The next morning we woke up to Poppy knocking on the door. I opened the door in my pyjamas. She grinned at me.
"Good morning, little sister" she beamed. "She agreed to speak to you but she wants to see you today" She was referring to the witch.
"Today?!" I cried. I thought I'd have a bit of time to prepare myself.
Poppy nodded. "I told her you'd set off straight after the meeting, so hurry up and get ready"
Carlos came to the door beside me. "Has Max organised the meeting?"
Poppy nodded. "Everyone is ready, we're just waiting for you two." She gave me a pointed look, as if she knew it was me that slept in.
We quickly got ourselves ready and packed an overnight bag. The witch lived on the coast which was going to take us about 4 hours to get there. It would be safer for us to stay there than travel during the night.
We reached the meeting room at around eight in the morning. Everyone nodded their heads at us as we entered. I noticed my parents, some of the pack warriors, as well as Max and the third in command, Noah. As my eyes travelled across the people in the room, my breath caught in my throat when I noticed Carlos parents, the ex Alpha and Luna.
My eyes met with Blake's and he looked just as surprised to see me as I was to see him. He stood up abruptly and approached me with anger in his eyes. He crouched down to my level, levelling his face with mine and succeeding at being intimidating.
"What the fuck are you doing here?" He growled.
Carlos pulled me away from Blake by my waist and put himself between us. "How dare you speak to her like that!" Carlos snarled
He turned his attention to the rest of the room. "For those of you that haven't met her yet, this is Evangeline, my mate."
Blake coughed. "Mate?" He laughed. "Son, she doesn't have a wolf, why haven't you rejected her? She shouldn't be here,I banished her years ago."
I saw my parents glare burning into his head.
My father growled. "Yes, we all know what you did to our daughter, Blake"
My mother reached for his hand, presumably to try and calm his wolf.
Carlos clenched his jaw at the mention of rejecting me. "I know she doesn't have a wolf, moron"
Blake snarled at his insult. "You will not speak to me that way, son!" He emphasised the word son, trying to make Carlos believe that he was beneath him.
"And you will not speak of my mate that way! Maybe if you gave her the chance to prove herself you would've realised that she was and is a blessing to this pack! She is the strongest woman I have ever met!" Carlos snarled back at his father.
I finally spoke up myself. "That's enough!" I growled, accidently using my Luna voice, shocking everyone, including myself. "We are not here to discuss that! I am your son's mate whether you like it or not so you need to find a way to live with it."
I wouldn't let myself be scared of this pathetic man anymore. He may have successfully chased me away from my home but I refused to let him do so with my mate. I had the power and position to stand up to him and I darn well used it.
He huffed but eventually nodded. "I'm happy you have finally found your mate son. I just hope she proves herself to be worthy of you"
"For the record," I added. "I forgive you for banishing me. I understand you thought you were doing what was right for your pack."
Carlos mother smiled. "She's already proving herself,dear." She turned her attention to me. "It takes a lot to forgive this grump. That alone shows me you will be a good Luna."
I smiled, "Thank you, ma'am"
She chuckled, "Please dear, call me Scarlett"
I nodded and shook her hand. "It's nice to meet you, Scarlett."
We all took our seats and Max breathed a breath of relief. "Now that's over, should we turn our attention to the situation at hand, Alpha?"
Carlos nodded. "Indeed. We have recently discovered why Evangeline didn't receive a wolf when she was of age. She has just discovered she has strong powers"
Blake was taken aback by this revelation. "A witch?" He frowned.
I nodded. "My mother explained to me that I am cursed"
He nodded and turned to Carlos."What's your plan son?"
Carlos sighed. "Well I need to make sure she's safe, that's my main priority. There's already someone after her so I think the best option would be to introduce Evangeline officially to the pack, this way if they know she's their luna, they'll fight alongside her"
I gulped at the thought of the Luna ceremony. I wasn't sure if was ready for that although I knew we had to do it if I wanted the pack to back me up.
"Do you know who is after her?" Scarlett asked, nervously.
He nodded. "Keegan Dawns. He's a Warlock and he wants to mate with her" He clenched his jaw and suppressed a growl.
I put my hand on his, attempting to soothe his wolf.
