Eighty four (FINALE)

Olamide walked out of the Crimson lane house unscathed. Witches and warlocks from the Primrose coven gathered around the house with the sole aim of retrieving Yasmin Maplewood. Olamide locked her arms with her brother as the Primrose coven witches surrounded them. Yasmin didn't resist arrest. Jason handed her over to the eldest member and watched as the aged warlock slapped handcuffs engraved with various sigils to Yasmin's open hands. The sigils glowed brilliant green as they clasped shut.

"What happens to her?" Jason demanded.

"She will be tried by the high courts. Her powers will be stripped and she will be jailed for a very long time. I can however assure you that Ginger Maplewood will not know the pain of losing her mother. The Primrose coven will do its best to protect her."

Olamide's eyes drifted from the conversing supernaturals. Far from where she stood, She noticed Sofiane walking towards an almost totaled car. In his hands was the limp body of David Blossom.

"I need to see him," Olamide notified her brother right before breaking their locked embrace. The final words Candice implored her to tell the broken-hearted Alpha burdened her heart and she was not even sure how she was going to go about it.

"Hey," She called on Sofiane as he placed David in the passenger seat and shut the door.

"Hey." He returned.

"I apologize for your loss." I began. "It might not have been your fight but I appreciate it."

"I did it for my mate." Sofiane maintained. "She is dead. Isn't she?"

Olamide gulped hearing him declare the words. It was the icebreaker she needed. Yet, the tension didn't seem to depreciate."How..."

"When I tried getting back into the room, I felt her presence fade. Just like it had done before. I feel worthless. I couldn't save her the first time. I couldn't do it the second time too. This time, I lost more than a mate. I lost a brother because I was selfish and a fucking refuce."

Olamide could tell he blamed himself. For both Blossom siblings demise but that could not be any more false. "I don't think what you did was selfish. You saved my life and others whether it was intended or not and even if you were selfish about it, Candice loved you till death."

"You don't know that." Sofiane sobbed.

"I do know," Olamide promised. She knew what tortured him. Candice had still been thriving within her when her brother was murdered. It wasn't a farfetched theory but Olamide believed that David's death was the deal-breaker. "I assure you that her brother's death was not what broke her. Candice Blossom was your mate. You knew her. I dare say even more than me. She was just like you. A stubborn witch and a fucking refuce. She once looked death in the eye and gave it the middle finger. Do you think her brother's death would have been enough to leave her in the dust?"

"Then why did she leave?"

"Because David was a tether to this plane. If the cards had been dealt differently, perhaps your mate might still be alive but Candice doesn't want you to cry for her sake. We talked in her final moments and she asked me to tell you that she loves you. And she truly did. Toll death. She would not want you to blame yourself. She would have craved that you fought for your happiness. Even if it is just semblance of it."

"I don't think I can," Sofiane confessed right before he dropped the brave facade, and tears spilled down his char-smeared cheeks.

“I understand.” Olamide hugged him to her as his sobs grew stronger. "More than you know. Some days will be hard. Several will be even heavier. But you have to remember that nothing, not even the pain lasts forever and unbearable as the grief can be, if you keep putting one foot in front of the other. You will eventually get to the end. Living will get a little better and soon enough, you'll be able to glimpse into the memories you shared with your mate without bursting into tears."

Sofiane shook his head, pulling away from the embrace at the last minute. He wiped the tears that dribbled down his cheeks; a foul mixture of ash and blood. “Thank you.”

Olamide stood and watched Sofiane enter his vehicle and start the engine. He spared Olamide a pained yet grateful smile as he stepped on the acceleration paddle. Olamide remained where she stood watching the car disappear into the distance. Deji walked up to her and lent her a much-needed platonic embrace.

"Are you alright?" He asked.

"I will be," Olamide promised and she meant it. She was done having to pick up the pieces of her life. Being in the state of divinity, as short as it might have been had opened her eyes to a lot of things. This world was a twisted little game. One she now had an upper hand against. Olamide had been destined for death but by the crimson threads in her blood, fate had mapped out an appropriate future for her. One where she did not have to suffer so much.

