Tears of Raven

63

"Your...Your... mate?" Raven had a stone stuck in her throat and it seemed it wouldn't go down when she swallowed it. Instead, the knot got tightened and she had to stand, stumbling back. Ina moment, it was like she had gone back to the first time the prince had told her they were to be married. And the first reaction her body could feel was trapped. Even the immense pond looked smaller compared to the rest of the world.

Her eyes rushed from her left to her right, every breath shorter.

"What does it mean? Your mate? Like in animal's mate?"

Zed had his hands opened right in front of himself, like you'd do in front of a scared faun as he rose from his chair calmly.

"Remember what I told you, Raven? This doesn't change it. You are free to leave at any point, I just hope you'll listen to everything I have to say before you take any decision. Could you do me just this one favor?"

Raven didn't miss the way he was getting closer but her body didn't seem to mind it. she wasn't scared, it was more confusion what she felt. She wasn't even surprised when he had told her that, it had sounded like an answer to her longing. She knew love wouldn't cover it, but mates? That sounded better to her brain.

It would have explained why when they had made love, she had felt as if she had fit right into him or how she could feel his missing from any place he had been to before. How her heart had gotten hunted so much, she had waited for him on that swing for thirty days before giving up. And even when she had decided she wanted to let him go and move on, her heart wouldn't let her.

But she couldn't help the feeling of betray for yet another male choosing her destiny.

"Why? Why did you make me your mate? Were you afraid I'd bolt?" she was angry now.

"No, you were dying and when I mended your heart, I desired so ardently that if you got another chance, we would be given another chance. I thought it wouldn't matter what I wished, I woven frost bite in the crack your heart had, but I must have accidently put something else inside of you." he didn't dare to touch her but his eyes had gone soft and Raven was doing her best not to crumble under them.

"You know what soul mates are?"

"No." answered Raven dryly. "I just know what animals do when they decide to mate for life. If one of them dies, the other follows because they can't continue to live if they are not together."

"That's correct. Soul mate is pretty much the same but it doesn't involve a choice, animals' mate because they will produce a better prole. Soulmates are two bodies sharing the same soul and they are meant to find each other in every life they travel through eventually."

"Are you saying that you cursed me so that I would always fall for you?" Zed was hurt but he wanted to understand her situation. For someone who had been caged, trapped, drugged and forced to do what another man wanted her to, he could see the refusal in every cell of raven's being and he didn't condemn it. it was actually the response he wanted her to have, the correct one.

"You are my mate, but I'm not yours. I'm bound to care for you, to have your best interests at heart and before my very own. I'm not asking for you to do the same. I would never do that."

Realization hit raven harder than a slap would.

"You, put a piece of your soul inside of me? That's why I always want to be with you since I came back. That's why, when I laid with my heart on yours, I clicked into place. Our souls were reunited. Why would you do something so reckless?"

"May I suggest that you always wanted to stay in my arms long before I did this thing you are calling reckless? Besides, you committed the worst possible act, even if it was moved from innocent feelings. No one kills themselves and can have their soul brand new. If I was to take you back, I had to fix it. Therefore, I gave you a piece of me. Well, a large part. Actually, precisely half."