"Do you think it is a good idea to introduce me to the pack?" I directed my attention to Blake and Scarlett. They both nodded.
"Definitely. I have no doubt that the pack wold fight alongside you. However-" Blake paused making sure he had my full attention. "I do not trust your word that you will be a good Luna. I want you to prove to me that I was wrong when I banished you. I want to see your skills first hand. To see if you're worthy of protecting. You will fight me, tomorrow at noon. Whoever submits first will loose. If you win, I let you have the Luna ceremony. If I win, you leave, and this time, I will not hesitate to kill you if you set foot over the pack boarder, again."
Everyone in the room gasped and called out against him.
"No fucking way!" Carlos growled, standing from his seat.
"Blake, dear, that is a little extreme!" Scarlett scowled at her husband.
I stood up. "DEAL!" I shouted over everyone protesting.
Carlos looked at me as if I'd grown a second head. "You can't be serious!"
A smug grin made its way onto my face. "He's right. I should prove my worth to this pack and I should prove him wrong." I turned my attention to Blake. "And I will prove you wrong."
My voice was strong and I felt a fire building within me at the thought of having my revenge on the man and humiliating him in front of his pack.
"Then it is settled. Go for you little road trip and we will fight a noon. Oh, and don't be late, as that's an instant fail" He smiled smugly.
I turned to leave the room but an idea struck my mind and I turned away from the door to face the room once again. "I have a request."
"Go on" Blake smirked.
"This fight will be witnessed by the entirety of the pack!" I grinned.
Blake laughed. "I wouldn't have it any other way"
I walked out of the room towards the gym that was below the house. Even though I was rather confident about the fight, I wouldn't let my ego be the reason I lost. I knew I needed to train. I text Poppy to let her know to push back the meeting with the witch so I could have the rest of the day to train for the fight. That's exactly what I did.
Anger surged through me as I threw my fists, repeatedly, at the punch bag, ignoring the stinging in my hands. I growled and imagined his face on the bag and soon the bag split and spilled sand all over the floor. I huffed and moved onto the next bag that was about six feet to the left of the bag I had just split. I continued battering the bag, drunk on adrenaline. I didn't even see or hear Carlos walk into the gym.
"Hey! Hey, stop that's enough!" He called out to me, breaking me out of my trance. He held my hands in his, looking down at them. It was now that I noticed I had punched the skin off of my knuckles. My hands were swollen and my knuckles bled slightly.
I sighed, breathing heavily and flexed them, pulling them out of his hold. " Sorry," I mumbled.
He led me over to a bench and grabbed a first aid kit. He started cleaning my wounds, ignoring my protests that I would heal in a hour or so.
"You have too much anger behind your attacks, you're sloppy" He sighed, while wrapping a bandage around my hands.
"Excuse me?" I looked at him, bewildered. "I'll have you know I've sent plenty of wolves, your size, running away with their tails tucked between their legs, I can handle myself" I huffed.
Carlos rolled his eyes. "It won't work against him, Eva. He's been training for more years that you have been alive."
"That doesn't mean he doesn't have a weakness though," I shrugged.
Carlos nodded. "You're right. He does have a weakness. He's old and hasn't been training as often since I took over the Alpha title. He also steps with his left foot before he punches. Kick him behind that knee and jab his throat. He'll go down like a sack of bricks"
He pulled me to my feet and led me to the boxing ring in the middle of the room. I knew where this was going. We started to circle each other and I watched his every move. He did the same as his father, stepped with his left foot before his punch. I dodged the punch and did exactly what he told me to do and low and behold, he fell to the floor. I jumped on top of him and put my hand around his throat, but didn't actually strangle him. I was saving that for his father. Carlos grinned. I stood up and helped him to his feet.
"That's great. I didn't actually think you'd deck me though" He chuckled. "When you have him on the floor like you did me, he will try to buck you off and flip so he's on top of you. Don't let him. Hold your ground. Get as many hits in as you can and disorientate him as quickly as possible."
We spent our afternoon training until both of us were covered in sweat and completely worn out. We decided to call it a day there, not wanting to use all of my energy up before the actual fight. As we went through our evening routine, the only thing on my mind was the fact that I needed to win this fight.
I will not loose my home again.