The King's Queen

————- ♔ ————-Four

♔ Flynn (P.O.V)

Flynn rubs his temples as he agonizes over the stack of paperwork that is carefully color-coded with sticky notes and organized by importance. All carefully placed in the right top corner of the desk. He has at least twenty separate cases dealing with his pack every case at a minimum of twenty-three pages, all front, and back. Groaning as he lays down on the mahogany desk in front of him, he slowly closes his eyes allowing himself to fall into deep thought.

It's been five years since Theo Van, the previous alpha, had been killed in a rogue attack. Six years since he was forced to shift a year early. It's been two years since he's turned eighteen, the age he is supposed to find his mate. Flynn honestly doesn't care about a mate, he has his demons to battle and having to figure out his issues isn't a demon he wants to confront yet. Sure, he is fucking around with Emma Rose but that's all it is. Fucking. She's a low omega, of course, that's not a problem for him but at the end of the day, he can dispose of her and go about his business if he wanted. However, for some reason, he doesn't. Maybe it's for the simple fact he needs a pretty face beside him to fill the role of Luna someday? Whatever the reason he had already decided that if or whenever he meets his mate, he'll accept her as the packs Luna and nothing more. It's been 3 and a half years since his birthday in April, and although he's sure he's met his mate he refuses to think it's her. He doubts she even realizes it and he prefers to keep it that way. So until the all-mighty Moon Goddess decides to give him a better mate and not one that's trash he's going to keep that fact hidden, from everyone.

Bam! Flynn nearly jumps out of his skin as his door is flung open, screaming what he deems as a very manly scream. Who the hell dares to slam the alpha's door open! He furrows his brows in anger before looking up to see the intruder immediately relaxing as he sees the friendly face of someone he trusts. Gedeon, his beta.

"Gedeon my main man!" Flynn roars happily, ignoring the shocked look on Gedeon's face he warmly greets him.

Quickly removing the shocked expression from his face from hearing such a girly scream escape his leader's body, Gedeon calmly replies to his alpha, "Flynn, we gotta get that damn door fixed. I sat out there tryin' to open the damn thing for five minutes. Finally figured if I hit it with my shoulder it'd budge, and sure enough, the damn thing done near flung me to my death." Of course, he was over exaggerating he wouldn't die from hitting the floor, especially even more so since he's a werewolf.

"You scared the shit out of me." Flynn laughs and makes himself a mental note about getting the door fixed he continues, "I don't assume this is just to catch up so what do you need Gedeon?"

Flynn rubs his chin in a thinking manner as he speaks, "That could pose a problem, seeing as I've not found my mate yet." The only way he could avoid this is if he somehow found his true mate soon or took a mate as his choice. The bond will never be as strong as a Moon Goddess appointed mate, but it has been done before. His mind clicks to the answer, Emma. She's his ticket to protect the pack, she's a werewolf that has been born with the howling wolf birthmark meaning she doesn't have a mate. Flynn's eyes glaze over as he opens the pack link, he reaches out to Emma.

'Em, you there?'

Almost immediately he receives a reply from her cheery voice, 'Yes darling?'

'How would you like to be the packs Luna and my chosen mate?'

'YES! OH MY GOD YES!' She squeals through the link before he closes it.

Gedeon who had been roaming around the room waiting patiently for Flynn to return to him stops cold in his tracks before he opens his mouth, "So... "He trails off not sure of what had transpired.

Flynn clicks his tongue as he begins to motion for Gedeon to leave as he speaks, "Get the servant to organize a party for Emma. She's going to become my Luna tomorrow." He hisses the word servant as it rolls off his tongue almost as if its burning acid. Gedeon simply nods and leaves the room.

"What did you just agree to Flynn?" Ashton, Flynn's wolf, howls into his head.

Shrugging with his head in his hands that he has propped up on his desk. "I dunno," Flynn whispers so low that almost he couldn't hear. What had he done? Sure Emma has the mark of a mateless wolf, meaning she doesn't have a mate she could potentially hurt. She's there for those who lose their mate and survive, she's simply like a wildcard in a game of Uno. While Emma doesn't have a mate, Flynn does. A mate the Moon Goddess herself decided for him.

"Yeah dumbass and you're going to fucking kill her if you mark another mate, Flynn!" Ashton hisses into his head. Flynn winces at that reminder. Ash is right if Flynn marks Emma she'll most likely die. His mate's wolf will know that he marked someone else and claimed them as his mate, simply abandoning her or taking over going on a rampage. All our wolf forms look forward to is finding their mate, the one the Moon Goddess herself picked out for us. So when the wolf finds out their mate has chosen someone over them it destroys them. Depending on the wolf's will and strength they may shut down or take over. If that wolf part of us shuts down and ultimately dies, by logic we would become human. However, that's not the case, when our wolf dies our human form feels the wolf being ripped from our body. The pain will most likely stop the human half's heart, causing death. The very thought of potentially killing his mate turns his stomach and makes him sick, and for whatever reason, he fucking hates that it does.

"I know Ash, but what choice do I have?" his voice is weak, almost as if he had been yelling for days on end.

