Without looking away from his mate, Glen, who had moved his hands to place them on either side of Eden\'s face, rubbed his thumbs on the soft cheeks. The younger man\'s gaze was dull, lost in the void. The alpha sighed and turned to the other persons in the room.

"I\'m sorry to ask you this, but can you leave us alone for a moment?"

Seeing the way the omega was acting made Connor tense. He knew something was wrong and the young werewolf\'s strange behavior was due to something he was in his system.

The agent had already noticed the way the omega seemed to stare into space every time he checked this system he had told them about. He guessed that the news were far from good. Disturbing enough to bring down the blond who hadn\'t shown a single sign of defeat even when they talked about the deadly countdown that weighed on Glen\'s life, or at the very beginning when they had no other clue than their intuition.

Connor imperceptibly clenched the fingers that rested around his bicep and calmed down. For now, all he could do was wait and give them room. He turned to the Soul Healer and uncrossed his arms to put a hand on her shoulder.

"Let\'s go, Oldie."

The old werewolf tore her eyes from the scene she was trying in vain to understand and turned to the agent who nodded to make her understand that it was better to leave Glen and Eden as soon as possible. The Elder got up and followed Connor who was already walking towards the front door which he opened without waiting. The three Skinwalkers eventually got up leaving the couple alone.

Elias strode through the doorway as the agent was stretching, cracking his back with a grunt of satisfaction.

"Can\'t wait to be out of this place," he grumbled to himself but the leader heard him and shouted.

"Do you intend to leave the village?"

Connor turned to him and looked him up and down as if the man just asked for the most obvious thing in the world.

"And why wouldn\'t I leave? I said it before, I only came here for Glen. If his business here is over, so is mine. It\'s that trivial."

"Yes, but…"

"But?" Connor turned and shoved the knife he had drawn into the wood in the porch railing.

Elias paused, surprised by the gesture which was a threat. He looked at the knife, then at the man whose fingers were curled around the handle as if it were a natural extension. The leader swallowed but didn\'t back away.

"You are a Skinwalker."

"And? Being one has never brought anything to my life since I was born," He stated in a dispassionate voice. "I must admit that when I learned that I was different, I had the curiosity to learn about myself…"

"So why not…"

"Given the shitty attitude you and your daughter have shown towards me, my craving died very quickly."

The man\'s fists clenched and he gritted his teeth as he stared at Connor, still seething with anger.

"I know we didn\'t welcome you with open arms, but maybe if you spent some time together with Alana... She would teach you all there is to know about Skinwalkers. After all, it would be a good thing for you because you are close in age so…"

"Wow, it didn\'t take long! Already offering your daughter as a sacrifice to a stranger you seem to viscerally hate, all to keep a power you don\'t need."

This time, Elias struggled to maintain his composure. He was already striding towards Connor to grab him by the collar when his wife and the old werewolf blocked his way. The agent sneered as he saw the man seething in anger.

"Who are you to say such things? Our powers were given to us by the Moon Goddess herself. You speak with arrogance when you know absolutely nothing! You, outsider!"

"Yeah, the same outsider you nonchalantly tried to match your daughter with! And I\'m the bad one?"

"That\'s not what I…"

Connor dismissively waved his hand to shut the man who started struggling to escape his wife and the old werewolf\'s grips.

"Don\'t take me for a fool old man. I\'ve seen how you look at me as a threat since I set foot here when I don\'t give a shit for your village and your little place as chief.

I also heard perfectly what you said to Glen and how he put you right back at your place. A very pleasant sight. You are ready to do anything just to keep your power when it no longer has a reason to be the day you decided to separate from the werewolves."

"You\'re wrong!" Alana cried out in defense of her father and her tribe.

"Yes? How so? I heard perfectly everything you said about your ability to turn into a wolf. I also understood very well why you decided to separate from the werewolves. Very noble indeed to erase your shared history from memories to protect them, but why not go all the way? If that was all that drove you, why not let your power die over time?

If the enemies were attacking you hoping to take over your ability, why not let the power fade away since you had cut off all contact with the werewolves anyway?"

"You talk like Light the cursed witch."

Connor shrugged, unfazed, at the statement that was supposed to insult him.

"She at least had constancy even in her madness, which not everyone here has." He smirked at Elias and this time, Alana joined the other two women in shackling her father.

"You son of…"

"Watch your mouth! Anyway, I have no intention of lingering here so you better give up."

He removed the cinquedea stuck in the wood with a gesture and put it back in its case before turning on his heels. He was already walking away when Alana\'s voice rose.

"You care about him, don\'t you? The Warrior, I mean your friend, Glen. You told us you think of him as your brother. You feel close to him and you are ready to fight for him. To the point of coming to this place and putting up with our presence when, from the beginning, we were rude and hostile towards you." She lowered her head as she said her last words.

"So you know you were wrong after all." Connor had stopped and answered without looking back.

