Third Person

“Justin, get that out of your mouth!” A woman stated, making One stretch his neck to the side and see her coming closer to the boy.

“Sollace.” One stated once again and blinked.

In such a small time, he had already come to see two Shifters with the blood of Sollace…

Didn’t the Elementalist’s try to kill them all? After all, he had seen it in their memories…

What was going on?

Going up to the woman and child, One looked at the woman with curiosity, only for her to jump in fright at the sight of him there!

“Who…Who are you!?” She asked, then looked down at the boy and picked him up, stepping further away from One once again.

“I’d like to ask the same thing!” One stated frankly back to her.

“I’m…I’m…” The woman stuttered but shut her mouth. Owen had told her that just in case someone did find her here, she wasn’t to give anything away.

“Sollace.” One, again, stated frankly back to her.

The woman swallowed and tried not to look astonished to have been found out so easily.

“Are you hiding from the Elementalist’s?” One asked in pure curiosity.

“Yes…” Was all the woman stated, and she bit her lip, not sure upon what else needed to be said. She really hasn’t been happy lately and…

“Oh, and since my father was the King, you didn’t have to be around, so, perhaps here was the best place to be, uh?” One asked, looking around.

It really wasn’t a very big place to live…It also looked boring…Don’t they get bored?

“…Yes…” The woman said softly, holding her boy more firmly. What did he mean by his father was the King?

The woman knew already that Owen had sexual relations elsewhere, she had felt it…And she knew that in Owen’s eyes, he had felt like the King…

But, to have said that at this person's age, was this person talking about Owen or…Could it possibly be Ethan’s son?

But…Chance was still young…

Who is this person!?

Looking back at her, One sighed, “The Elementalist’s are no more, so there’s no reason to be afraid.”

The woman blinked and then looked away.

Afraid?

Are you telling me not to be afraid? She asked quietly.

How can she not be afraid!?

Her life had been great once, only to become more and more darker as the days went by!

At first, when she and Owen had first mated, life was still grand and happy. Owen worked his way into the world from the bottom, as she knew how low he had been upon first meeting him.

From being a rogue, shunned by his mother because Owen had stolen from his father at a young age, Owen had grown into a more honourable man who worked hard.

Not long before her royal father’s death, Owen had still been a relatively good man, but it all changed upon most of the Sollace family dying…It all changed…

The man she once knew and was fond of as her mate…He changed…

She was afraid of her mate, whom wanted so much, afraid of her child, who had the Sollace bloodline, and of her life!

How can she not be afraid!?

“Did you want to come back to the palace with me?” One asked, again looking around, but this time had a face plainly stating, ‘How can you live here?’

The woman got scared and stepped back, “Oh, no, it’s fine. I live here, I’ve lived her for a long time.”

What if Owen found out!?

She had not had to see him in a while, and it had been good!

There was no way she’d want to leave this place if there was even the slightest chance that she would see her mate again!

To get to this cause of thinking, this woman had gone through hell…

Owen had not failed her once, not twice, but three times!

He had even killed one of their little girls in front of her, threatening her, and this woman had been afraid that it’ll happen again!

She might still have a little girl of the age of ten, but…How long will she be alive?

It always felt like she was on egg shells and if she made the smallest change or the smallest wrong move, she could lose even more then she has already!

“Ok, whatever! Stay here then!” One shrugged and then flew off, not caring beyond that.

If his aunt or cousin, or whatever she was, wanted to stay there out of the way, he wasn’t about to stop her!

Flying back to the palace, landing just inside, One caught up with Damien and followed his father’s all the way into the King’s room…Making Damien feel weird…

“What is it?” Damien asked, not sure if he should continue to the bath or not.

One shrugged, “Nothing.”

Looking around at this room, One reminisced as memories from a past life came to him again.

Damien decided to leave One be and continue on to clean his precious mate, leaving One all by himself.

Sighing, as he touched the old fireplace, One shook his head. The years had really made this place look…Old…

When he had helped build the palace, placing the last of his magic as a barrier to stop the elemental power to penetrate it, this place looked a hell of a lot better!

Now…It could be better to tear the whole thing down and start from scratch!

Actually, One came to realize that this whole palace had been through the best of times and really needed to be redone, not just that of the King's room!

The old throne room had not moved rooms and having seen it, had made One feel depressed. It needed to change!

Seeing the waterhole still there, but not as beautiful as it once was, One wanted to change it!

The stairs creaked, the floors were not shiny, the carpets were old…

Bah! The palace was not to One’s liking at all!