"Gee! Let me think. . ." Ashton pauses sarcastically and continues, "I don't know, maybe accept our mate and tell her?" Annoyance lacing Ashton's baritone voice.

"The pack needs the strength a Luna provides Ash. I refuse to have a weak-"

Ashton cuts him off before he can finish, " so you are going to just throw our mates life away as if it equals nothing?"

Ashton sounded almost as if his heart his breaking. Flynn can feel the pain this is causing his wolf and dreads the words he's about to say next. " I guess so Ash." Almost as soon as those words were spoken, Ashton cut himself off from Flynn. This causing Flynn's werewolf senses to dull, after all, he does rely on his wolf for the most part. Sighing he puts his head down on the table and sits in the quiet, slowly drifting off to sleep.

♔Zoe, Eustacia's wolf (P.O.V)

I found a pygmy rabbit after a few minutes of running through the adjacent forest, our scent concealed as I had implemented careful measures to roll in a pile of fox dung I had fortunately found not too far into the forest. The rabbit which is a lump of very lean meat will not keep us alive by itself. We need a few more fats or at least a few more carbs. Shaking my wolfy blockhead I mentally groan seeing as we're on a time limit, I won't be able to hunt to obtain a better piece of food. Yet what right do we have to be picky, we get what we get and luckily, we have managed to scrape by.

'Zo, I'll snatch some bread later tonight,' Eustacia gently says in my mind. She must've grasped what I was troubled about as she piped up with the idea of stealing some bread. Bread is high in carbs will hopefully tide us over until we receive another chance to hunt. Silently bobbing my head in agreement, I begin to run back to the hollowed-out tree, surely our time window is almost up.

'We have roughly four minutes remaining Zo. I kept count as always,' Eustacia again pipes up. I got lucky with the human I was paired with. The Moon Goddess is as great as she can make mistakes herself, like our curse. Forcing two souls to occupy the same body be it in human or animal form seems like a crime against nature, yet it exists. The human parts of us don't know that the wolves they harbor inside themselves retain small bits of their past hosts or life. When a werewolf dies their human part is sent where ever they go but for the wolves, we're sent to Paradise. The meadow the Moon Goddess herself keeps for certain wolves to have a second chance at life. No one comprehends why she does this, maybe it's out of pity for the hardships she's brought to us, creatures.

Weaving in and out of the trees, feeling the wind blow through my fur, the smell of the forest leaves and the feeling of the earth that crunches beneath my paws I decrease my speed as the hollowed-tree reaches my line of sight. Carefully, I make certain the area around me is clear of other beings when all signs clear I let Eustacia take back over. Our bones begin to break and reform into their human figure, the hair that covered our wolf form begins to fade away revealing the human skin that lies beneath. Our teeth shift back into the omnivorous state they were in advance. As everything falls back into place, I slowly fade back into the back of Eustacia's mind and begin my slumber to preserve our strength.

♔Eustacia (P.O.V)

Back in control of our body, I seize the bag I had previously stowed into the tree and retrieve the clothing inside. Cringing as the fabric is revealed to my eyes for the first time in a while I notice how grungy it is. The scanty remnants of what used to be a white t-shirt are now a dull tawny color, stitched in various patches around the shirt is hide that I have scrounge up from my kills. I notice they are beginning to fall apart from the improper treatment of the material. Thankful that the Alpha does at least physically allow me to hunt once a month so the hide I have the clothing patched with isn't a dead ringer that I hunt under their noses. The gray sweatpants are rugged and torn. Out of the five holes and frayed edges I've only patched two of them, the ones near the left thigh the others that span from the knees down on either side I have left open. I can't afford to patch every single hole in my clothing and in my opinion, the shirt is a tiny bit more important. Slipping on the clothing fabric and deciding to leave my raven black hair down I stealthily begin my way back into the packhouse. Entering through the side door, I left from and swiftly making my way back through the kitchen and up the two flights of stairs I hastily enter back into my room and note the time on my small clock, 8:28 a.m. I didn't have to be as sneaky so it didn't take me near as long to reach back to my room.

"Huh. 8:28 means I have an hour left until I have to go back to my duties," I say out loud to myself. Groaning as I realize my following task is cleaning this three-story house also including the dungeon and Gray Room in the basement. I hate cleaning the entire house. Emma makes sure her little clique leaves things stranded everywhere throughout the house mainly in their rooms to make my job harder for me. That only adds to the fact that I must clean the dungeon and Gray Room daily, one would think after daily cleaning it wouldn't be so bad. Those who think that could never be more wrong, every day there is new blood, some unlucky soul who had the misfortune to cross onto our pack boarders or someone who they have caught near the borders, those being mostly rogues. Some days are worse than others. Those specifically bad days are when I go do my normal cleaning, but there's still either a fresh carcass I must dispose of or an unfortunate soul who is currently being tortured. Shaking my head at the thought only causes me to recall the fact that depending on Emma's mood for that day. done, she may take me to that Gray Room and have her 'fun.' Her fun frequently consists of silver, wolfsbane, whips, knives or any other sharp object she can get her grubby little hands on. Curling into a ball on my improvised bed, my hands on my temples as I whimper, I gradually feel myself falling into a light slumber.