Despondency

Chapter 40

Aiyana yawned. It was dark but she wanted to reach the South Eastern pack before she stopped. She knew it would be a safe place to ask about her mate in.
A comfortable, yet invisible, weight rested on her limbs. That, combined with his intoxicating smell around her, left her defenseless to the onslaught of sleep. Before she knew, her head fell to the side, and the car drifted to the edge of the road...

Ai hummed drunkenly. Vitally tall and proud stood over her and brushed her hair from her face.
"How did I let you go?" He furrowed looking at the golden woman in his hands. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and pulled her tight to him. She rested her hand on his warm chest and felt it vibrate under her touch with his next words "Did you think to let me go?"
"Not even once." She forced past her lips, still struck that this godly being held her firmly.
He frowned still. Her cold fingers lifted to rub away the thin lines that marred his brow, yet left behind a streak of black. Disturbed she shook her head. The slick black goop glinted a deep red in the light and she silently gaped at the blood she smeared on him. She looked down still gaping to find that his body was mangled into a mishaped clump. His legs gone and oozing stumps of flesh were the only sign they were ever there. Long claw marks stretched over his torso. Her dream had turned into a nightmare. A deep hole in his chest where her hand had just rested stared back at her. It took up the space of where his heart should have been. His face paled reflecting her own horror. "You should have. I'm dead."
In a motion too quick for a dying man he lurched forward and bit into her neck to mark her as she closed her eyes and all went black with only faint sparkles of light in her vision.

