"What is this full moon called?" Ayla asked while we were on our way to the clearing. "Winter Moon." I answered. She smiled.

"Another nice name." I hummed in agreement. We were in our wolf form, carrying a big rabbit we had hunted. It was an old tradition long forgotten, but I had read about it. After the first shift on the next full moon bring the alpha fresh caught prey to show the pack that you will be a valuable pack member. I didn't care about that, I wanted to leave the pack anyway, but Ayla wanted to make a good first impression on the other wolves, so here we were, carrying fresh prey

I arrived at the clearing. After shifting behind the trees and putting on some clothes I let Ayla bring the prey to the alpha. She happily told him about the tradition and he just as happily accepted it. I think this was the first time I made a good impression on someone in a very long time. It felt kinda good. I was so lost in thought that I hadn't noticed James approaching us.

"Mate!" Ayla yelled in my head. I turned around and looked at James. It is hard for me to describe the feelings I felt at that moment, but I could feel something in me break as my hope shattered. Probably because of my distress Ayla didn't jump and hugged our mate although she could have easily done so.

"Mate" he whispered. His voice made me want to throw up. This had to be a bad joke. What had I done to the moon goddess to deserve that?

"Muru, what do we say?" Ayla sounded panicked. I could feel her wanting to say 'this is our mate in front of us, what is wrong with you? Why aren't you happy?' but she didn't and I was grateful for that.

"Give me some time" I finally said and went over to the food. "We'll talk later, Ayla okay?" I told my wolf. She nodded. "Let's just get through the evening, then I will explain everything to you."

The evening went agonizingly slow. As soon as it was socially acceptable we left the party and went back deep into the forest.

I sat down under an old oak and explained everything to Ayla. Now that we couldn't leave the pack, now that we would be the future luna I had to come clean to her completely and so I did. At the end Ayla was crying.

"What are we going to do now? Do you want to reject him?"

I could hear the fear in her voice. Fear of me rejecting her mate.

"No. Can you handle a few months without him?" I asked. She nodded.

"But why?"

"I need a little distance from everything, time to think and therapy so we can make that shit work." I sighed.

"So you are not going to reject him and instead work on our issues so we can be with him?" The hope in her voice killed me and made the broken shards of my hopes and dreams dig deeper into my heart. But how could I ever reject her mate? How could I be willing to hurt her just for something as worthless as myself?

"Yes, I will work on the issues or find some solution that'll work for us." I promised. I could feel her relief.

"Then let's go and do that! The faster the better!"

I nodded and together we made our way back.