Refusing my Alpha mate

Clair

I hurried into the hospital with Arthur behind me, and I had been there so many times that I knew exactly where Dr Keller's room was, I just followed without even thinking and found my doctor in the hallway.

"Alpha, did something happen? What brings you here?" He asked worriedly, frowning.

"My condolences, Alpha Arthur." Keller addressed Arthur.

"Thank you, Dr Keller," Arthur said quickly but his gaze turned to me right away.

"I need the silver treatment, we just found out I was poisoned and I believe it was for a long time." I started to say and he greeted me with wide eyes.

"Alpha, what do you mean? This is something very rare and…" He started to speak but then he shook his head. "Come in here." He said opening his room and closing the door right behind us.

"I tried some tea that was for Clair and it burned me, even though the drink was cold. Then I ended up burning my fingers when I went to get the dagger for my father's ceremony, and the burning was the same. I even went to see Dr. Tyler, and Clair had all the symptoms." Arthur started to speak, Dr Keller received the information but it was as if he still wasn't convinced of it.

"It's something very rare, silver can lead to mental manipulation, but even administered in small doses, the person feels it, and even if it is offered in a hot tea, and your body gets used to it, you should still feel the burn afterward, or your body should go into a feverish state trying to expel the silver. And you should bleed a lot more than normal..." At that moment, Dr. Keller put his hand on the back of his head and took a step back.

"What?" Arthur asked scared.

"The day you brought her here, that Clair was attacked, remember I said that your tourniquet saved her life? Even though the bite was deep, she was bleeding more than normal. You know it's not normal for a wolf to get stitches, but she actually needed it…” Keller started to say, but he turned and walked to his closet.

Arthur turned to me, frowning, not understanding either.

And then Dr. Keller turned around with a bottle, and inside was a little silver stick, he put on his latex gloves and took a pair of tweezers.

"What will you do?" Arthur's question came out worried.

"Testing a theory." He responded and came with the silver toward me, Dr. Keller used his hands to pull back the sleeves of my blouse and expose the thin skin on the inside of my arm, and then he removed the silver stick with tweezers, and positioned it gently on my skin.

From what they always told me about the silver burn, I was expecting to feel pain, burning, something, but I felt nothing, absolutely nothing, it wasn't even warm.

"Do you really feel nothing?" Dr Keller's blue eyes lifted to meet mine as he asked.

"No. That shouldn't be silver anyway." I replied, furrowing my eyebrow in confusion.

"Alpha Arthur." Dr. Keller said, extending his hand to Arthur, who placed his arm there, as soon as the small stick touched the skin of his arm, Arthur let out a groan of pain, and the smoke that came out of there was visible, in addition to the slight smell of skin burned mixed with silver acid. When Dr Keller moved the stick away, the place where the silver touched Arthur's skin was dark, almost black. "That's a normal reaction."

Dr. Keller took the silver and tweezers to his cabinet, he then placed his hands on the counter and sighed heavily, it took a few seconds for him to breathe again, and open a drawer and then the refrigerator. Then he came back with an ointment and anti-silver serum. He opened the ointment and quickly rubbed it over Arthur's skin, and I could hear him sigh in relief. And then Dr. Keller gestured to the chair in front of his desk, and I sat down, and he took a rubber band to make the tourniquet and get my IV.

His expression was serious as if he was trying to understand something inside his head, trying to align his thoughts, which were very far away.

He then punctured my vein and placed the serum on a support, and when the anti-silver serum began to go down the hose and enter through the needle into my bloodstream, I felt like an ice-cold liquid running through my veins, it was an ice-cold relief like my whole body had a fever and I didn't know it, like I was hotter than I should be and now I was finally getting back to normal. But the feeling of internal coolness was nothing compared to what I felt inside my head and chest.

It was as if every second that the serum cleansed my body from the inside, I gained more space inside my own mind, it was as if I was taking myself for a walk inside my thoughts, I saw them clearing themselves, I saw they gain space.

It was as if until then I had been limited to a small room inside my own head, and now I discovered that this room was just a small room inside my own head and everything else, it was like I was a prisoner inside my own mind. And little by little I saw all my thoughts being cleaned, the rest of the smoke was disappearing, being sucked away.

