Chapter 78

“Now, my question is: do you wanna leave or not?” He asked me in all seriousness. “Do you want to be a mere mistress or do you want to step up into your role as a Luna?”

I breathed out. Did I actually make for a good Luna? What even made a good Luna? I didn’t have the answers, frankly I didn’t know.

“Arsen,” I spoke shyly. He locked eyes with me. “Genuinely, will I make for a good Luna?”

“Why are you asking this, Aelin?” He wondered.

“Because if it was just a group of phonies who are to set in their ways to see that I may be worth a chance, I’ll do it; but if they’re right and I have been left too weak to fend for this pack, I don’t want to do it,” I explained.

“Aelin, this pack doesn’t need any more testosterone and adrenaline fueled warriors. We need someone like you. Look at Sage, Cain, Nova and Lotte. You were given the task of taking care of four orphans and you gave them a home, a safe place for them to grow, laugh and learn. You created a family after years of been shown the opposite of that. Not everyone can do that and the North needs that,” he explained. “I don’t care if you are a great fighter or if you can take down Alexis in a combat or not, as long as you can protect yourself.”

“Is that a yes?” I smiled, but as I saw the lack of a smile in Arsen’s face, mine vanished.

Arsen was hurt, truly and deeply hurt by my actions. He wanted to dissipate the situation on my end as much as possible, make sure that I’ll stay, but one fact didn’t stop the other. Arsen wasn’t going to let this one fly. I guess I had taken for granted all the times that he had come to my rescue, that he had accommodated everything around us just for me.

“Give me an answer once you know,” he said, getting up from the bed, “*and you’re sure about your decision*,” he emphasized before turning away.

“Wait, Arsen. I know,” I stopped him. He halted but didn’t turn around. “I’m sorry. I want to stay, I wanna be with you. I promise,” I spoke from the heart. My words coming out shaky and raspy. He turned around. “You weren’t here, it was every day, I-. It made me question things, and with the situation with Ascian and the danger that we-.”

“Not us, you, Aelin. The danger that you were in.”

“I just, I guess I thought it was for the best,” I finished. My shoulders fell down in defeat.

“Well, it wasn’t Aelin.”

I sighed through my nose.

“If you want to be Luna of this pack, you have start believing that you are not only part of this pack but Luna- only then will people start seeing you as one. So, I’ll offer you this. I have to go now pay a visit to your dear friends from earlier, you can either stay here or come with me to show them who’s in charge,” he presented to me his offer. “I won’t judge your call.”

“I’ll go with you,” I agreed, swallowing down a pit of nerves.

“Do you have to do anything in particular or can we leave already?” He asked.

The tension between us was undeniable. I don’t think we’ve ever been so out of tune, even when we were in Kylain. I needed a moment to group my thoughts and think of my plan of action. How did I want to be perceived?

“I wanted to go quickly to the bathroom, actually,” I commented shyly.

The last thing that I wanted was to disturb him even more. He didn’t seem to mind, as he took a seat on the bed.

I came out of the bathroom after splashing some cold water on my face. I knew exactly what I wanted to do before seeing these people.

“Arsen,” I asked almost normally. His stern expression made of me a coward momentarily. “Did you bring any fitted t-shirts with you?”

He frowned at me with a slight confusion, but ended up answering me with a “yes.”

“Do you mind if I borrow it?” I asked fearful of rejection.

I doubted a mate and even more an Alpha would ever reject such a proposition no matter how mad they could be, but perhaps this time I was testing my limits. However, I do believe Arsen understood my train of thought when he nodded his head.

He got up from the bed and quickly fetched me from his bags, a tight black shirt. I quickly took off my oversized t-shirt off and put his on. I didn’t care to hide away from him, it was nothing that he hadn’t seen before and at this time, any hint of arousal from his end would aid the situation. I then put the oversized t-shirt on again, hiding his clothes underneath.

His smell would radiate off of me which would tell those who smelled me a different story to what had actually happened today.

“Ready?” He asked, I simply nodded.

