20.5. Lunar Shadow: Xander's Pov

Warning- there is a lot of POV switching in this chapter

QOTC- Charlotte vs Xander, who would win?

"Fuck." I mutter when I see Brody angrily stalking towards me. I make sure that Charlotte is with my mom before going into the vacant pack-house to meet Brody. "Don't hit me, man." I raise both of my hands to show him that I don't want to fight.

"I'm not..." he trails off, his voice deadly calm. "Yet. But we need to talk."

"I know you have a gun." I roll my eyes, remembering the last time he said that we needed to talk.

"I mean we need to have a serious conversation about your relationship with my sister." Brody explains. "I know you two mated, but I won't beat your ass unless you screw up and hurt her."

"You know that I will never lay a hand on Charlotte." I remind him. Brody is my best friend, he knows that I won't do anything that will hurt my mate.

"I know you won't do anything bad to her physically, I'm talking about emotionally." Brody cracks his knuckles and takes a few steps closer to me. "I don't know if you know this Xander, but you have problems when it comes to giving people attention-"

"I don't have attention problems." I cut him off.

Raising one eyebrow, Brody shakes his head and says, "You and I both know that Char never asks for attention or does anything to get it. She won't say anything if she thinks that you're ignoring her and she'll automatically think that you're mad at her if you push her away."

"I know that." I nod, not knowing where this conversation is leading to. I make sure that Charlotte knows that she's the one who makes my day every time I wake up with her in my arms. I learned touchy subjects that she doesn't like talking about and how sensitive she is to certain things that I say to her. "What are you trying to say, Brody? Just get on with it already."

"I'm saying that you better not screw up again." He and I stare at each other, neither of us willing to be the first to look away. If it weren't for the fact that he's my best-friend, and as Charlotte would say it- only friend, I would've killed this sucker already. "When that guard hit her, you were able to feel it. You should've known that she got a bruise, she shouldn't have had to tell you that she was hit." Brody growls.

"Xander, you've never been good with attention giving." he shakes his head as he looks at me. "I know that you won't be the one that lays a hand on her, but I need to know that you won't be the one who doesn't protect her from people who want to hurt her. I'm her brother and she's older now, I can't protect her in the way a mate could."

"I'm her mate, I won't let anybody hurt her. Not anymore." I mutter. I can see the guilt in Brody's eyes too; neither of us were able to protect Charlotte from Red Stone all of those years. Brody feels like he failed at being her big brother and protecting her from the bad men that lurk around the corners. Every time I see her face and the constant fear in her eyes, I'm reminded of how I wasn't able to stop those bastards from taking her away from her home.

"You better start paying more attention." Brody growls through gritted teeth. "Char is the only family that I have left, if she ever comes to me crying because of you, you're fucking dead. Understand?"

"I understand." I nod, knowing that this is something that I have to agree on. Even though Brody is my Beta, he is also my mate's only brother.

*** *1 day since mating

'Lets go!' Charlotte shouts through the pack mind-link. Already in her wolf-form, she runs up to me and excitedly howls. 'Shift, hurry up!' she demands. 'Your body shouldn't be slowing down, Xander. You aren't that old.'

Rolling my eyes at her silliness, I shift into my wolf-form and move my shredded clothes into a pile so that I can pick it up later. 'Happy?' I tease, nodding for her to follow me to the front of the group.

I stand by her side and Brody stands slightly behind us, showing his rank as Beta. I know that he's staring at the mark on both of Charlotte and I's back, most of the other wolves are doing the same thing. 'When do we start?' she asks, looking behind us. When she notices all of the wolves staring at her, she lowers her head a bit and moves under me.

'Don't be shy.' I tell her, not liking that she lowered her head to the rest of the pack. I know that she naturally isn't very dominant, but the rest of the pack doesn't need to know that. I don't want the pack to think that I'm above Charlotte either; I want us to be seen as equals.

'Sorry.' I notice Charlotte almost lower her head to me, but then she straightens up and lifts her chin.