But then the worst happened.

I started to see through my memories, everything that wasn't me, my attitudes, my speeches, my gestures, the orders I gave, the laws I changed. And the absolute worst of all, the way I treated Arthur, my mate Arthur, and there it hurt more than anything.

But at the same time, just thinking about Arthur, all the love, desire, and affection I felt for him was multiplied, my brain without silver didn't love Arthur, we breathed him, we idolized him, we worshiped him. It was like I was flooded with the real feelings of a mate bond, suddenly, all at once, and damn, how good that felt.

And at the same time hurt me to know all the bad things I had done to him, I was completely glad that we still got a chance to change everything. To love and respect each other. To build our lives together.

I felt a tear slide down my cheek, but Arthur quickly used his thumb to wipe it away.

"Are you okay?" He crouched down beside me, and his eyes met mine with concern.

"I only see now so many things that weren't me, so many things that I did, that I did to you…" My words came out broken.

"It's okay, sweetheart," Arthur said, running his thumb lightly over my cheek and smiling, it was the most wonderful smile in the universe, and I just wanted to kiss him and never let go again.

But suddenly a loud and strong sound of the door opening made us look, at my father suddenly entering, his eyes were red and it was as if I could feel his anger exhale. Arthur stood up and moved away to give him space to get closer to me.

"Clair, are you okay?" He said, stopping in front of me and bending down slightly to run his hands through my hair, the same gesture he always made when I was a child. "David told me you would meet me in your office, but I couldn't wait. And the story seemed so absurd that I had to hear it from you." My father said, and his last sentence came out weak, almost broken as if he didn't want to say it out loud and didn't believe it.

And then his eyes went to the anti-silver serum hanging above my head.

"Is it true then, daughter? Was Jackson poisoning you? Was he poisoning my daughter right under my own eyes?" And there I understood a little more about the layer of anger he felt, it was guilt, not just anger at Jackson, guilt for not having seen me, for not having protected me. "But shouldn't we have been suspicious? Shouldn't she have felt something?" My father now asked Dr Keller.

And there I saw Dr Keller tremble, he took a step back, ran his hands through his hair, and swallowed hard. I saw him take a breath before speaking.

"It should, but…." He stopped, looked to the side, opened his lips to speak, but closed them again, he shook his head, and raised his gaze to us again, while trying to speak. "It's just a crazy idea, but Clair is partially immune to silver, she doesn't burn, so she didn't feel the small doses of silver in the tea." He stopped again. "Ivy died of hemorrhage during childbirth and…" He was about to say, but my father didn't let him, my father took a step back, and he exhaled forcefully while shaking his head.

"You're not trying to tell me that…" My father started to speak, and then I started to understand, my brain started to wonder if that was what they were implying.

"She was probably being poisoned for some time, which explains the exaggerated bleeding she had during childbirth, and Clair received small doses of silver in her bloodstream during pregnancy…." Dr Keller started talking and the urge to vomit came so strong that I couldn't hold it back.

I don't know if Arthur felt my urgent urge for our bond, or if he really had a very agile reflex, but he was quick when he pulled out the trash can that was next to him, so I could vomit in it, and with his other hand he held my hair.

"So that's exactly what you're saying, my Beta, my best friend, the person I trusted most in the world. Not only did he poison and kill my wife, my mate, my Luna...But he was doing the exact same thing to my daughter…." My father's voice was completely choked, I just didn't know if it was from crying, anger, resentment, guilt, or everything mixed together.

I turned to face him, and I've simply never seen him so upset. My father was standing in front of me, looking at the ground, trying to take it all in, trying to make his mind understand. And then he said, from the depths of his soul, making every fiber of my being tremble.

"He'll only be breathing if I'm not anymore. Because I won't have peace while this bastard is alive."

More emotions, many feelings, and many revelations.

Some of you already suspected that Jackson and Veronica might have had something to do with Ivy's death, I need to say that you guys are really good.

What will Ethan do now? And I need to ask, after all this, you there are Team Arthur, or already are Team Both or Team Clair?