Pain on top of Pain

She was willing to bet that within six more months he wouldn’t even come to her room at all. Just retire to the Alpha Suite with his second Mate every single night. They’d be broken completely soon, and he didn’t care to realize it. Though she thought he had to feel it, but could only guess it was okay in his mind for her to be bound to him, but nothing to him eventually. He had Christy now, and so he wasn’t the one who slept alone at night. Bonded pairs weren’t designed to sleep apart all the time, it hurt. But only she hurt within their mate bond, because he had a bond with another that could, she knew, outweigh his and hers. Christy wasn’t just calling him back to her, she was trying to imprint herself over everything she and Anthony had once had, and the moment he stopped coming to this room altogether, that was the moment she knew Christy had won. She and Christy were chalk and cheese. Christy was young, outgoing and fun, whereas Mischa was 41, smart, sensible and responsible. She could run this pack without Anthony, and she knew it, because she’d been here to help rebuild it and knew the business' inside and out. Christy couldn’t do that if her life depended on it, and she could see that at some point she would be managing everything while Anthony was always off having fun with Christy. Their lives hadn’t been fun, always struggling to keep the pack together, it had been serious and filled with worry all the time. Christy had come along only after all that, and Anthony liked being able to spend time with her in that playful, fun manner that she and he had missed out on, because they’d been too busy trying to save this pack. He was, she thought, reliving his younger days with Christy, and Mischa, to him, was older and too mature and sensible to be like Christy. What he’d forgotten was that all wolves liked to play, but his wolf Shade had not once called Laud out to play since Christy’s wolf Sunny had become his second wolfen mate. She got up from the bed and pushed out through the French doors onto the balcony and stood naked out in the bracing cold of the beginning of winter season, maybe the oncoming chill would freeze her heart completely, and she’d have the strength to leave, reject the other half of her soul and go through the pains of rejection. She didn’t know if it would just hurt or if it would kill her, breaking an Alpha Luna bond of 20 years could she knew kill one of them if not both of them. He thought everything was fine, he was getting his cake and eating it too. Maybe it would just kill her and not him. She turned her face up to the moon, “When it happens, Selena, don’t make me a Luna again. I don’t want the responsibility of holding a pack together at the cost of my own heart or my wolf's heart. We’ll be happy just being regular Joe's,” she told their Goddess. For now, she was still the Luna to this pack, granted by Selena herself, “I will not fail this pack, or those that live here, even if one day Anthony fails me completely. I will stay until I truly know I am not needed, but then, I will leave, and you’ll release me, to live a new better life elsewhere. That is the deal I make with you, my Goddess. “My oath to you, Moon Goddess, for the blessing you gave me that lasted two decades. But this new blessing you gave my Mate, I reject her as being seen as a blessing in my eyes. She is unworthy of being Luna. “I feel your choice was wrong on that she-wolf. I’m sorry I state something so unforgivable of the one that created us, gave us life and blesses us with the other half of our souls. It is just my opinion. Do not take it to heart or punish this pack for my thoughts on the matter.” She stood out there in the cold until she was numb, watched the moon fall beyond the tree line of the pack and promised herself she would attend every request that was asked of her and be the perfect Luna always until the day came when she was truly not needed. Even though she didn’t really want to be anymore, she knew she would know the day when it came because she would simply not care about whatever it was that she was seeing and that would be it, the day she left. How it would happen? She couldn’t say. When it would happen? She didn’t know. It could be a month or a year, five years from now, she didn’t know. Where she would be when that moment came, or how she was living when it happened, were also things that were uncertain in her mind. She would simply feel nothing and see no point in being here at all anymore. That was the one thing she was certain of about her impending departure. Though the part of her that clung to the belief that the will of their Goddess was how they should live, was still hoping that Anthony’s words about everything would settle down in a few years, that it was just a rough patch; they were true. That one day, Christy wouldn’t see her as not a threat to her own Mate Bond and stop trying to eclipse her in every way, and the three of them could live in harmony with each other. That Anthony’s time would be spent equally between the two of them, but she doubted it