Page 24 of The Witch’s Fate (The Lunaterra Chronicles #13)

IDALIS

W ith the early morning light slipping into the cottage, I wake deeply rested—though with my muscles still aching, especially between my thighs.

I take a few minutes letting myself get used to the day.

A smile finds its way to my lips. It doesn’t feel real.

I’ve found love. Well I suppose love has found me.

With that thought, I peer down to the pillow beside me.

Ryker’s not in the bed with me. Patting the sheet next to me, I find it cool to the touch.

I can sense, somehow, that he has not gone far. Is that because of a bond we’ve created between us? I think it must be. Delight fills me with warmth. A new kind of magic exists. A kind I can play with for the first time.

If only he can stay as I asked. At least for a little while.

Although he didn’t say he would or that he could. Ryker answered in kisses and touches and his body, but we didn’t stay awake long enough after that final round to have a deeper conversation. Tension strains my heart.

It’s been so long since I have felt companionship and never did it feel like this. I fear losing it just as quickly as it’s found me.

For all I did tell him, there’s much I haven’t said as well. I didn’t tell him that I don’t think I can bear such a loss a second time.

Here in my bed, with the scent of him still on the sheets, it’s hard not to let my thoughts turn toward him completely.

It’s true that we haven’t known each other for long, but he is my mate .

I know the heart of him. And I know that he is a highly trained weapon.

He has spent his life building himself into the best soldier he could be.

I know the army has been his entire purpose. His entire life. He would be giving up all that once to stay with me. If they would allow it.

Was it right for me to propose such a thing?

It is too late to take back the words, even if I wanted to, and I do not. As I always do, I drift toward thoughts of my books. Of the ancient grimoires for answers. But one thing resonates through me and keeps me still and at peace.

I was made for him.

I will be with him regardless. Always. We cannot be separated. This magic is impossible to break.

Whether it was the moon or simply fate itself, I was destined for Ryker. And he was destined for me.

With a deep breath in and a slow breath out, I release all those worries and thoughts to the moon. The moon might not be as visible, but she is still there in the sky. She is always there to hold the burdens I cannot carry alone.

Spurred by my need to find him, I throw over the covers and I get out of bed.

I imagine he’s only gone for a quick run.

I go to my bathing room and wash quickly, letting the water trickle down over my skin, treating myself gently.

Reminding myself that I can survive anything and with this new love, so much more awaits.

As I wash the most tender parts of myself I blush. I’ve never given myself to a man before. I’ve heard of the pleasures, but I could have never know it would be so all-consuming and divine. I do wonder if being fated made it more intense or whether it’s always like that.

My desire for Ryker hasn’t waned at all.

My clit is still sensitive although all of the rest of me is sore.

I shiver as I pull a clean dress over my head, my skin even more sensitive to the fabric.

It’s been kissed and sucked and bitten now and carefully marked by my mate.

My fingers drift to my neck finding a faint mark in the mirror. Only a slightly silver scar remains.

I love it.

I’m already at peace with that change. I do not see how it could be any other way. It’s like being at peace with having a heart, or a soul. It is simply part of me.

I’m even at peace with this small interval of solitude while Ryker is outside.

I know how to spend time alone. It’s not at all the same as being alone for all these years, with only the letters with pleas for help and only the creatures of the forest for company.

This is a solitude that knows it will soon be broken. That my mate is nearby and will return.

And that speaks to me to the depths of my soul. Selecting a simple crimson silk dress that falls down to the floor, I speak my intent for the day: Passion and love will guide me today and I will trust in it. So mote it be.

Those little bits of magic, simple statements of what you wish even in mundane acts like getting dressed or washing your face, that little bit of magic is so very powerful and should not be overlooked. I do them as often as I can and from now on they will include thoughts of Ryker.

My steps are sure as I select a candle from my shelf.

Not the candle I burned for my spell, of course, because that one has nothing more to give.

Perhaps the spell went as wild as it did because I was trying to give the prince and princess something I wanted desperately for myself but believed I would never have.

Somehow, my powers turned those words into Ryker. The spell did not create him, but it did create the situation that allowed us to discover one another. For fate to finally bring us together as we were meant to be.

So…was it a mistake that led to a violent storm and trapped him here, or something else?

I wished for no harm to come if I didn’t attend to the wedding.

If he wasn’t trapped here, Ryker may have never found me.

Unless we’d both attended the wedding. What could have been is not mine to see, but I am grateful for what I have been given, including spells gone awry.

Is it ever a mistake if all a witch is doing is guiding herself onto fate’s path?

I cannot say.

I bring the candle to my worktable and sit down with it.

I close my eyes, reach for the comfort of the moon, and focus on a spell of truth. Not a spell of prophecy. Not a spell of comfort. Not a spell that will tell me what I want to hear.

A spell that will tell me what is and what will be.

I etch the words into the candle, murmuring them softly and holding myself and Ryker in my mind. I’m careful not to place us anywhere in particular. I do not want to influence the spell in that way. It’s just the two of us, the background indistinct. The only important aspect is him, not where .

It’s difficult, I will admit, not to influence the spell, but I remain strong, to manifest what I desire rather than to pray for our highest selves to be shown.

The moon must have a reason for all this. She must.

I search the candle flames. For a minute, there is nothing.

Then it dances slightly differently, and the world around me dims. It doesn’t go so dark that it disappears, more so to alert me that it is not the time to look at the present. It is time to look upon the future the spell has shown me.

The first clear image to appear is me, and a second later, Ryker.