The night was cold. The moon lightly illuminated the scene. Broken glass and bits of metal lay strewn across the forest floor. A poor, old oak had been victimized by a truck hood that seemingly wrapped around the trunk in an embrace. Steam drifted up to the sky, its own cloud of shadow to join the others. Mist hung low, creeping through the undergrowth. It would take a good eye to be able to see the crash.
Emerson, had just that. Even in his old age there were traces of his youth. A strong hand, deep brown strands of hair and a sturdy jaw were a few bits of evidence to a once young lad. The old twisted man stepped around the rubble. The passenger could have been significantly hurt in the disaster. His concern was immediate and his actions deliberate.
He tugged on the door, and after realizing it would not open, ripped it off. A testament to his superhuman abilities.
The smell of the interior hit him hard with an emotion, one he had not expected to feel. A feeling of surprise slapped across his nose. When someone's lived as long as Emerson, it's hard to be surprised.
Carefully he pushed broken objects away from the cold body.
"Oh dear," he mumbled.
A part of the car had molded to her and held her two legs fast.
With much love he carefully pulled the bent metal away.
Her legs had been smashed but it looked only one calf was truly broken past the skin.
The woman's bag was untouched, oddly, to shrapnel or blood.
He took both the body and belongings with him.
"Emerson, what happened?"
"It seems I've found another stray, put on some water."
A boy rushed off to do as commanded. He was only a lad of barely 9 or 10, another stray of Emerson's. An eager to please boy with a rough past and eager to kill temper, went by the name of Ambrose.
Emerson laid the body down and proceeded to pound on her chest in a very diligent pattern.
Ambrose came back and paled as Emerson put his lips to hers in an effort to breathe for the girl.
"What are you doing?"
"Showing you how to do it when my old bones get tired."
It took a lot of strength that Emerson no longer had to bring back a werewolf. He needed his pupil to do the rest soon.
"You pump her heart 60 times and breathe into her mouth 5 times, pushing the air out and putting it back in. It's similar to humans but it takes hours for werewolves."
Ambrose took the place of his master and thus took on responsibility for the woman's life.
"Move to the other side I have to clean out her wounds."
The young boy climbed over obediently.
"Why have you paused?"
"She's naked now..."
The wise old man rolled his eyes.
"It makes no difference. You can revive a naked corpse and a clothed one just the same."
Ambrose flinched at the word corpse. He was beating life into a corpse. It made the battle he fought more bitter and real.
The old man cut his own arm let his blood poor into her open wounds before grabbing a needle to pierce her skin.
The boy felt sick, very sick. The sound of the corpse flesh being sealed, the way it gushed brought back searing memories of flesh ripping.
He pushed onward in his endeavor to revive her so he might be able to leave quickly.
Emerson had finished his stitching and covered her body in bandages.
Ambrose lowered his weary body to breathe once more into a corpse when he froze. It started to cough.
It was a gross, disfigured sound, her cough. The sound of a deep rough puff of smoke being expelled from the lungs.
It was Ambrose fault that he felt horrified really, he had expected her to sound like a dainty woman when she awoke, but the sound he received was harsh to his sensitive ears. He shouldn't have expected a whistling song to meet his ears from a dead now live woman.
"I think she's good now." Ambrose stood up and left as quickly as possible. He never was the limelight personality, nor was he confident of the year. Being cold and leaving was the best thing he could do.
Emerson allowed him leave. Then he let a worried look overturn his features. With every stray there was a story to be told. He just couldn't wait to hear hers, and how involved it was in his adopted son's life.
Emerson stayed up all night with her. If ever he felt the woman returning the state she was found in, he would be able to help her.
It was close to 2 in the morning when she groaned. Her eyes opened.
They closed too quickly for her savior to see them.
"It's too bright." She weakly mumbled out.
"Let your eyes adjust."
"No, they can't, I've tried so many times before."
With curiosity the man turned off the single lamp the illuminated the room.
She opened her eyes slowly.
A moment after she looked at the kind man, he sighed.
"It all makes sense now."
"Excuse me?" Aiyana was lost.
"Why the moon goddess trusted you to me. You need answers. Answers that only I have."
Aiyana tried to sit up, only to gasp in pain.
"Don't sit up, your still recovering, you shouldn't scar though, most of it is superficial. The damage to your lungs is what really did you in."
She laid back down. The man helped her into a sweater and underwear, strangely she was not uncomfortable with him seeing her bare. He would not touch her.
"Did you see the moon goddess a second time?"
"What? No," she mumbled still disoriented.
"Then it is not as I feared. You've been significantly dead, but not with the goddess, that's good."
The man talked a great deal, but she could barely understand his meaning. It felt like a culture shock, the way she could only just grasp his whimsical wording.
"My son should be here a few hours after dawn, that gives us quite a bit of time to hear your story. Please tell me."
"My story?"
"Yes, start off with your eyes, and be truthful, the moon goddess whispers to me and she'll let me know if any parts of your story are missing. It's my gift, much like your eyes."
She started to tell her tale but paused.
"It actually starts a few years ago... Four years ago I think,"
"You were at the Massacre?"
"Yes,"
"I always did think the challenge of the mates made people feel like children, what an awful way to die, your last memories full of hoop la."
He smiled a lazy grin, "I'm sorry for interjecting, do continue."
"It's farther actually," she frowned. Her whole life was 'hoop la', as he had worded.
"When I was very young a man snuck into my room, he made his son mark me."
"That's very unfortunate."
"I grew up normal besides that."
"No, you did not." The man said. "You were given much trial, a social pariah, enemies at every turn, and visits from the man who caused it all, that isn't normal. Continue." She shrugged instead of being stunned. She believed the moon goddess whispered to him.
"I was finally old enough to go to the challenge. I had no idea what it was, but it gave me the opportunity to meet my mate."
"Mates rarely meet there."
She ignored his comment.
"I had met my mate, and I don't think he wanted me then, but Markus, the father of the boy who marked me was there. He tricked me to go to the top of the mountain. His son had grown up and I couldn't fight him. His influence over me was too strong... He took me to his pack and I was prisoner there for years..."
The man nodded in sympathy.
"It's a blur really, I can't quite remember everything that happened... But I did have a friend, Sonya."
"She's a good woman." He knew that the moon goddess smiled on the name Sonya by the way the moon beams from the window warmed the room.
"She's a free one too now, we escaped together. I used an old tooth to break the bond, and she met her mate."
He smiled.
"So will you." Emerson said, it caught her off guard.
"I knew of Sonya years ago, although not personally. She freed a man I claimed as my son. He was a troubled boy. Abused his whole life, never trusting and he felt undeserving of a mate." Emerson prepared himself for her reaction. "Vitally is a strong handsome man now."
She stared openly at him.
"Finish your story, I am a terrible listener. Even worse spoiler."
"I'd prefer to hear about Vitally..."
"I will tell you about your mate when the story is finished." He would not be swayed. He did however reach behind and hand her a very old blanket. It still had the Omega smell of her mate.
Shakily, she tried to push through.
"We escaped during an attack on Constantin's home. The Alpha was away. I broke the bond and met a man named Jordan."
'A slimy character I'm sure.' Thought Emerson.
"He drove me to Diamond Crescent pack, Sonya met her mate, and I found my brother."
"You've left out some details."
"Like what?"
"Youve been tempted to throw away your body at a man." He frowned.
She hung her head in shame. How could he know?
"The moon goddess never gets truly angry, so do not fear. She's just disappointed."
Aiyana looked at him. She truly believed the moon goddess whispered to him. How else would he know?
"When I met my mate," she dared not say his name, "He said he wanted someone experienced. I-" she couldn't finish.
"I know child. Vitally was being cruel. His pride hurt you for years. He should be here in sometime. The moon goddess can be quite the manipulator when she needs to be."
"Vitally?"
"Yes, Vitally, my son. Although he goes by his last name, a very successful man now."
She tried to sit up. He was alive. This man said he was alive and coming to them.
"No child, when the sun rises you may stand on your weary legs. But use this cane when you do."
He handed her a long wooden rod.
"Do you know where he is? What has he been doing? I thought he- he was dead."
"He is coming, he has been preparing a war." Emerson could see the strangeness of emotion in her icy white eyes. He sighed at her poor ignorance.
"Some men must feel a thousand deaths before they know how to properly live."
He gently stood and made it to the door. She wanted him to stay. To tell her that there was hope for her and Vitally. That Vitally had searched for her just as tireless as she him.
"Sleep now child. There's a lovely beach just out back, when the sun rises."