'Lets go!' I shout through the pack mind-link. Before I even finish speaking, Charlotte is darting into the woods and howling up at the full moon.

The rest of the pack and I sprint to catch up to her. She may have shorter legs than the rest of us, but she sure is fast. 'Xander.' she runs back to where everyone else is grouped up. 'I thought that this was suppose to be a run?'

'It is, you just took off. We're leading this together, sweetheart. Just mind-link everyone and say that you want to go fast.' I explain. I see Charlotte pause for a second to think about mind-linking the pack, but instead she just nods and her head and signals for everyone to follow.

Following Charlotte, I hear the steady thumps of everyone running behind us. 'I like this.' I state, making sure that I'm speaking through our personal mind-link.

'Like what?'

'Leading together.' I turn my head back and let out a long, happy howl. A couple others behind us copy my actions too. 'I like being next to you and by your side. It shows our pack how great of a couple we are.'

I'm not going to lie or hide the fact that I like to show off my relationship with Charlotte to people. She knows it too; I never hesitate to let people know that she's taken by me and that she has my heart as well. 'You aren't a good dancer are you?' she randomly asks, looking up at me.

Not understanding why she asked me that question, I wait for her to explain. 'You keep stepping on me... Big foot.' she teases. 'Why are we in the front? Everybody is staying away from us, Brody is too.'

'It's still the beginning of the run.' I remind her. 'No one socializes until either the Luna or the Alpha starts mixing into the group.'

During pack-runs, it always starts off with the Luna and Alpha leading, the Beta couple behind them, and everyone else behind the Beta couple. There isn't any socializing until the formality wears off and one of the leaders goes into the group.

Slowing down a bit, we all travel in a steady jogging speed. 'Don't go too far back.' I warn when Charlotte turns around and meets up with some of the teenagers behind us. I follow her, not wanting to be far away in case something happens.

A couple of the guys my age with teenage mates do the same. It's just our natural instinct to keep our mates close. 'Alpha," they mind-link me in acknowledgment.

I don't even try to make conversation with anyone, it's not my thing. Charlotte playfully bumps into the wolves, but I growl when she either gets too close to certain males or if she strays too far from me. Other guys do the same too, our wolf instincts are a lot stronger when we're in our wolf-forms. 'You look mad... And scary.' Charlotte comments. 'Like the Big Bad Wolf.'

'Is that a good or bad thing?' I ask, leading her towards the front of the pack again. I want to just roam around and just hang out like how we did earlier, but we have to lead the pack-run first. I'm not really used to relaxing or using my free-time to socialize with people, Charlotte changed that about me. I just always feel a need to interact with her, hold her hand or something at the minimum.

'Good, I guess...' she trails off. 'You almost look cute when you put on your macho-Alpha face.'

'Men aren't cute.' I growl, speeding up to chase her through the trees. This might be something that girls will never understand about guys, or maybe just about me; I hate being called cute. It makes me feel weird, especially when Charlotte calls me that. I would rather her call me hot or attractive.

'Mate keeps running into trees.' my wolf states. 'We should take her back home. She might be "injured".' he suggestively howls.

*** (a few days later) *five days since mating

"Stop being sad, it's no fun when you're sad." I say, pushing the plate of food closer to Charlotte. She does even pick up her fork though, she just stares at the bacon and eggs sitting in front of her.

"I'm n-n-not hungry." she mumbles, pushing the plate back to me. "I need to go to Doctor Kale... by myself." Without giving me any explanation of why she wants to see Dr. Kale, she turns away from the full plate of food that I gave her and walks upstairs into our room.

'Why is mate being so secretive?' my wolf asks. 'If she thinks that there's something's wrong with her health, we should know. We can take care of her.'

"I got this." I walk outside to the backyard and pick up a random blade of grass. Traveling upstairs, I tap on Charlotte's shoulder and hand her the hand-picked plant. "I got this for you."

"It's green." she states with a small smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.

"Why do you want to see Dr. Kale?" I ask, looking at her in concern. She could be pregnant, but we only mated two days ago. It'll take at least two weeks for her to show any signs of being pregnant.

