It sounded absurd but after he saw that she was serious, he could not help but believe what she said. Ever since he was rescued, everything around him seemed to be not normal anymore. Every belief and knowledge he had was all rendered useless and meaningless in the face of these mythical creatures.
"Am I going to die?" strangely he was not bothered by that or maybe he got used to it after the first time that he almost died.
"You're not going to die. I will make sure that you will stay alive," she wanted to continue but she could not because if he dies, she might go crazy.
"Why?" he looked her in the eyes. "Why do you want me to stay alive? Why are you concerned of me? I have been wondering about this for a long time now and I wanted to know the reason behind your concern, your soft gaze, your smile and even the reason why you were flirting with me these past few days?"
The barrage of questions caused the Alpha to froze. She did not know how to answer all of these questions. 'You know, you just refuse to tell him the reason. You could just tell him directly and be true to him, that way our lives will be easier.' Her wolf finally spoke after staying silent.
"It's a bit complicated but you need to know that the desire within me to get to know you more is real. It might have been influence by some force but I myself genuinely want to know you better." It was a shaky start for her that her voice shook for a bit while saying all of it as she took another deep breath.
Xander raised his hand and placed it on his chest only to feel his wildly beating heart. He did not understand why he suddenly felt excited and nervous at the same time. He retracted his hand while Amber watched this with a slight smile on her face.
She could feel it too, his nervousness and even the beating of his heart, she could hear it. That was new, it must have been the effect of the mark and this relieved her because she knew that he was being affected by the bond that had slightly tightened because of the mark she gave him. Everything she told him was true, the bond might have driven her at first but the more she looked at him and spoke with him, she realized that she did enjoy those moments.
"Xander, you are my mate." She just said it without any warnings.
His head snapped at her direction after hearing those words, even though he did not understand what those words mean, he could still feel the weight of it. 'Mate' it was a familiar but at the same time a foreign word to him right now.
Amber saw the look of shock on his face and how his eyebrows furrowed after his initial reaction. She saw how his mouth thinned and how his fists clenched even the confusion in his eyes cannot be hidden from her.
"Mate, what do you mean by that?" he was nervous. He could feel the sweat trickling down his back after those words were said. He instinctively knew that that word meant something big based on how she was reluctant to tell him at first.
The Alpha avoided his gaze and instead looked at the wall in front of her. "It is a word we use to describe a werewolf's fated one. For every werewolf, there will only be one mate their entire life, unless the Luna makes an exception and gives a werewolf a second chance mate but that rarely happens."
Xander stiffened after hearing what she said. He was right and now he did not know how he should react so instead he remained silent and looked at his hands. The concept of 'mate' did not exist in his world and now that someone was saying that he was her mate, he did not know how to respond.
If this was said when he didn't know about the existence of werewolves, he might have just laughed it off as a joke because in the very first place he did not believe in the supernatural. They were only fairytales and stories to scare children or a very rich source of material for novels. He would have already run if he could but now that he had stayed with them, he was a bit conflicted.
He could only sigh then clenched and unclenched his fists. It seems that all he had been feeling these past few days were all in conflict. "Can you tell me more about it because right now, I don't know how to respond. For now, I just want to listen to you."
The sentence was spoken softly that it looked like he had been defeated. Amber only closed her eyes for a moment before opening them again. She wanted to look at him but she could not so she continued.
"When I turned eighteen, I was excited to meet my mate but as the days passed by that he did not appear I was discouraged. That's why even though I am a werewolf, I don't have any experience about having this kind of relationship. All of my knowledge about mates came from books or from what I had seen from my pack members who had found theirs." She stopped talking for a moment to take a deep breath before she continued. "When I saw you, many things had changed," she let out a laugh, "I was a mess and clumsy that I don't know what am I supposed to do and I even did some things that made you mad which I apologize."
"Haah," he rubbed his face and massaged his head. "I'm not sure, I have never been in a relationship either and have not seriously fallen in love. It would be a little bit difficult for me to accept that concept of yours."
Amber nodded without looking at him, "We are both new to this then. The only difference is that I am a werewolf and you are a human. This pairing rarely happens and I hope that you'll be able to accept us being mates."
Xander did not answer as both of them fell silent before he asked another question, "How are you so sure that I am your mate when you don't even know who I am?"
"Everything starts with a scent, you smelled like the scent of the sacred flower, sweet and fragrant. That's how I knew that you were my mate because I was the only one who could smell it at that time." She became a bit bashful but she hid her face and decided not to tell him what had transpired when they saved him.
He lifted his hands and smelled himself but he was not able to smell anything, "Do I still smell like that now?"
Amber slowly nodded her head, "Yes, you still smell like the silver moon flower."
That was very new to him, for her to be able to give a label to his scent while he was clueless about it. He guessed that it must have been a werewolf thing so he did not respond and just accepted it as it is.
'Tell him about the mate bond,' her wolf pitched after remaining silent throughout their conversation. 'We need to tell him about it so that he would not misunderstand us.'
"Ah yes, my wolf reminded me of something. With werewolves finding their mates comes the mate bond. Which I think you had already experienced in the past." Strangely, Amber felt a little bit embarrassed when she told him about her observation.
Xander shifted in bed and angled his body to be slightly facing Amber who refused to look at him ever since they started this talk. A memory also flashed in his mind when he heard her, "Is that the reason why I felt strangely attracted to you the first time I saw you even though you were practically a stranger to me?"
"Yes, that must have been the mate bond. Although it will not affect you in a way like it does with us. The mate bond can cause us to be protective of our mates to the point that some would become possessive, especially with alphas." She answered without hesitation this time.
"Is that the reason why you are so concern about me and that you can't let me leave?" She gasped in surprise at the sudden question from the man that she could not stop herself from facing him only to see a grin on his face.
She could feel her face heating up after seeing the handsome grin on his face. "You can't blame me!" she turned her face away with a frown while Xander was left with wide eyes.
He was surprised at the expression showed by the Alpha, whom he had only seen to scowl, frown or smile, he was not expecting her to blush like that. "I guess you're also like any other women who would turn red whenever their crushes pass by."
"What?" she once again faced him but this time she was glaring at him, "did you think that I can't be like the other girls out there?"
"That's not what I mean, it's just that I have never seen you with that kind of expression ever since I was here. But you looked really beautiful…" he had a smile on his face which made him appear to be shining in the eyes of Amber.
She looked on the side and sighed, "Well that's normal since I am a woman even though I have a masculine role in this pack."
"That's good, at least there is something normal about you," he softly laughed.
"Of course, we are, since we have our human side. We are like any other human out there with regards to any other aspect the only difference is that we transform into wolves," her answer was full of confidence because she did not like others to be calling them beasts or monsters.