at the same time. Two years had passed and though Christy’s ways to eclipse her had become more subtle, Mischa saw it all for what it was even if others inside this pack did not. She returned to her suite and stripped that bed and tossed the linen down the laundry shute, remade it and got into her bed. The room was cold and aired completely. She did not bother to close the balcony doors and left them open to sleep in the mind-numbing cold. Maybe, just maybe she wouldn’t feel so lonely if she couldn’t stop thinking about being freezing cold. She heard Laud huff inside her mind but didn’t shift them to her wolfen form, allowed Mischa to do as she pleased. It took a long time to fall asleep, but she managed it only to wake up with pains in her lower abdomen and she half snorted. Of course, her heat would come now when she’d opted to finally just be in the background. Anthony pushed into her bedroom and frowned at how cold the room was. She’d gotten up and closed the doors only because she was in heat, and wouldn’t risk herself to those un-mated wolves of the pack. Then he smiled at her as he started pulling his shorts off. He’d been at morning training. She could tell from his attire, bare-footed and bare-chested. Even as rough and difficult as their Mate Bond had been for the past two years, she knew he still enjoyed her heat. Though even to her, it already felt different, she wasn't rushing to climb on him as she once would have, and she wondered if that was because of their fading Mate Bond. Something that once saw her think about in a happy, excited way. Because she had enjoyed it, so had Laud and Anthony and his wolf Shade. He’d always been attentive to her needs in this department, she would be in heat she knew for just four days. Had been having two heats a year since the moment they were marked and mated, something Anthony thought was another blessing from Selena, that he got to enjoy not one, but two heats a year with her. He was climbing on the bed, leaning over her, smiling down at her. “We should have an heir this year, a son who is big and strong.” He told her and claimed her mouth with his. He’d completely forgotten he’d abandoned her last night for Christy. Her heat was, it appeared, all consuming for him right this minute, and once where it would have been for her, she wasn’t now, was lying there while he mated her furiously thinking about those words he’d just stated. A pup, a son and heir for the pack? It wasn’t something they had discussed in a very long time, not since making the decision to stabilize the pack and have it be prosperous before opting to have a pup of their own. She was rolled over in that bed and pulled up onto all fours as he took her once more, and she knew she realized, he did talk about that with Christy. They talked about it every time Christy went into heat. She recalled Christy’s words right as Anthony knotted himself to her with a groan. “I’ll give you a good strong heir, I’m healthy and can have pups. We’ll have one right away.” Christy had stated. Mischa understood hearing those words that Christy thought she and Anthony didn’t have an heir after 20 years of being mated to each other because she thought Mischa couldn’t conceive. She clearly had no idea that Mischa was on wolfen birth control, and it was a joint decision between herself and Anthony. Right this minute, even Anthony had seemed to have forgotten that himself, had mated her furiously and was now knotted to her, she heard the smile in his voice as he held her body to his. “Sweetheart, what do you want to name our son when he’s born?” She closed her eyes and refrained from sighing, refrained from stating 'what do you care', held that in as well. She felt his mouth touch her ear, and he hummed at her when she didn’t answer him. “On wolfen birth control, remember.” She stated finally, seeing as he’d clearly forgotten. “My bad, I forgot in the heat of the moment.” He chuckled softly. “Perhaps it’s time to come off that now.” “Mm,” was her only response. “What’s the matter?” he asked, and she could hear the frown in his voice. “The pack is healthy, in the black, and we’re making money, growing our wealth.” “I’m aware. I’m the pack accountant,” she’d stated simply. There had once been silly lovers talk between them in moments like this, or they would lay in the bed after his knot was released and dreamed about what their pups would look like, whose eyes they’d have, his light blue or her pale green. Whose hair they’d have, whose temperament even. Of all the things they would teach them and all the games they’d get to play with their children. Where they would take them on vacation when they were old enough to leave the pack. He’d dreamed of just two pups, been conservative about it, considering how much Alpha College cost, and was likely to go up with inflation over the next few decades. So just two pups, a boy and a girl was his idea for the pack. A son to take over and a little girl to spoil rotten, was how he’d always put it. She’d never objected to his thoughts, just told him there would be no playing favorites.