Arsen guided me to what I believe was the ‘packhouse’ of the city. He walked me inside, his hand carefully placed on my lower back. Many of the pack members were in the canteen eating together, some of which smiled and waved at Arsen. Some did to me too.

Arsen moved past that crowd and led me to a big door. He opened it and let me walk in first. Inside the room, Beta Cullen was seated in silence with all of the training instructors from my group as well as Alexis and her group of friends.

Arsen’s hand was quick to make its return on my lower back. Our serious faces along with the tension between the two of us seemed to go unnoticed as even Cullen showed a glimpse of surprised when he saw us. I guess, my trick of wearing Arsen’s clothes did work and probably had more than one of them believe that we had been beneath the sheets just before this encounter.

The last thing that I wanted was to make these fools think that they had affected me and thus my relationship with Arsen as much as they had.

“Cullen, you’re free to go now,” Arsen dismissed.

Cullen got up, nodded and left the room, closing the door behind him.

“Does everyone know why you have been gathered here today?” Arsen questioned.

They all nodded, their eyes flickering towards me. None of them daring enough to glare at me apart from Alexis.

“Alexis, are you sure?” I asked myself. I caught everyone’s attention, catching even Arsen by surprise.

Alexis settled into her chair and lowered her gaze to the table. I then proceeded to look back at Arsen, indicating him that he could proceed.

“While we are here to discuss how seven of you were prepared to kill Luna Aelin-,” Arsen commenced.

“When weren’t going to kill her,” one of the men pleaded.

“I know what I saw and Solak was ready to kill my mate,” Arsen quickly answered. Solak, the man that had lunged at me earlier today, lowered his gaze with what appeared like true remorse. “I have Reggo and Eisak here to explain to me how come these growing tensions were never addressed.”

Eisak had been a mere spectator to everything that had happened, he had never concerned himself with our group, putting his blind trust onto *Reggo*. I despised that man. Eisak was quick to explain his side of the story. Arsen dismissed him after proving him that Eisak had little to add to the story.

“Reggo,” Arsen pointed at the instructor.

“As instructor, I only wanted Aelin to improve. I believed that pairing her up with Alexis would make for a faster development of her fighting skills,” Reggo explained.

“Did you notice any tension growing between the two of them?” Arsen wondered.

“I-, it’s fighting, you know? It can quickly turn personal when you’re training every day with the same person. I simply took it as two fighters showing competitive behavior. Once again, I thought it would help Aelin.”

*Bullshit.* I mindlinked Arsen angrily.

*Either speak or keep your thoughts to yourself.* Arsen answered.

“Alexis, what’s your telling of the events?”

“First and foremost I want to confess that from day one I had played a bit rougher with Aelin than I should’ve for her level. I am after all trying to become an instructor myself. However, Reggo did have a talk with me prior that since Aelin wasn’t training as a wolf that I could and should go rougher. I followed his command.”

“That doesn’t explain why you and your friends went after her afterwards,” Arsen pointed out.

“She beat me,” she spit out. “As a human, that’s not even my forté,” she excused herself. Her ego clearly bruised. “It may have bothered me more than I should’ve let it. We went after her to just kinda scare her off. But,” her attention turned solely to me, “as we tried scaring her off, she just began bad mouthing the pack talking about how she hated all of us and wanted to leave.”

“Oh!” She remembered, “and she even said that you were mine to take if I wanted.”

“That means that you had previously informed her that you and I have had sex before,” Arsen pointed out.

Alexis cheeks went red with guilt.

She sighed, “okay, Aelin for being Luna seemed a bit too weak,” Alexis explained, head down. “Pretty much everyone in Falj was talking about it. To be honest when I first fought her, I was genuinely upset how you had been paired with someone so weak. This is the North after all. Your mom, Luna Ulala had been such a great warrior. It was-,” she sighed. “It felt as though the Moon had gotten this pairing wrong. I felt destined to be Luna, ask anyone in Falj they would say the same. So, I told her. I thought that if I continued roughing her up and talking her down, once you come back you would see her like we all do,” she finished explaining.

“What is that?”

“A weak Luna,” I answered for them.

“If you dare even call her that.”