"S-Somethings wrong with my back." she whispers, tears brimming her eyes. "It burns."

"Turn around," I instruct. "Let me see."

Hesitantly, she turns her back to me and allows me to lift her shirt. I could feel what she's feeling, but for me it's a tingling sensation. Not burning.

"Sweetheart," I breathe out as I raise the back of her shirt. In the place of the burn scar that labeled her as Red Stone property is a dark symbol similar to the mark on her neck. "The brand... It's gone."

"What happened to it?" Charlotte asks, pain evident in her tone. Gently running my hand over the tattoo-like shape, I admire the enlarged crescent moon and the slight shadow underneath. Lunar Shadow.

"I don't know." I answer. I've never heard of this before, scars on wolves have never turned into things like this. "It looks like a tattoo, a really, really, pretty one."

"How does it look like?"

"It's- Wait, if you have one on your back then I should too." I quickly take off my shirt and throw it aside, removing my hands off of Charlotte in the process. "Turn around, sweetheart. Mine should look the same as yours."

At first I don't hear or feel Charlotte react to the mark, she just stays silent. "X-Xander." she gasps after a couple of seconds. She reaches forward to take hold of my hand, but I see her tremble and almost fail to do so.

"What's wrong? What's happening?" I frantically ask, beginning to feel the burning that she was talking about earlier. I turn to face her again and see her eyes filled with pain. "Shit." I curse as I feel how warm her body is.

"I don't know if this is Heat or not." I mutter, trying to figure out what's going on. Doing what I did earlier, I trace patterns on Charlotte's back and hope that it soothes some of her pain. She slightly relaxes into my arms, but I can tell that it still hurts. "Does it feel like you're in Heat?"

"It's j-just my back. It burns." her voice is strained and she closes her eyes.

Thinking about ways to soothe the burning, I say, "I'll go get some ice, I'll make it stop hurting. I promise."

Charlotte's Pov

'We need mate.' my wolf whimpers. I clench my jaw and try to hold in the scream that wants to be heard so badly. The burning sensation is bearable, but it almost feels like when I first got branded by Alpha Jones. It felt better when I had Xander by my side.

'I don't know what's going on.' I tell my wolf. 'It's not Heat, it's something else.'

'It's the Red Stone brand.' she explains. 'Now that we're fully mated to Xander, our body can't take having another pack's mark on us. It's changing to symbolize Lunar Shadow.'

"Xander." I whimper when the burning increases. He said that the mark already changed to a Lunar Shadow one, I don't understand why it's still hurting.

"I'm here, I'm here." I open my eyes and see Xander standing near the edge of the bed with a cup filled with ice in his hand. "Lay on your stomach, sweetheart. The ice should help cool the burning."

Slowly turning around to lay on my stomach, I let Xander raise my shirt to expose my back. When he places one of the ice cubes on the new mark, it relieves the pain. For a second.

After that, it burns even more. I let out the scream that I was holding in earlier and bolt up into a sitting position. "Shit!" Xander shouts, instinctively wrapping his arms around me.

"Ice doesn't h-help." I whisper, holding onto him as tightly as I can. I feel his hands slip under my loose t-shirt and sigh at the sudden relief. He gently rubs the mark, causing pleasurable sparks to mask the burning.

"Does it feel better when I do this?" he asks, applying more pressure to the new mark.

"Mmhmm." I nod, snuggling against him. I know that the moment he lets go of me, the pain will come back. "D-Don't let go."

"I won't." Xander whispers in my ear. "Do you still want to see Dr. Kale tomorrow?"

Again, I nod in response. Even though my back doesn't hurt as much as it did a few minutes ago, I still need to know what happened. Wolves are only supposed to have one mark given by their mate, I don't think Xander has ever heard of a wolf having two.

*** (tomorrow)    *6 days since mating

QOTC- Charlotte vs Xander, who would win?