When he takes over and becomes King again, he’ll build a whole new one!

Sighing to his idea, One felt refreshed and walked right into the bathroom, only to get yelled out by Damien and so…One laid on the bed but…It was dirty and had a bit of dried blood on it, making One immediately scamper off it!

With another sigh, One left the room, investigating the other rooms there on the floor, obtaining even more memories from his past life…

In the Queen’s room, One finally remembered his last mate. She had been human, and he had never thought that there was a ‘mate’ type of connection, until her.

He had been over a hundred years old and already had a fifty year old daughter and a twenty year old son by the time that he had met her but…That was when he finally understood what one other Shifter, that he had created, had finally meant by having a different type of bond with another.

And so, the ‘mate bond’ was known of and written about, talked about and investigated upon.

It had only been a small tribe of humans that had been changed into Shifters, so knowledge back then was all through examining and experimenting.

Sadly, before meeting her, his mate, One felt like it would be easy, but upon seeing his mate’s pained expression through an experiment, he no longer wanted to experiment on what it was…

…She was quite the catch, One remembered, sitting on the bed.

This room used to be full of her unique and lovely smell and he remembered that it wasn’t his room that he usually slept in, it was hers!

After meeting her, and remembering that humans only lived for so long, One had made the best of it, knowing what it was like to make the best of his situations because of being reborn and living as different beings. This was when he found out the repercussions of summoning and then life stealing what he had summoned, as he wanted to give extra life to his mate...It had worked, giving her twenty years or so, but a backlash of a summoning happened and he had to defeat it! Unable to use any of his magic to either chain it or curse it, as it seemed to be immune, it became quite a critical time! By this time, he had already made the Elementalist's, so he didn't have the elemental power, and in the end, nearly half of the Shifters had died...Making it a secret law for himself from then onwards...

Not only did this rule come from his loved one, but he too felt very guilty that so many of his friends had died, just so that he could live beyond means with his mate...So, of course, this process was never repeated.

Their little family had started straight away, and they had several children in the space of her life, and that gave One enough want through his depression of losing her, to stay and bring up his children and grand children.

It was different from when he had a human life, much to his likeness. Shifters were already living longer than that of a century and most of his children waited for their mates, as seeing first hand upon what their mother and father were like, they had wanted the same for themselves.

One lived for quite a number of centuries, being able to life steal but…He stopped doing it after his last child with his mate had perished and he had still been there, without a little bit of her left…Unless, of course, if you included that of grandchildren and great grandchildren…But, it wasn’t enough.

This life hadn't been his longest, but it had felt longer. He had never known such a deep affection until this life. He had never known what it was like to rule and live so long without his elemental powers. He had never had so many friends and wants for this new species...

After One stopped stealing life, he lived for another fifty years, seeing great great great grandchildren and he finally choice someone to teach the ways of being King to them.

One wasn't one to state his misgivings, but his ruling was done with a lot of help, so all he had to do was pick someone that he liked and hoped the others liked them too!

He might have been powerful and well respected, but he had his days where he hadn't agreed with his friends over something, that was for sure!

He had to be told 'why' often, as he didn't think sometimes before he wanted to act!

Luckily, down his generation, there was someone that did stand out to his friends, both the old and the new...

The Sollace royal heir that he choice was already mature, into his sixties, but he had been a favourite because he thought of others and One thought that would be good for the growing Shifter existence.

Upon telling theories to his successor, about how to bring about a good and stabilized future to the Shifters, One then had one more thing to do before he finally passed away…And that was to produce a great amount of money.

At first, the Shifters being a secret hadn’t been foremost in their minds, as they didn’t really interact with them anyway but, through obtaining money, One found that their existence can bring harm and other problems, so…He had to not only quickly fix their secret from becoming more known, but also make a rule about it, a law…

After that, One finally took his last breath in that life and he can only fill in the time that he had been gone with the memories of the Elementalist’s.

Speaking had changed slightly, but even that had been easily learnt by One, also, what had changed was that of the packs. When he had left, his successor and him had come up with a few ideas and it looked like this one was the one that his successor had picked.

It seems to have worked…

The problem was, One knew, was the timing of his return. War had descended upon the Shifters and now he wasn’t able to see how the packs work personally!

Sighing, One knew that he had quite a substantial amount to fix!

Looking around at the unfamiliar room, One showed a rare sadness, before walking out…He missed her.

He didn’t think that he will find another quite like her.

Being reborn didn’t give him false hope to find another that could share her life with him…No, he will be busy for a while anyway, so he can think about that later!

***