The Elemental Mate

Xander POV

“Are you okay?” I ask her as I cup her face in my hands.

She nods in reply as I wipe a stare tear that had fallen from her cheek, “Thank you for showing me all of that.”

I smile at her before she leans closer to leave a soft kiss on my lips. We stayed connected for a moment before she pulled back again.

“So how do we go into my mind?” she questions.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” I ask her, seeing the hesitation on her face as I continue to hold her close to me.

She takes a second to think before answering me, “You told me our bond won’t be complete until we both go through the sharing. You trusted me with your past. I want to trust you with mine.”

I nod my head, “Alright,” I lift her hand to mirror my actions from earlier, “Imagine there is a door into your mind. Once you see it, all you have to do is open the door and let me in.”

I watched her shut her eyes as she did what I said. Closing my eyes, I reached to her mind to see the solid door. Waiting for a moment, nothing happened.

I could feel her uneasiness and nervousness course through me as I laid my hand gently against the wooden door.

It’s okay. Let me in, sweetheart, I call out to her mind, Just let me in.

Feeling a shift in her, I looked down and watched the handle of the door twist open. The door opened slowly to reveal Aurora standing hesitantly in the frame.

I held up my hand for her to take, “Are you ready?”

She nodded quickly, placing her delicate hand in mine before pulling slightly and walking into her mind with me following close behind.

The white light surrounded us as we pushed through her mind. I could feel the emotions of her past rush through me all at once.

I felt the movement settle as the light dissipated around us to reveal a small living room.

The space held a large chocolate-colored couch and a tv mounted in the wall playing some horror movie. There was an oversized glass coffee table in the middle of the floor which gave the room a smaller feel than what it was.

A small squeak sounded from the couch as I saw a small little girl hiding her face behind a pillow.

There was a boy on the couch with her chuckling as she shrieked again, her red hair flopping in her face to hide her.

“Which memory is this?” I asked Aurora as I continued to stare at her younger self.

“My brother and I woke up at midnight to watch The Exorcist. My parents refused to let us watch the movie, so we had to sneak downstairs to see it,” she answers me, “I was so terrified that I spent most of the movie with my head buried behind my brother for protection. That night he promised me that he would always be there to protect me.”

“That’s really sweet,” I squeeze her hand.

“He was always my hero,” she smiles up at me, before her face drops a little, “Until everything happened anyway.”

I wanted to say something in reassurance to her, but the memory started to fade away.

The white pushed through my vision as we move onto the next memory. As my eyes adjusted, I looked at my surroundings.

We seem to be in an old-style kitchen as I took notice of the yellow tiles on the wall and the checkered pattern floor. A young girl around age eight or nine sat at the table with her head in her hands as her left leg kept bouncing up and down. Her bright red hair giving away her identity immediately.

I could hear screaming down the hall and the younger Aurora stood from her seat to start pacing around the small kitchen.

“What is going on?” I turned to her.

“My mother just went into labor with my younger sister Tara,” she tells me, “I was the only one home when her water broke. I ran to a neighboring coven member for help, but when I got back, it was too late. The baby was coming.”

I watched as another woman into them. Her back was to me, so I couldn’t clearly see her face, but I noticed how she held herself with power and grace. She pushed a loose strand of blonde hair back into her bun before she spoke.

“Congrats. You have a baby sister,” the woman says as Aurora snaps her head up to the woman’s voice.

“Are they both okay?”

“They’re both alright,” she answered, “Your mother lost a lot of blood during the delivery, but I was able to perform a spell to keep her stable until she gets to the hospital.”

Aurora rushed to the woman and threw her arms around her, “Thank you so much. I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t been here,” she pulled back smiling, “Thank you, Iris.”

A shock went through me as I turned to Aurora in question, “Iris? The witch who wants you dead?” I ask.

She nodded her head, “Iris wasn’t always a bad person. Before she met Francis, she was a brilliant witch who only cared about helping the coven. She is the reason my little sister was alive. She became family after this.”

I nod in understanding as I take in the information. Iris was family and having Iris be the person who wants to kill her must feel like a betrayal.

The light surrounded us again and we shifted into a new memory.

The light dissipated as I took a look at our new surroundings. We seemed to be in a wood of tall oak trees.

I felt Aurora grip my hand tighter as a younger version of her appeared through the trees. She seemed to be laughing as she was staring at the forest floor, her concentration on finding something.

“What memory is this?” I ask her, but before she could say anything. I heard a male’s voice call her name, “Who is that?”

“My father,” she says, sadness filling her tones, “This is the day he dies.”

“How does he die?”

She swallows back her tears before she answers me, “A witch hunter. My dad and I were looking for this rare plant out in the woods near the cabin we were staying at. He was going to teach me how to perform a cloaking spell. I didn’t even see the hunter until I was on the ground.”

I heard a scream as my eyes connected with her younger self. She started to collapse as I noticed the arrow sticking into her left thigh.

We watched as her father rushed towards her before another arrow shot out, hitting him in the shoulder. I watched as a hooded figure came around the trees, stopping in front of them both.

He draws back his bow again, aiming for Aurora’s father. I watched as her father moved his hands quickly, forming a fireball. He shoots towards the hunter, hinting the man square in the chest.

The hunter releases the arrow as he collapses to his death. I watched as the arrow hit Aurora’s father right in the heart, killing him instantly.

