Before they woke Hades up, Freyja had removed all the charms and runes, keeping her true self hidden. In addition, she made sure the potion from Josephine has worn off and has cleansed herself of the lotions masking her scent. When they initially met, she was so well hidden that even Seth couldn't sense she was their mate, but now everything was clear.
"Why?" Hades asked, surprising all of them.
"Why, what?" Freyja asked, trying to figure what he meant.
"Why would you hide?" Hades asked again, his voice laced with hurt.
"Because I had to," Freyja said, shrugging her shoulders.
"Would you have ever told me if I hadn't seen you back there?" Hades asked, looking into her eyes. He felt so hurt by her gesture. If he wasn't there to see her, he wondered if she would've left him to think he doesn't have a mate.
"Not sure, I thought of rejecting you, though," Freyja said truthfully.
When he heard her say that, he felt his chest tightening, and he couldn't breathe for a second. Not only she hid it from him, but she thought of rejecting him too. How could she be so cruel? Rejecting your mate hurts the person rejecting, but the rejected one as well. It was a horrible pain to endure, leaving you hollow inside. She was ready to make him go through that without even telling him a reason, and he could only despise her for that now.
"What stopped you?" Hades asked with a bitter voice.
"Look, I know it sounds cruel, but hear me out," Freyja said, closing the distance between them.
Now she was standing right in front of him, and it drove him crazy. While part of him wanted to kiss her, another wanted to rip her apart. He never felt so conflicted.
"I will tell you everything, and you can decide for yourself what to do after, but first I want to remove the restraints, and so you have to promise to hear me out until the end," Freyja said in a low voice.
Hades nodded in response, and she removed the restraints from his arms. After she did that, she pointed to a chair to take a seat, and she revealed everything to him. Or everything the boys and her agreed to reveal when drawing their plan. Despite telling him about her parent's death, she never mentioned being a murder or the culprit. Instead, she portrayed it exactly as Arawn, Hades's father, has described it to everyone, an unfortunate car crash. In addition, she used Josephine's coven as her reason for staying hidden and not revealing herself to anyone, explaining how they ordered her death before she was born.
"Now you tell me, isn't this too much to ask, even for a mate?" Freyja asked when she finished revealing the story to him.
After hearing her story, Hades fell silent. As he suspected before, she was trying to protect him so he couldn't despise her anymore. Now, rage filled his body against the witches who wanted her dead and have put her through so much. Suddenly, he pulled her into his warm embrace.
"I will make this right," Hades said, determination filling his eyes.
"What do you mean?" Freyja asked.
"I will let everyone know who you are, and we will hunt those witches down," he said sternly, a murderous look glazed over his face.
"Great, another kill-now-think-later idiot added to the group!" Aris said, throwing his arms in the air, mocking them.
"And who are you again?" Hades asked, annoyed by his comment.
"The voice of reason," Aris said, smirking.
"Don't mind, Aris. He is always acting smart," Axel said, punching Aris's arm lightly.
"He is usually right, though, and he is definitely right now," Ace said before letting out a small yawn.
"I agree with Ace," Blade added.
"They are right. You can't tell anyone for now," Freyja said, looking straight into Hades's eyes.
After saying that, she explained why he needed to keep quiet about her. Now that all the supernatural world knew of her existence, not only would the witches' coven be after her, but every other being afraid of her would try to hunt her down. So the longer she stays hidden, and they have no clue who she is, the better. At her words, Hades recalled how back at Crimson Pack, there were a bunch of Alphas dying to know who she was, and while some would support her, some would die trying to kill her, so he agreed with them.
"So, what is your plan?" Hades asked, looking at all of them.
"Our plan, um, we don't have one," Freyja said, shrugging.
That was a half-lie. They had a plan, but not one she could share, as it also involved her revenge.
"Well, you should make one, darling. You can't hide forever, and I don't plan on leaving in hiding with my mate," Hades said, smirking cockily at her.
His cheeky remark made her blush a little, and he caught that.
"Oh, so she is shy now," he added, amused.
Because of the late hour, Hades left for Crimson Moon, dreading the meeting he knew awaits him. He will have to pretend he is unaware of anything and lead them astray if they come close to the truth. He doubted that any of them would, as no one knew of her identity.
When he arrived at Crimson Moon, the hoard of angry alphas immediately met him because he was late. While giving them a random excuse for his late arrival, he excused himself to change and told them he will be in the meeting room in a couple of minutes.
As soon as he stepped into the meeting room, the Alphas resumed the debates from the other day. With even more alphas pleading their cases and scoffing at the accusation made towards them and the former alphas. While the entire room was beaming with their voices and heated debates, Hades and Rhys, Moonlight Desire's Alpha, were the only quiet ones.
"Instead of suspecting ourselves, shouldn't we suspect the ones that have stood quiet until now?" one Alpha said, routing all the attention to the two who hadn't said a word since the meeting started.
"I have nothing to say," Rhys said dismissively. The whole discussion bored him.
"It's pretty obvious I'm not the one who hid anything, and neither is my father," Hades said calmly.
In fact, Hades's answer was truthful. He was an only child, so his father couldn't have lied about his Luna, and Hades was too young and unmated to have a child that would be old enough to display that type of power.
While the others didn't like Hades' attitude, they had to agree with that. Rhys, on the other hand, became the primary suspect. They all hovered over him, now suspecting he was hiding something. Finally, after about an hour of questioning, they gave up and left Rhys alone, even if he was hiding something he was impossible to deal with, and they couldn't get anything out of him.
"Hold on, wasn't the former Luna of Crimson Moon from the alpha bloodline in Moonlight Desire?" one of the older Alphas asked.
At the mention of that, both Hades and Rhys froze, their bodies tensed, and their hands tightened into fists.
"My mother was born in Crimson Moon," Hades said, feigning ignorance.
"Not your mother. The one before her," the same Alpha said.
"Yeah, and I believe they had a girl," another Alpha said.