REPERCUSSIONS

Iris stepped back in fear as Daniel turned his blue eyes from his surroundings to her. This time she knew she messed up by breaking the rules and sneaking out, but she was tired. Tired of hiding away and living in fear. Her people were completely content in remaining hidden, but iris found it was stifling and she didn’t know how much longer she would have to carry on that way; where there was no excitement, no fun, no happiness; just fear and caution. She remembered her days when she would look out the windows of her palace walls and see how dreary the air was. And conveniently the window she sat at to watch the sunset from her room was right above the garden to the main building where most of the mates resided.

A mate.

Something she longed for her whole life, yet never got the chance to experience. She heard him; in her dreams, every night, calling out to her. That small taste of it she got led her to a sip of something she found she could no longer do without. He wasn’t in their coven, so he had to be out there, somewhere in the world. The only thing she had to satiate her desires was the sound of his voice and the way he laughed. Yet how was she supposed to find him when the laws of the palace kept her locked away from that same world outside, she knew he was in. Iris almost found it ironic with the way things turned out. Before the massacre of her people by William, she lived a life of innocence. Too young to be released into the world she watched with innocent eyes, naïve to the cruelty of people. And yet when she finally came of age and took the opportunity to explore, she was taken by him.

Beaten. Starved. Tortured. Experimented on and left for dead.

And even when he got what he wanted, their parent’s death and her sister’s submission. He still wasn’t satisfied. He committed genocide on their people, separated hundreds of families, murdered thousands of the supernatural, and finally destroyed whatever joy and hope left in their coven.

IRIS POV

Yet after all of that, I don’t deserve some peace and a moment of happiness? Every day goes by and yet we repeat the same cycle. I knew my mate was out here and yet if I stayed in my palace locked away for the rest of my life until they find and kill William, which might take forever, I would’ve never found him. I didn’t even know what race he was, and I was supposed to wait there? He might’ve even been a human or a fae. And I was supposed to just stay in the palace until when?

**********

Daniel looked over at Gaia who was impatient to leave and snapped his fingers at one of the vampires behind him. He walked up to Gaia and tried to find out what the situation was judging by the feelings he was reading from the emotions of everyone there. Yet when he had heard everything, he wasn’t in the slightest prepared. A spark of surprise in his eyes and then a sigh of defeat left his lips. After a moment of thinking, he raised his head back up to her, “So what do you want to do?”

“We need to leave first. It’s not safe here; for any of us.”, in other words, Gaia meant they needed to get back to the castle.

Daniel pointed in Iris’s direction with his head to the vampire behind him, “Restrain her.”

“The rest of you. Stop them from interfering. And don’t kill anyone.”

“The one in the middle and the one shielding Iris seem to be the top of the chain here, so you and I will deal with them. Get it done in 5 minutes.”, Gaia said to Daniel before they nodded and took off.

Disorder broke out across the field as the vampires took little to no time in subduing the wolves. Gaia approached the three men left as Daniel knocked the one shielding iris out of the way. When she was sure he had a screaming Iris retrained, she stepped back and looked at the man in front of her who was looking at her in confused hurt.

“Anatu Issa numun”, a sleeping spell strong enough for a supernatural.

“We’ll have this conversation another time. For now, goodbye.”

Gaia watched them fall asleep before she stepped through the portal behind Daniel who had a struggling defiant Iris over his shoulder.

Back at the castle

As quick as the portal closed, Gaia snatched Iris by her arm off Daniels’s shoulder and threw her on the ground. Everyone slowly stepped back in caution as Gaia’s aura changed with her rising temper.

“What you did was completely irresponsible Iris!! We could’ve been found out or worse!! William could’ve found us. We were out of this barrier for a long time; due to your brash and careless behavior.”, Gaia spoke to Iris who stood up from the ground glaring at her.

That behavior irked Gaia who was used to her people following her orders. Her careful approach in situations is what kept them safe and hidden away from William’s prying eyes. Looking at Iris who not only disobeyed her orders but also ignored palace laws and now showed no apologies for what she did, Gaia felt her anger getting the best of her.

“You’re glaring at me? You have no remorse for what you did do you?”

She opened her mouth to respond but the throne room’s door opening cut her off as their parents stepped in. Dario and Fiona Flanington stepped into the throne room seizing all arguments about to arrive.

Fiona glanced around the room and walked up to them, “What is going on here?”

When no one answered Dario stepped in with a booming voice that echoed throughout the room, “Your mother asked you a question!”

When Gaia noticed Iris was about to speak, she interrupted her knowing that whatever she was about to say was far from the truth and that she would put it over in a way that would gain pity from their parents.

“Mother, Iris snuck out of her palace when her guards were on round changes, left territory grounds, brought the wards down, temporarily exposing all of us to who knows what kind of danger, and ventured onto werewolf territory when I specifically ORDERED HER NOT TO!

When I finally located her, she was stubbornly refusing to return home and was hiding behind a wolf.”

Iris felt that Gaia was not understanding why she did what she did, but then how could she? All she was ever focused on was hiding away from someone who might not even be looking for them.

“That werewolf was my mate and yet you just took me away from him without even giving me the chance to explain anything. You’re the one who was acting selfishly. All you care about is yourself! What about what I want?!”, Iris screamed.