As I make the cookie dough, I debate on whether or not to ask Evelyn and Bryanna about what comes after mating. Whenever I ask Xander about these things, he just shrugs and gets the answer from his dad. Neither of us know what comes next in our relationship. I thought about talking to Brody, but I know that he'll just tell me that sex is bad and all of the overprotective brother stuff.

"So..." Bryanna gently nudges me with her elbow and winks. "You and Xander recently mated. How was it?"

"Good, I guess." I shrug, flushing with embarrassment. I try to change the subject to making cookies, but Bryanna notices what I'm trying to do.

"Come on, Char. Give me details." she nudges me again. "It's just you, Evelyn, and I here. There has to be some girl stuff on your mind."

I can feel both Bryanna and Evelyn staring at me with smiles on their faces, but I don't say anything for a couple of seconds. I look up from my hands and feel heat rise to my cheeks. "D-Do you mind explaining what comes a-after the mating process?"

Bryanna smiles and replies, "I knew you would have questions. Don't worry, I'll try not to make it awkward."

"Xander and I mated six days ago. If..." I pause for a couple of seconds, the thought of having kids scaring me a bit. I'm seventeen, humans would consider my age too early to have kids, but most wolves have their first child at age seventeen. Xander and I aren't exactly planning on having kids yet, but if it happens, then it just happens. "If I become pregnant, I-I don't want to be clueless on what happens."

"Have you and Xander talked about kids?" Evelyn asks.

I answer, "We talk about it sometimes... I'm okay w-with having kids, he is too. He told me that all Alpha-Luna couples have a b-boy first."

"That's true. Do you want me to explain werewolf pregnancy?"

"Yes please." I nod.

"Each time you make love with your mate, there will be no way to detect pregnancy until a week afterwards." Bryanna starts off. "You said that you and Xander last mated six days ago, so you won't be able to tell if you're pregnant or not for another week. You can't figure out if you're pregnant until two weeks after mating. At the beginning of pregnancy, you'll start being more sensitive to things and morning-sickness usually starts pretty early for wolves."

"Sensitive?" I tilt my head in confusion. I've heard about people having mood-swings when pregnant, but I thought that was only a human thing.

"Werewolves get extremely sensitive during pregnancy." Evelyn explains. "You'll get angry every time you see something you don't like, you'll randomly cry over little things, and it will be a lot easier for you to get annoyed. The sensitivity usually starts when you're about a month pregnant and when the bump starts to show."

Noticing my nervousness, she adds, "Being pregnant really isn't that bad. Xander will basically be your bitch once you become pregnant."

Bryanna and I are shocked as Evelyn says this, but neither of us speak up about it. "I can call all of my sons bitches if I want to, I gave them life so it's fair." Evelyn shrugs.

*** (a few hours later)

"I noticed that you and the Alpha have completed the mating process." Dr. Kale gives me a warm smile. "Is that why you came here today?"

Blushing at her suggestive question, I frantically shake my head in embarrassment. I already has this talk a few hours ago with Bryanna and Evelyn, I don't want to have to do that again. "It's a-about the mark that we h-have." Her eyes automatically travel to my neck, but I explain to her that I received another one during the past couple of days and what my wolf told me.

"It may seem odd, but your second mark isn't anything bad at all. I'm certain that you've heard that Xander's wolf is a lot stronger than others, that contributes to why your scar turned into one that symbolizes the pack that you two lead together." I nod as Dr. Kale informs me with this information. "With him being an Alpha and you already having Beta-ties to Lunar Shadow, the wolf side of you will do everything it can to remove any marks from other packs. Just like when two wolves mark each other for the first time, the second one will heal the same way. Not everyone has two marks, it depends on who your mate is and how you are tied to the pack."

"So a-all couples with someone with Alpha blood in them w-will have two marks?" I ask, still confused on how the werewolf mating process goes. It seems like all of the simple stages aren't enough, there's always some technical term behind everything.

"Not exactly." Dr. Kale shakes her head. "Xander naturally produces a lot of Lycanthrope. That causes his wolf to be able to override effects of wolfsbane and things like the Red Stone scar that you had. Any other regular Alpha wouldn't be able to do this for his or her mate."