He stays beside me until we are both old and gray.

The sight of us together, knowing we make it many moons together, brings me such comfort the back of my eyes prick with tears.

I don’t wish to be alone anymore. I only wish to be with him.

The image shifts, seeming to move backward in time, whirling through different vibrant colors as it does.

There we are again, much younger than we eventually became but slightly changed from how we are now.

Pups play in the grass in the background.

In the distance, those pups tumble and chase until they at last grow older and become wolves and among them a young witch playing with fire. She has Ryker’s eyes.

The seasons change, too. This is more a feeling than an image, but I understand with perfect clarity.

There is a hand on my shoulder.

I keep my mind focused on the images brought to me by my spell. It is the truth without a doubt. This is what we will be.

This is where the future begins.

He is quiet in the present, letting me watch.

“What do you see?” he asks eventually.

My heart swells with this new truth. “I see that you love me forever.”

“I already knew I’d do that,” he says softly behind me, planting a kiss on the crook of my neck.

I let out a sob that’s half a laugh and turn away from the future. It’s a seed I have planted, only it’s one that I cannot hurry to grow faster. It will bloom in its own time. And what must come, will. But I have comfort in the love we have today.

I stand up and the tiniest movement brings me into Ryker’s arms. He tips my face to his. Giddy nervousness overtakes me. “I don’t know what’s going to happen exactly or how we will get there, but?—”

He smiles at me. “Step by step, I would think.”

A huff of a laugh leaves me at his statement. “Can we start with getting to know each other?”

“We did last night,” he teases, and another laugh escapes me.

“We have forever but I want it all now,” I tell him truly. “I want to know everything there is about you.”

Ryker thinks about it for a moment. “I’ll start. My favorite season is summer.”

I don’t think I could smile any wider at his admission. “Mine is winter. And—” I search for a truth about myself. “Lillies make me sneeze but I think they’re beautiful.”

“What’s your favorite flower then?” he asks.

“What’s yours?” I counter.

“The tropical ones, like birds-of-paradise.”

“I love peonies and roses.”

“Then I will build you a rose garden,” he tells me. Where? The question hisses in the back of my mind but I don’t speak it. Instead I tell him another truth of mine.

“The outside world is dangerous, and it’s scared me for years now.”

He touches my face with a fondness, staring deep into my eyes. He leans forward as if he’ll kiss me but instead he whispers, “The outside world is beautiful and thrilling.”

My heart beats faster, knowing he’s right, knowing I will venture to places I haven’t known but that he’ll be beside me.

Ryker’s eyes flash with a knowing desire. “This all happened for a reason.”

“What reason?” I question wondering why fate had us meet this way. Why now?

“This reason.” He kisses me with a passion that weakens my knees. It doesn’t matter that he had me over and over last night. It doesn’t matter at all. I kiss him back as fiercely as I ever have, and Ryker sweeps me into his arms and presses me back against the wall in a few hurried strides.

I’m drowning in desire by the time his cock is hard against my hip. I writhe against him needing to have him inside of me again.

Lifting me by my hips, with my legs wrapped around his waist, Ryker fucks me up against the wall, uninhibited and free, and the push of him inside me and his hard body in front of me can be nothing but heaven.

I clench around him, pleasure building in me until I come undone.

Once? Twice? I lose track in our touch and the heated kisses.

In his primal need. And Ryker follows me, thrusting hard inside me until he kisses me one more time before he finds his own climax.

He leans his forehead against mine, my body still wrapped around his, and catches his breath. Then he kisses my cheek and then nips the lobe of my ear.

With his lips at the shell of my ear, his warm breath sends shivers down my shoulders. “You don’t have to ever question that I am yours or whether I’ll ever come back to you,” he says, and then pulls back so I can look into his eyes.

His eyes have never seemed brighter or more possessive. They have never seemed more wolf-like. But I know it is him I am seeing.

I am seeing his very soul.

“Fate brought us together,” he continues. “Not your spell.”

“Fate and my spell brought us together,” I correct, playing one last round of our game. He lets out a huff of a laugh at my correction, giving into me.

“I love you, Idalis,” he whispers. “My soul was meant to be with yours.”

I’m filled with so much joy that I can hardly breathe, but then I must, because here is my new life and my mate, before me at last.

“I took some pleasure in my solitude,” I begin, then pause, choked with emotion.

“But I did feel sorrow. I told myself that I didn’t long for anything.

That I was content with my purpose. I told myself it would be safer to be alone.

But then you stepped onto my land, and into my life, and I knew longing.

I never knew longing like that until you looked at me.

I love you Ryker. And there is no doubt that I will love you forever. ”

A Spell for a Happily Ever After

For a happily ever after, I suggest the following be placed in a red, pink, or white satchel cleansed by sitting in pink salt overnight before adding your ingredients and tucking it away under the bed you share with your lover.

Rose petals for passion

Rose quartz for love

Clear quartz for longevity

Lavender for peace in union

Obsidian chips for protection

Dried wine stained on the tip of a cork from a shared bottle (the cork could be added whole if preferred and if there is room) for divine blessing

A parchment with both of your names, folded three times toward you before being slipped into the satchel.

Do not worry if the parchment folds come undone, the spell has already been cast.

May your life be filled with love that is all-consuming. Love that never drifts. Love that you are so very worthy of. Know that you can have this love alone, as you should always love yourself fiercely. Or you can share the power of such divine emotion and magic with whomever you wish.

With all my heart, so mote it be.