"The blessing is not just our ability to turn into wolves. Our aura, this energy that flows into us from birth, also pushes us towards the werewolves, that\'s probably why you…"

"I got nothing to do with you all." Connor felt a fury that made his whole body shake and had a hard time controlling himself not to explode. "Let me guess, are you trying to make me believe you\'re doing this because you don\'t want to give up on your connection to the werewolves? And of course, this attachment is an effect of the blessing? So if I care about Glen so much it\'s because I\'m like you? Bullshit! Sorry, it doesn\'t work. We are nothing alike at all.

That\'s total crap because I know that my affection and care for Glen is not the product of a blessing granted by any Goddess.

The proof is that I lived with another person who didn\'t have any Skinwalker blood running through her veins, and she had as much, if not more, affection for Glen than I do.

A person who tried to fight with her bare hands with an alpha when she was never able to open a jar of jam on her own.

She is the one who by dint of patience and love managed to get Glen out of the fortress where he had shut himself away after Alpha Carter, his father, tried to poison him with his toxin. If there is one person who has influenced the affection I have for Glen, it\'s probably her and no one else.

You dare to compare the bonds that I have created, those that my family has created with Glen with your interest soiled by greed?" Connor sneered. "Don\'t insult me. It would hurt me to have something in common with you."

He walked away leaving the Skinwalkers and the Soul Healer who watched the silhouette of the man disappear into the night.

The agent shoved his hands in his coat\'s pockets and ran away from the house as quickly as possible. He took the direction of the nearby forest and plunged through the trees.

The emotions made his heart throb painfully in his chest and his throat constricted, making it impossible to swallow the lump that had formed there.

Without thinking, he pulled out his phone, which he stuck to his ear after unlocking and making a call. He heard several tones and after a moment, a click. His heart skipped a beat when he heard the voice on the other side of the phone.

"Connor?"

Greg\'s voice sounded surprised. He didn\'t look like he\'d been awake, but he didn\'t expect to get a phone call from the man he\'d let go a few hours earlier.

"I almost waited." The agent said in a small voice.

"What happened? It\'s not like you to call me." A sound of broken glass sounded in the distance and the man pushed the receiver away. After a moment, Greg was back on the phone and he heard a faint sniffle.

"Hey…you worry me. What happened?" His voice had softened and Connor could feel all his concern even through the phone. The feeling warmed his heart.

"It\'s nothing. I\'m just...I miss you." Greg was silent for a brief moment, once again startled by the sudden honesty of the man who had accustomed him to an independent cat behavior.

"Yes, I miss you too, Sweetheart." His voice answered softly and Connor squeezed the device between his fingers.

Another sound of glass pierced his eardrum and Connor chuckled as he heard the man sigh.

"What are you doing at this time of the night? Your neighbor will be pissed. He always makes a fuss every time I spend the night."

"That\'s because you\'re very loud…" Greg said in a slightly suggestive voice before picking himself up. "I\'m not at home and it\'s not me, but my clumsy assistant who seems pretty useless when it comes to everything which is not lab related. He explained with another sigh.

"What are you doing at work? It\'s almost... It\'s past midnight! I thought you took a leave."

"I did but I had to come back to take care of some business. I was busy with emergency meetings with the leaders and now here I am in the middle of the night trying…"

Noises of broken glass interrupted them and Greg sighed this time deeply annoyed.

"I think I should let you take care of your assistant before he destroys your lab." Connor chuckled.

"Yeah, you\'re probably right. So, goodbye I guess?"

"Hm, goodbye."

________

Inside, Glen had managed to calm his mate down. He moved his forehead away from that of the blond\'s to observe him for a moment.

"I don\'t understand where we went wrong. I thought we would have saved some time or that the countdown would be paused. What did we miss and why can we no longer access information about your curse?"

He leaned on the back of the chair and lifted his legs to put them against his chest before wrapping his arms around his knees.

The omega was no longer emitting pheromones of distress thanks to his dominant\'s reassurance, but he was barely able to hold back the tears that were still threatening to start flowing.

Glen sat down on the arm of the armchair and put his arm on Eden\'s shoulders, who instinctively came to snuggle up against him.

"We will find something. I\'m sure we\'ll find an explanation, but Eden...?"

The blond didn\'t answer and remained glued to his side.

"Eden, do you still want me to mark you at the next full moon? I mean with what we just learned, if you ever prefer to wait until we get rid of the witch, I would understand. I know what happens to a marked omega who loses his mate." The warmth of the young man\'s body huddled against Glen was abruptly replaced by the same coldness that filled the rest of the room, when he peeled himself off, upset. He was silent for a moment to calm himself down, then finally spoke.

"I want it. I want you to mark me… If we could go straight to mating, that would be perfect." A timid smile curved his lips as he peeked at Glen\'s reaction.

"Nice try.." The alpha chortled.