"So the s-second mark is n-normal?"

"Yes." she answers. "The reason why you felt pain while Xander didn't is because of the amount of Lycanthrope in your body."

"Do I have to take another shot?" I ask, suddenly feeling nervous. According to my medical records, I've been taking Lycanthrope shots since I was born. Yet, I can never get used to the pain. Ever since I came back to Lunar Shadow, I've taken seven Lycanthrope shots and every time it felt like my body was fighting against me. Taking those shots make me feel like I want to rip myself apart and  put myself back together at the same time.

"You don't have to." I let out a relieved sigh when I hear the good news. Not only are the shots painful, but they're also extremely expensive. If I wasn't born with low Lycanthrope levels, I wouldn't be able to pay for the substance. Dr. Kale receives three syringes filled with Lycanthrope every month from the supernatural council to support my body. I heard that they also do the same for the other seven known wolves who have the same condition as I do.

"I want you to keep this, have it on you at all times in case of emergency." Dr. Kale holds up one of the syringes. She puts it in what looks like a make-up bag on the outside, but has small compartments on the inside to place the needle and liquid Lycanthrope. "Since you're about to turn eighteen, that means that your Lycanthrope levels will be extremely unstable. It will be safer to have some of these on your body and inside your home."

After about twenty minutes of talking about how to assemble and use the Lycanthrope injections, Xander comes back into the office with three bottles of water in his hand. He left to go get drinks thirty minutes ago, I don't get what took him so long. 'I didn't know where the water bottles were.' he tells me.

'Why didn't you ask someone?'

'I didn't want to look lost.'

"Alpha." Dr. Kale nods when Xander sits down next to me. She explains the second mark to Xander and then asks, "Is there anything else that you two have questions about?"

***

Xander's Pov (a week and a few days later) *19 days since mating

"What time does the sun set?" I read as I type my question on Google. I need Valentines Day to be perfect. I'll take her out to dinner, then we'll go back to the cabin and go swimming in the lake while the sun sets. I only have a few more hours to plan until the day arrives.

I always wanted to spend Valentines Day with my mate and I can finally do that this year. I'm thinking about waking her up with pancakes and orange juice too. For the past week, I've been sitting in the office and planning the entire day out. Charlotte doesn't know about any of it of course, but I've kept her by my side because I couldn't stand being away from her. 'Get up and follow mate.' my wolf demands all of a sudden.

'She's just going to take a shower. We need to finish planning.' I don't even look up from my laptop as Charlotte stands up. Out of the corner of my eye, I see her yawn and start walking out of the room. She turns around and opens her mouth to say something, but she decides against it and leaves the room.

'Get up and go after mate.' my wolf demands once again. He tries to take control of my body, but he fails to do so. 'You didn't even listen to mate while she was talking.'

'Yes I was. She was telling us about her day.'

'You missed the most important thing she said.' my wolf starts off growling, but then that growl turns into a whimper when I don't answer him. 'I'm done with you.'

Charlotte's Pov

"Y-You don't care?" I ask, tears starting to form in my eyes when Xander doesn't even look up from his laptop. This is the third time that this has happened during the past week already. Each time I delivered the news that I thought he would be excited about, he seems like he isn't even listening.

"Sure, that sounds great, sweetheart." Xander nods, still not looking at me.

'Mate doesn't care.' my wolf angrily growls. 'We've told him three times and he doesn't even acknowledge us. He's too occupied with whatever he's doing on his laptop.'

"Xander, look at me." My vision blurs from all of the tears in my eyes, but I refuse to let any of them go. Not in front of this man. He says something about the time that the sun sets, but I try my best to block him out just like he's been doing to me.

Pretending to yawn, I use the fake excuse to wipe my eyes and turn away from my mate. If he doesn't want to hear what I have to say, then so be it. It doesn't matter anymore.

During the past few days, Xander has been sitting in his office all day on his laptop. He always kept the screen hidden from me and he never really paid attention to what I said while he was working. I've sat down next to him to do some paperwork, but he never tried to make conversation with me. I was simply there to keep him company.