Gaia couldn’t believe what she was hearing, “Everything I have done was for our protection, to keep us SAFE! HOW COULD YOU EVEN THINK THAT WHAT I’M DOING IS SELFISH?”

Fiona and Dario felt like they had to get them to stop arguing before things escalated. Fiona was the first to interrupt, “Now hold on darling; You know she doesn’t mean it like that. She’s just a bit upset. Iris, you know you’re in the wrong this time. What you did could have easily exposed us all.”

“Mother!”, Iris gasped. “Should I have just gone mate-less for the rest of my life?”

“Sweetie that’s not what we meant. There were better ways to go about doing something like this. You left without protection and without any of us knowing. You put not only yourself but all of us in danger.”, Dario cut in.

“I put on a protection charm and a cloaking spell before I left”, Iris insisted; she was determined to swear she hadn’t done anything wrong.

“And you think that’s enough? This poor excuse of magic you’re calling a cloaking spell. I found you in less than an hour. And had William’s men caught even a portion of your scent you wouldn’t even be here!”

“And this protection spell you speak off…...”, Gaia shot a beam of light from her palm that hit Iris square in her chest and sent her tumbling to the floor.

Everyone in the room stepped back and bowed their head in submission from their queen’s depleting control over her emotions. The biting aura of dominance felt like someone was holding a sword at the back of their neck.

“And that was weak compared to what the lowest of his men would’ve done HAD THEY FOUND YOU! “, Gaia growled out.

“Yet you insist that your plan was so flawless, and you had it all figured out. And YET YOU STILL DON’T THINK YOU’VE DONE ANYTHING WRONG!!!”, Gaia felt the anger that had left her body with her mother’s calming voice slowly returning from Iris’s rebelliousness.

“You’re being completely unreasonable! Are you saying that I should’ve just ignored the calling? The one that I’ve been hearing for centuries.”, Iris was determined to let them see things her ways.

Gaia threw her arms up in defeat and turned away from Iris. Pinching the space between her brows she tried to ease her emotions and calmly deal with Iris. The punishment for breaking this coven law was too harsh for Iris who had just found her mate. And though she was mostly in the wrong, she had some reason for what she did; a fresh mate bond was a precarious thing. It HAD to be solidified in the first month.

“You are to remain in your room for the rest of the week. You WILL NOT contact the wolf or have contact with anyone outside your palace until the new week begins. THAT is your punishment and consider it mercy because of your brand-new mate bond.”, Gaia told Iris her punishment in a low tone, voice thick with authority; one iris could not defy.

“This is not fair!”

“Why are we even living like this? Hiding away in the shadows like demons, living no better than if we were dead. Always cautious, always careful, never to have any joy or any pleasure; just being alive but not living. Everything for the last few centuries has been grey, stripped of any color in our lives. All so that an ex-enemy, who you are not even sure is still after us, doesn’t find out where we are? I would rather risk being caught by William so that I could be with my mate. If anything, it’s better than living like this any longer.”

Daniel grabbed her arm before she could say anymore, “Iris that’s enough. You’ve gone too far.”

Gaia snaps her fingers to stop Daniel from interrupting whatever else Iris had to say. This was obviously something she had carried on her mind for the last few centuries and now she finally found the courage to say it.

Iris snatched her hand from Daniel’s grip in anger not noticing the increasingly darkening look her sister was giving her.

“But what would you know of this? I get that William took the opportunity from you to enjoy the pleasure of having a mate but why should I allow you to ruin mine?!”

“IRIS!”, Fiona and Dario shouted at her.

Iris’s eyes widened, grasping her mouth behind her palms in shock, she stepped back in horror as she realized she went too far.

Gaia closed her eyes with a rub to her temple and hid behind a neutral mask. The cold eyes that penetrated Iris when she opened them were hard and without any emotion.

“Your punishment is extended to two weeks, and you are not to leave without my permission. When you leave to see your mate, you will be accompanied by me and if I am not available you will go with Nathaniel. Is that clear?”, cold and strong with authority is what spoke to Iris.

Lowering her head Iris nodded in submission.

“If you disobey my orders again, I will make it so that you do not see your precious Keiho for a decade. “

“Dismissed.”

When Gaia phased out of the throne room Dario immediately berated Iris,

“That was uncalled for young lady. How could you say something like that to your sister after everything she’s been through?”

“This is how you show gratitude to Gaia? With those hurtful words? I hope you are aware that she was being lenient with you for this punishment.”, Daniel growled.

“He’s right sweetie; when your sister calms down you need to apologize for what you said. For now, accept your punishment and reflect on what you did.”, Fiona rubbed the top of Iris’s head, tucked a strand of her thick curly hair behind her ears, and walked back to her husband’s side.

Iris released a sigh and phased back to her room in her palace to calm down and think about what she did. She knew what she said had hurt Gaia deeply, but she was too high on the adrenaline of anger that she said something she didn’t mean and now she couldn’t take it back.

***********

Another problem, however, was on the rise in Gaia’s palace. Sitting at the desk in her office, Gaia could not even begin to assess her thoughts from beginning to end. There were too many unanswered questions in her head pilling on to the confusion of the ones she thought were already answered and in the past. Nothing was making sense currently and Gaia couldn’t figure out a way to deal with the biggest problem of all……. her newly discovered mate.