The primrose coven dispersed and soon after, envoys with the crow crest arrived. Deji helped his sister down to the caravan of the cars where Jason stood. Satake was wheeled in a stretcher to one of the cars while Jason walked up to his mate.

“Are you alright?” Jason asked Olamide, sparing his spontaneous brother-in-law a curious look.

“I have found peace in a lot of ways,” Olamide replied. "Of course, I am okay."

Outside the demolishing house in Crimson lane, the trio made their way toward a waiting car with burning confidence in their hearts.

***

They dropped Satake off at the pack's sanitarium. Deji chose to drop by at their old apartment. In his words, he wanted to connect to his past before his rebirth. He had however promised his sister he would drop by from time to time. There was a bit of an unnerving stillness between Jason and Deji but they both chose to be better men. Jason understood the grudge his vampire brother-in-law had against him and Deji acknowledged in his heart that his sister was much safer in the hands of her werewolf lover.

Jason drove Olamide to the De'crescent hotel. When they reached their room, Olamide collapsed into the tidy white sheets that covered the master bed not minding that her entire body was covered with blood that was not her own and ash borne from Lilith's flesh. Jason retired into the bathroom for a few minutes and returned soon after with nothing but a towel wrapped around his hips. Olamide noticed new scars riddled his body. They were a reminder of the battle they had just fought.

"Why didn't you reject me?" Olamide was compelled to ask.

"W–hat?" Jason stuttered, certainly disturbed by the nature of Olamide's question.

"Why didn't you reject me?" Olamide repeated. She could tell her mate's heart skipped a beat. Jason was panicking.

"Why do you ask?"

"During the ritual, as I bonded with your mind, I got to know that you could have rejected me the night we met. It was your well-kept secret because if you had not taken me that night your brother held me captive, I might have died. What convinced you?"

"I don't remember. " Jason lied, forgetting his mind link was clear and free for her to peek into. Olamide caught on his falsehood.

"That was a lie. Your heart is literally singing."

Jason sighed in frustration and looked his mate in the eye. There was no point keeping it a secret anymore. "I did want to reject you," Jason confessed. "But my brother would not have hesitated to finish you off if I had rejected you. But if I am being honest, a part of me wanted no part in renouncing you. My wolf had been alone for so long that it was elated to finally have its mate in his life. Despite my fears of losing you to my enemies or you turning out to be a worse variant of Candice Blossom, I couldn't keep myself away from you. It was a battle I lost every day. My whole world almost shattered when you were taken away from me and I could have sworn by the moon goddess that that accursed prophecy from the eye of Cassandra could have become a reality if I had lost you."

Olamide smiled. "And what if none of this is real?" She questioned. "What if this is just the attribute within me ensuring that I latch on to you to remain safe?"

Jason leaned in for a kiss. "Do I look like I care?" He whispered into his mate's ear.

"Not really," Olamide admitted, accepting the kiss. They swatted saliva and secrets as their tongues glided in chaotic harmony.

Jason deftly undressed his mate and led hee into the bathroom where they showered together.

They made slow, peaceful love under the fall of warm water. She didn’t want to think about what had happened in Crimson lane. And pressing her fingers over Jason’s skin, tracing the dark deep scars, and following that path with her tongue was a distraction she needed.

As the two of them came, their mouths together and their gasps muted by the connection, she hugged him tightly about the neck as he pumped inside her. “I love you,” she managed through cries of rippling orgasms

“You made me believe in love,” he said. “And if that isn’t magic, I don’t know what is.”

Jason was not the only one who found peace in this formerly shaky alliance. Olamide had gone from being his captive to accepting her destiny as Luna of the Crow pack. No matter the travails that followed suit. She had found her brother and she had found peace in the violence of grief. If that wasn't mystic, Olamide couldn't rack her head to understand what it could be.

THE END...OR IS IT?