I get up and slowly walk over to the door of the office, trying my best to hide my tears from Xander.

*** (Valentines Day night)

Xander's Pov (sorry for a lot of POV switching and time-lapse)

"Charlotte?" I knock on the guest bedroom door for what seems like the millionth time today. "Sweetheart, I'm sorry for whatever I did to make you feel like this. I'm sorry."

Instead of having the perfect Valentines Day that I planned for Charlotte and I, I've spent the day apologizing to Charlotte for... Whatever I did to make her switch rooms and ignore me. Last night, I was doing last-minute changes and didn't notice that she wasn't sleeping by my side.

My wolf stopped talking to me and so did my mate.

Pressing the side of my face against the door, I'm able to hear soft sobs and sniffles coming from Charlotte. I can imagine her sitting on the bed with her knees pulled up to her chest, tears freely falling down her cheeks. "Sweetheart," I call out, the guilt of being the reason for her sadness eating me alive. "Please tell me what I did."

None of this was supposed to happen. Today was supposed to be just the two of us going on dates and having fun, but here we are. I can feel how sad and angry Charlotte is with me. I can't even think of any reason why she would feel this way because of me.

I can easily break the door down and get to her, but I know that won't help my case at all. Barging in and trying to force Charlotte to forgive me won't make matters better. It'll just drive her farther away from me. 'Sweetheart, can you please open the door? I want to talk to you and figure out what I did wrong.' I mind-link. I hear Charlotte move the doorknob, but she doesn't twist it enough to get the door open.

After a couple of seconds, I hear the sound of the bedroom window being opened and some shuffling; she's trying to leave the house.

Rushing downstairs and outside to where the guest bedroom window is, I see Charlotte about to climb down the hidden ladder bolted to the side of the brick wall. I sneak over to where she will be when she finishes climbing and wait. I won't be able to help her climb down, but I'll be close enough to catch her if she falls.

About twenty minutes later, I find myself coming out of my hiding spot in the trees and approaching Charlotte. "That wasn't very safe, sweetheart." I say, referring to how she just snuck out of a bedroom window and down steel ladder. "What are you doing out here?"

She turns around and looks at me, but she doesn't make a sound. "What did I do?" I ask, taking a few steps closer to her, only to stop in my tracks when I notice her stepping backwards every time I move forwards. Moving slower this time, I take cautious steps towards Charlotte while she backs up until she's pressed up against a tree.

"Sweetheart, please." I plead, not able to take her silence. "Please, say something to me. Anything."

We stand there for a couple of minutes, just staring at each other. Then, Charlotte steps around me and starts walking back to the house. We walk faster this time; she's desperate to keep the distance between us while I'm trying to close it. Once we make it back into our home, she rushes to get back into the guest bedroom. She didn't climb back up the ladder because she knows that I would've caught up to her faster that way.

"You need to be careful." I say, catching Charlotte in my arms when she trips over a few things on the floor. Her teary eyes widen when she realizes that if I hadn't have caught her, she would've hit her head on the nearby desk. She pushes me away and stands up on her own two feet again. "Sweetheart, wait." she tries to retract her hand when I reach out for it, but her movements aren't fast enough.

Looking at her eyes, red and puffy from all of the crying that she's done today, I say, "I'm sorry for whatever I did to hurt you. I won't make you sleep in the same bed as me if you don't want to, just please don't leave the house like that again. It's dangerous in the woods, you could be carrying our child right now-"

Finally letting her tears fall, she whispers, "I already am."

&/&:;)$:&/&//));&&-):);&:&/$)-;;//@$(

"Hi."
                      -me

QOTC- Charlotte vs Xander, who would win?

Sorry for all of the Pov switches and time-lapse in this chapter guys! The end might be a little choppy, but I really need to go back to regular updates on Fridays instead of Sundays. I have Monday off of school, so I will definitely be able to update THIS FRIDAY!

It's almost 2am where I live, so I'm going to sleep now.

Don't forget to leave a vote!

xoxo Priscilla