Her hand squeezed mine tighter as I tug her closer to my body.

“He died when I was twelve, but the pain is always there,” she says quietly as we stand there, “When I think back to this day, I constantly ask myself if I could have done anything differently if I could have stopped it, but I can’t change the past.”

“We can only live with it,” I tell her, “We take the pain from our pasts and use it.”

She gives me a soft smile before the light surrounds us again and we move into her next memory.

“Where are we now?” I ask her as I notice we are standing at the bottom of a staircase.

I watched her reaction as she bit her bottom lip as she held back tears, “It’s the morning my sister died.”

She squeezed my hand tighter as another her bounced down the stairs, calling out for Tara. My heart clenched in my chest as she searched the entire first floor before checking outside.

The second she opened the door, her entire body tensed up before she screamed. The anguish ricocheted off the walls of the house. She rushed forward the body of her sister lying in the grass, but there was nothing she could do.

“I tried spells to heal her, even one to resurrect her, but it didn’t matter. Tara was gone,” Aurora tells me, before turning to face me, her eyes swimming in questions, “Why this memory?”

“What?” I ask her, confused about what she meant.

“I understand going through my first memories with my brother or when my sister was born. I even understand how my father’s death was a memory that shaped who I am, but why this one? Why do I have to relive this one and not Francis?” her voice cracking as she spoke.

“Most likely because this is the moment everything changed for you,” I try to reason, “Your sister is the reason you discover the truth about Francis, she is the reason you can stop him, and most likely this moment is the reason we won’t see what happened with Francis. Killing him affected you, but it didn’t shape who you are. Your sister’s death is the turning point that changed your life, not his.”

She nods her head as she wipes at the tears running down her face. I pull her closer to me as we watch her other self-mourn over her sister.

I would do anything to take her pain away.

But we can’t change the past, Kai reminds me as he whimpers for our mate’s loss.

I feel the light surround us again, taking us away from her suffering and into her next memory.

When the light left, we stood in the middle of a great hall. Women and men stood on the outskirts of the room, forming a circle around Aurora, who stood in the middle with her hands bound as three women sat before her.

I watched as Iris stood from her seat as she spoke.

“Where are we?” I asked Aurora as she squeezed my hand tight.

“It’s my trial,” she answers, guilt shining in her eyes.

“What do you mean trial? I thought you left your coven after Francis died.”

She shakes her head in response, “No. I murdered the head warlock. I was arrested almost immediately. It didn’t matter whether it was self-defense or not, I was tried for murder.”

I watch the scene unfold in silence as the trial begins. I watch as Aurora retells what happened and focus on Iris’s reactions. As she spoke, I watched Iris tense and get angry.

Near the end, Iris asks if Aurora regrets her actions.

“I will not apologize for what I did, and I for sure as hell will not apologize for who I am,” Aurora says with her held high.

“If you do not even regret your crimes, then I cannot give you even the benefit of the doubt. Know that I didn’t want to do this,” Iris’s smiles, “By the power of this council, I, Iris Crowther, sentence you, Aurora Wytte, to death.”

Anger filled my muscles as she spoke those words. She had no right to sentence my mate, nor does she have a right to hurt her. Iris better hope I never find her.

“Do what you must,” Aurora spoke. I couldn’t detect even a drop of fear in her voice.

A pair of guards came to her sides as they lifted her and moved her towards the pike in the center of the room. I watched as she was tied to the stake as fear over what would happen coursed through my veins.

I felt Aurora snake her other arm around mine as she pulled me back. I hadn’t even realized I had taken a step towards her past self, “You can’t change anything, Xander. Remember this already happened and I’m here with you. Just watch.”

I watched Iris move her hands as she spoke. I watched the fire spread around Aurora, but she didn’t make a sound.

“What’s happening?” I ask her as the fire starts to dwindle.

She gives me a small laugh, “I’m an Elementalist with a specialty in fire magic. Fire doesn’t burn me.”

I look at her in amazement before I hear Iris scream out in outrage. I watch as Aurora shoots a fireball of her own towards the table of head witches.

The place erupts into chaos as she bolts through the crowd and out the door.

“I escaped but Iris has been hunting me down ever since,” Aurora tells me before giving me another confused look, “Although, I’m not sure why I showed you this? This didn’t affect who I am or had some huge impact on my life.”

“I don’t know,” I tell her, a little confused about the importance myself, “Maybe it’s just a memory I needed to know about.”

“But why?”

“I don’t know,” I say again as I feel the light begin to surround us again, “But I’m guessing we’ll find out.”

The light disappeared once more as the rain beat down around us. I look around the side of the road before my eyes land on Aurora’s form in the rain.

“I could hear your car tires against the gravel,” she says softly to me as we watch her slowly lift her hand before a bolt of lightning crashed against the ground, “I called out for help and you came.”

Light invaded the area as my car pulled over to a stop on the road. I saw as I got out of the car and moved my way over to her.

“I didn’t think you would remember,” I say honestly.

She gives me a light smile before she speaks, “I don’t remember everything. The last thing I remember for sure is looking into the brightest pair of green eyes I had ever seen and telling them that I didn’t want to die.”

“I told you,” I start as I turn to look into her eyes, her soft orbs looking at me with such trust, “I will always protect you and I will never let you die.”

I felt a surge forward as I slowly leave her mind. I feel her softly shut the door behind me before I open my eyes to meet her bright blue ones staring back at me.