go.
“Listen,” she said, voice low and careful, like someone speaking a truth she’d rehearsed a thousand lonely nights.
“I never got a chance to experience love. I felt it, I felt it so fiercely but my mate never accepted me.”
She swallowed; the memory tightened her throat.
“The pain… it was unbearable. To be left, to be told you’re not enough it eats you worse than any wound.
The pain of rejection sat in my bones until I thought ending it was the only way to stop it.”
Her eyes found mine and held the hollow of that grief.
“I’ve seen so many pass through here carrying the same black stone in their chests.
Countless mates rejected for a hundred petty reasons: not pretty enough, not worthy enough.
You know the lines, blah, blah.”
She gave a short, bitter laugh.
“But then you came,” she continued, and the sound in her voice softened.
“I watched your life unfold. You were almost swallowed by that same loneliness until Alessandro.
He showed you, in ways words couldn’t, that you were worthy of love.
He didn’t let the pack’s whispers name you. He stood for you.”
Her fingers drifted back, a small, uncertain movement.
“I thought... if I had stayed, if I hadn’t left myself to that darkness, maybe I would have found someone to love me the same.
Maybe I would have learned what you learned.”
She shook her head, a rueful little smile ghosting her lips.
“Bummer that I died.”
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