Depressed

POV: Xander

Her name is Celia, and her wolf has the most beautiful name I’ve ever heard, Aurora. She is not my true mate, she is a lycan princess from another kingdom. We were friends from when we were cubs, and as we grew older, our parents saw it fit that we get mated to each other and create a lasting bond that would unite our two kingdoms forever.

It was the perfect idea, and it certainly worked!

We got together and fell deeply in love with each other. She may not be my true mate from the moon goddess, but she certainly filled that void in my heart with joy and laughter. She is a born warrior with a heart of gold. Even my true mate can never love me like she does. I doubt there is any kind of love that is greater than what we share. Mating with Celia is the best thing that has ever happened in my entire life. Ours was a bond that I thought would never be broken, I dreamt of growing old with her and having beautiful kids that would look just like us, mini versions of both of us that would forever put smiles on our faces.

I dreamt of watching her grow bigger with my seed growing in her womb, watching her glow in our unending love. But all my dreams were shattered by fate, my mate, my one true love was taken away from me. My heart broke into a thousand pieces when I felt that searing pain in my heart, I felt it as if our bond was broken like a tiny twig under the feet of a mighty man. She was dead, forever gone, and there was nothing I could do to save her. If only she had just listened to me when I told her to stay back and let me handle the rogues if only she wasn’t so stubborn about it.

You see, the rogues were giving us a hard time. It seems they recruited a master planner or an organizer. But we noticed that something seems to have changed in their strategy and attack format. Where the rogues would run and hide from us before, they became bolder to stand in our faces and challenge our right to rule. They began to multiply in number from their daily attacks. They attacked without mercy, and they leave no one alive, not even a single soul could ever be found around a pack that has just been attacked by the rogues.

Our population kept decreasing while theirs increased daily. I volunteered to be on the case because I want to get these rogues before I become the king. My father is long due for retirement, he always teased me that he was way younger than me when he took over from his father. I didn’t care about my age, and I still don’t. I simply wanted the records to state that the vicious attacks from the rogues ended in my father's regime. It would be an honor to him, and that would make his legacy so perfect for me to emulate. The plan was to put an end to the rogue attacks, then Celia and I could retire and let the general lead the army, while we live the rest of our lives in the comfort of our Palace, building our family and leading our two kingdoms to greatness.

I wanted to do this myself, we had just found out that she is expecting our first child. But Celia is a trained warrior who would never give up on a chance to take out the rogues. She fought so hard to be on this case and it hurt me so much because there is nothing I could do to stop her, nothing at all. Besides, she has a piece of vital information that I needed so urgently, and she wouldn’t tell me unless I let her join me in handling this case.

“We work better together, my love. Together we shall put an end to this menace, retire together and start our family together. This is how it should be, it makes perfect sense.” she let out in that perfect voice that I could never seem to resist. I found myself nodding and accepting her terms like a fucking idiot. She has me wrapped around her fingers, I can never refuse her, I can’t even think straight when she is around. That’s how fucked I was.

I mean, royally fucked!

I let her join the party as long as she promises to stay by my side always. She revealed to me that she has a lead on the case that may actually tell us exactly what we needed to know about the rogues and their plans and mode of operation. Apparently, she has a double agent that is just about to turn on the rogues and get them exposed. He was recruited from her kingdom, right under her nose. He is one of the warriors that trained with her when she was still a young princess, training to be a warrior princess. He left the pack when he wasn’t appointed as a general, he left in anger and never looked back.

It was said that he even sold us out to the rogues. He gave them our security strategies and even told them secrets about us that made us look weaker to the rogues. He is the reason why the rogues know all the weak points of each pack and how to break through their defenses without being caught. I don’t know what happened between him and the rogues. Maybe they too wouldn’t give him the treatment and rank he wants, so he decided to turn on them and try to get a full pardon from the king so he can return back to the pack with his family.

He couldn’t reach out to me because he is so scared of me and my crew. He reached out to Celia, and he told her he would tell us everything about the rogues and their plans. He was going to tell us how they managed to become so powerful and show us what they do with the rest of the packs that they always take as hostages. The deal was perfect, we were going to get everything we need to track down these guys and take them down for good. We would find out how they operate and how they manage to get confidential information about all the packs.

We were so excited to get rid of them that we forget to do a background check on this guy and find out why he chose to betray the rogues after so many years of living with them. We didn’t know about the inner conflicts within the camp of the rogues. They got to him before we got there, and they made him betray Celia and I. On the day we were supposed to meet him and get all the evidence we needed, we found him dead in the forest, along with his entire family and allies.