Leonardo

A month later……

Father had declared that the pack wouldn't be handed to us unless we found Maya and our heir—that wasn't an issue. At this point in my life, I didn't care about anything else. I only wanted to get back to my Maya and pull her into my arms, begging her for forgiveness. I’d give everything away to get her back.

But she was far away….

That night, when we got the letter, I didn't have the courage to read it then, and I still didn't and perhaps never would. I didn't know how I was supposed to just read it when I knew that every fucking word would only make me feel the pain she'd endured because of me and Max. Of course, we'd messed up, but we had been blind—or maybe we chose to be. Still, none of that justified our actions and our treatment towards her.

She didn’t deserve any of that.. Any of the pain at all. 

"We have thought so wrongly of her, Leo," Max sighed, burying his face in his hands, his words trembling. "She wasn't like her mother at all. The whole time she was telling us the truth, begging us to believe her and just listen to her for once but…. we just ignored all her pleas. We ruined her just because someone else has ruined our lives once…..she was never at fault. She was innocent.”

"Why are you talking in the past tense? It's as if we'd never get to meet her again," I hissed. "We'll find her, alright? I've sent messages to all the packs. They'll help us track her down."

"And what would we get from that, huh?" He let out a bitter chuckle. "Nothing. After what we've done, she'd never accept us. She probably thinks that we'd also want to kill our child, so she'll try her best to avoid us and she should actually, what have we even done to deserve her? We don’t even deserve to be near her shadow.”

He was right...

She'd definitely think like that, and of course, why wouldn't she? We were the ones who'd given her reasons to do so, not just one, in fact, many. Enough to make her never think, not even in her dreams or nightmares, of ever coming back to us.

"I can't live without her, not when I know that she'd forever believe us to be her culprits," I let out, growing restless. "Even if she does not come back or wants to see our faces, I want to beg for her forgiveness. I will fucking beg and do everything I can to make her believe that we have realized our mistakes and we truly regret what we have done.”

“And you think she’ll forgive us?” 

"Doesn't matter. Even if she doesn't, I still want to do it. She deserves it for everything she bore without a word. How could we be so blind, Max? We had our doubts, yet we decided to overlook everything just for the sake of our revenge. We had questions, didn't we? Why didn't we listen to our hearts? Why couldn't we see that she's innocent?" The words left my mouth, each one trembling. "That night she came to tell us that her mother was the killer, it's clear as day now, and what did we do? We wiped out the last few chances we had to make things right. We fucked up. Mom wouldn't even want to see our faces. What are we going to do now?! Morgana is going to be executed anyway, but what we have lost, how do you suggest we get it back? Can we ever get it back?”

"I don't fucking know! I don't know!" He growled. "I am as ashamed of myself as you are right now, Leo, but mindlessly searching for her won't fucking fix it. We have to consider if she is going to accept us or even want to see our faces. What if she decides to take some drastic action upon seeing us? She has said that she'd hurt herself, hasn't she? We can’t risk it!” 

Fuck, he was right, and I hated the fact that he was.

"So what do you want to say? We won't search for her? We don't even know if she's safe or not!"

"She is safe! She may have rejected us, but we can still feel her, can't we? She is alive. A severed bond doesn't mean that she is not ours; she is ours, and forever will be. Of course, we will search for her, but let things settle for a while. Let her live her freedom for a while, let her have a taste of the life she has chosen. We will search, and I am not saying that we are going to delay it, but even if we happen to find her, I need your promise that you won't rush things."

"I too don't want to rush things, Max. I need time as well, at least to gather the strength to be able to face her when we meet her," I sighed. "So you don't have to worry about me. But we are finding her, and we won't fucking give up, even if it takes years."

"Even if it takes eternity, I am not going to give up, Leonardo," he stood up. "But we have to be strong ourselves because it's a tough journey. We might, and... might not find her. So don't get your hopes up. If we find her, we'll do everything to earn her forgiveness, and if we don't, then... we'd consider this our punishment for the sins we've committed and keep searching for her for the rest of our lives. But there will be no other woman anymore—it'd be either her or none."

"Yes, either her or none."