Shattered (Complete) #Wattys2019

Chapter 14: Rose

"One of these days, you're going to beat me little wolf." Phalen grinned as he moved a chess piece. "Unfortunately for you, that day is not today. Checkmate." His tie loosened, white shirt sleeves rolled up, and a grey suit jacket flung over the back of his leather wingback chair.

My face twisted into a pout. I really thought I was getting somewhere.

"Don't take it too hard, you are showing improvements. Honestly, had I not seen your strategy, you would have had me in three moves."

Chess had become our thing, something we did every night before we each headed for bed. Well, rather, I headed for bed and the king tried to head for bed. Far too many times, duty called him away once again.

I felt bad for him. He carried a lot of responsibility and got very little sleep.

"Can I ask you something personal, Your Majesty?" I let the words linger.

"Sure. And for the millionth time, please just call me Phalen when we are in private quarters."

My fingers pulled at the hem of my dress. It was rude to be so curious, I knew that. However, I didn't want to ask questions behind his back either. "Why don't you have a mate?"

Hazel eyes snapped up to me as he leaned back and let out the air from his chest. "I did have a mate. Elora. She was beautiful and kind." He said with a small smile on his lips. "I had never marked her. Not because I didn't want to. My wolf practically begged me to every chance he had. But she recognized the danger of it. If we sealed our bond so intimately, she could be targeted and killed as a way to kill me. And she would never allow for her life to threaten mine."

"What happened?" The sound was barely above a whisper.

He looked down and started to collect the chess pieces. "She died. Despite the accelerated healing of wolves, our kind can still get cancer. Cancer is the rapid growth of abnormal cells in the body, however, they are still seen as natural to the body, something our healing abilities do not fight against. In fact, it helps those rogue cells all the more. Early detection is the only possible way to remove it. If not, the cancer is far too damaging. I lost her in two weeks."

"I'm sorry."

"It wasn't your fault." He said dismissively.

I shook my head. "No, but I reminded you of your pain. I'm sorry for that."

He stopped. "So many people say sorry, so few understand why. It's nothing more than an instinctive toss of phrase. But I think you're the first person to truly mean it." His knuckles grazed my cheek. "It's getting late. Why don't you head to bed?"

Without question, I got up from the chair and slowly made my way to my room.

It had been two months since I was found, a little over a month since I moved into the royal suites. I had argued against it, but the king had insisted. He said that less people had access to his personal suites where he and Emerson lived. It would be more comfortable for me to have my own room where I had more control over my interactions with others. And he was right.

I was always free to leave if I wanted to. But I didn't have to force myself to deal with so many strangers. I was beyond appreciative as I didn't really want to face people.

It also kept all of my essential locations close by while I slowly regained strength in my legs. Even with the accelerated healing of a werewolf, Xavier said it would take time. After not standing or walking during my four years of captivity, I had to start a whole process of building my nutritional foundations and then building muscle and relearning how to walk, which couldn't even start until my hip healed. That had taken several weeks on it's own.