Naomi watched as the guests started arriving. She couldn’t get Irene’s words out of her mind and it had made her a little distracted that she didn’t even notice that Asher was not back yet. She could already tell the people arriving by their mode of dressings and appearance. It was easy to identify the vampires from the werewolves. While the wolves looked like humans with their warm skin and shouty colored outfit, the Vampires were dressed in dull colors, and mostly black colors that matched with their pale skin and striking beautiful faces.

She already knew that tonight, they won’t be any demons. According to Asher, the Blood moon doesn’t give the demons their mates. Demons mates are chosen. Just like humans, they fall in love and mark each other and so everyday is mating day for them. She found herself liking the lifestyle of demons and she knew it was mostly because a blood moon doesn’t give them mates which means should they fall in love with someone, they won’t have to worry about the blood moon coming and giving them another person. No matter how sure everyone seemed that she was Asher’s mate, including Asher himself, she was still a little scared. She is not a wolf or a vampire, why would the blood moon choose her as his mate? She had even raised the discussion to Aliyah last night but the queen had told her that in the beginning, their kinds mated with humans before they had to go into the forest to protect themselves.

She watched the youngsters, —according to Asher— majority of the wolves that would be there tonight would be teenagers with only him and Anita the only adults because wolves finds their mates from sixteen. But it was a different thing for the Nightwalkers as they mostly start finding their mates from one hundred years old. The thought that she was in a room with over one hundred years old vampires made her want to find a hole and bury herself but she has to trust in Asher, she has to believe in him that no one would dare hurt her.

She tried to stay on her own, not wanting to attract attention to herself and stayed in the far end of the ballroom. Asher had told her that sometimes, younger vampires do attend the ceremony just to know if they can be lucky but right now, she doesn’t even know how to identify the younger ones, not that she would even want to know. For crying out loud, she is a human!

“There you are,” a voice said and soon, Anita appeared beside her, “the blood moon will rise in approximately five minutes. You nervous?”

Naomi scoffed nervously, “you bet I am.”

“You don’t have to be, I mean, a mark is already on your neck,” Anita shrugged. “I on the other hand, I’m embarrassed to be here.”

“Why is that?”

“Hello, didn’t Asher tell you?” She raised an eyebrow, “I am an adult. There is no wolf here my age, apart from Asher, but he already has you, so, I am the lone wolf as I can see now.”

“Don’t say that, you may find him here,” Naomi said as a word of encouragement.

“You don’t understand, every wolf here is younger than I am. Which means, if I should find my mate here, I would be older. I am not really ready for a relationship that I am the older one. Left for me, I would have sat tonight out but my mother wouldn’t hear of it. According her, a mate is a mate, whether older or younger. That over there, that’s my younger brother. He is eighteen this year and that made this his third mating ceremony.” She pointed at a deep brown haired boy at the other end of the room, chatting with his friends. “He is the future alpha of our pack.”

Naomi frowned, “you are older, shouldn’t…”

Anita shook her head, “alpha genes don’t pass to females. At most, it would make me a little stronger than other females and faster, but I will never have the full power. It was why the Queen is not the alpha of our pack. The alpha gene was in her bloodline before, but because her parents only had her, the powers had to be moved to my family, giving it to my father and then passing it down to Micah and from him down to his generation to come until they meet a stumbling block too, having only a daughter.”

“I see,” Naomi nodded, “well, you would have made a pretty bad ass Alpha female if you ask me.”

“Tell me about it,” Anita laughed, “that’s why I made myself Asher’s Beta. It’s not a norm but I am ready to fight anyone for it when the time comes. I know I won’t be an alpha, but I won’t give up the chance of being a Beta. What would be my purpose if I’m not?”

“Well,” Naomi shrugged, “you would make a bad ass Luna as well.”

Anita stared at her and she smiled with another shrug. Anita frowned, she has never thought of it like that, she has never thought of being mated to a future alpha. However, she killed off the thought before it took root in her heart. “Forget it, I know every future alpha here, and I have been in mating ceremonies with them and nothing happened, so,” she shrugged, “I don’t think that is a possibility too.”

Naomi nodded too, not knowing what else to say. They both stayed silent, each lost in their own thought until the announcer came and ushered everyone outside. The blood moon was rising. “Say what,” Anita began, “what do you say we play a game with Asher.”

Naomi frowned, “what game?”

“Well, we all know he is your mate and obviously, when the blood moon rise, he would just walk up to you. What if we make it a little challenging for him?”

“How?”

“I say we hide you.”

“What?” Naomi stared at her like she doesn’t know what she was saying. “Are you okay?”

“Oh come on, it would be fun. Let your scent guide him to you.”

“But I don’t have a scent, I am not a wolf or a vampire.”

Anita smiled, “oh come on, everybody has a scent. Whether you are a wolf, a vampire, a witch, a demon or a human. While each identity has a collective scent, everyone has their own unique scent individually, and it’s that scent that the mating mark makes us perceive on the blood moon night and after that night, that is the only scent you will perceive from your mate.”

“So you are saying I have my own unique smell?”

“Human, witch, whatever, you have your own individual smell, trust me. And tonight, no matter where I hide you, Asher would be sure to find you without even looking hard.”

It was daring but also exciting and Naomi found herself thinking about it, how Asher would find her. She chuckled and gave her consent and so, instead of going out to the garden where everyone was going, they doubled back and Noami stayed in the kitchen where she could still see what was happening in the garden even if she couldn’t hear them. “See that?” Anita pointed at the now orange moon, “it’s turning, very soon, it’s going to be blood red and it lasts for only ten minutes. Before then, everyone whose mate was here would have found each other. It usually happens so fast,” she winks. “Now stay here, let me go find Asher, oh, this is going to be fun,” she clapped her hands happily and left.

Naomi could hear the loud beating of her heart and her eyes followed Anita. She hadn’t seen Asher in the ballroom and she actually wondered where he could be and now, watching Anita, she saw him running out of the woods. Her heart was racing that she started breathing from her mouth because enough air wasn’t getting to her lungs. The background color was changing slowly as everyone started looking like there was a candlelight held up on their faces. She saw Asher talking to Anita and saw her shook her head. She doesn’t know if he was frowning, he was a little far that the details of his face weren’t clear to her.

Soon, she started hearing howling and taking her gaze from Asher, she met a lot of red eyes and her breath caught in her throat. People started walking around and right before her eyes, she saw two people stand in front of each other and then shapeshifted into their wolves and ran to the woods. Her mouth was wide open, yes, she had seen Asher’s wolf but he had never taken the form right in front of her. As if that wasn’t enough, she started seeing more people turning and they always run off in pairs. Her eyes went back to Asher and she saw his eyes were red, has he finally caught her scent? Would he be coming to her?

She saw Anita walking towards the woods, she couldn’t see her face so she doesn’t know what was happening but she knew Asher let her and start walking towards the house. Her heart was beating loud in her chest and she placed her hand on her chest to keep herself calm. Each of his step was precise and determined. His eyes were blood red that she could see the redness glowing softly in the semi dark night.

He was coming to her and she knew her scent had given her away just like Anita had said. Just then, two girls started going to him, one’s eyes were red and the other she can’t tell. She frowned, what could they possibly want with him? She didn’t want to think too much about them but then Asher stopped in front of them. Her heart was beating loud, what could this mean? What was happening? Right before her eyes, the two girls hugged Asher and he…hugged them back.

Author's note:
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