His Blue Moon Princess
His Sunshine Baby Chapter 110

So many things make sense now... How Sylviana knew about Nora and me, our connection, our relationship to the Sapphire Moon and Blue Moon packs! No wonder she helped us so much, she kept watching over us all this time...

But when we talked about it, she always remained so enigmatic! She never gave me any answers, aside from my birth parents' death...

"You were born... in the same place as us?" I can't help but ask.

Sylviana slowly nods.

"I was... Just a few years before you and Nora. I was just a child back then... I barely remember Queen Diane, just the day she passed away. I remember your birth, and Nora's, though. Your parents were so nice to me."

"Oh yes, I bet you lived a great life there, Sylviana," says her sister. "Just as much as the twins that our mother was so focused on protecting, and their children too. I had suffered so much, yet you were all living happy lives up there. My own mother had thrown me away for someone else's sake, and was leaving me to suffer in the hands of those vampires.... While you were growing happily by her side."

"Mother had no idea, Nephera," Sylviana said. "Her barrier was just acting on its own, she couldn't have known it was you..."

"Shut up!" She yells. "I don't want to hear a damn word about my mother and me. Danica was the worst! All because I was born first, you had a great life while I was sent to Silver City!"

Damn, someone has mommy issues...

Shut up, Liam. We need to talk about your girlfriend's choices, too.

I swear I had no idea...

Yeah, that's our problem.

I don't blame Liam. Sylviana kept the truth from all of us. Liam couldn't have imagined the truth, neither could any of us. I turn to her, ignoring Nephera's fierce glare.

"That day... Do you know what happened? To our parents..."

Sylviana nods sadly.

"After Queen Diane's death, the barrier was weakened... Mother could barely hold it up, and the vampires were trying to get in, too. She decided to keep it closed, to anyone, but Princess Lilyan was worried about Reagan... They had to open it sometimes, but it was getting more dangerous every time... until Nora's birth."

"Reagan didn't know about Nora," I say. "And you pretended you didn't know about her either."

"Reagan really didn't, I think Princess Lilyan had just gotten pregnant when we saw her for the last time. I thought keeping your identities a secret was the best... The vampires were after the Royals. Royals have incredible power, and they wanted to get rid of them. They had found the perfect source of power to fight them and my mother's power, too..."

"Me," sneered Nephera. "The more they abused me and drank my blood, the stronger they became, just like Judah Black. It was only a question of time before that damn barrier would break, wasn't it, Sylviana? Our mother was getting old, too, for a witch. With Diane gone, she couldn't hold on much longer."

"She knew the vampires would attack the minute they could," said Sylviana. "Princess Lilyan tried to take over her mother's in helping her maintain the barrier, but, the day Nora was born..." Oh, Moon Goddess.

It's exactly the same as now. Though the Witch does maintain the barrier, the Luna is the own channeling the moon power. However, a Luna giving birth just can't possibly focus on her power properly. Nora is experiencing the same thing as her own mother, Princess Lilyan, did more than twenty years ago!

Nora, you're hearing that?

Yes... I can't believe it. My birth was...

Don't you start saying s**t about it being your fault.

She stays quiet, whether it's because of another contraction or because she doesn't want to say it. I'm choking up, right now, too. All those tragic events are unfolding under a new light now. Though I resent Sylviana for keeping quiet, I'm starting to understand why she did. She's on the verge of tears, too, looking awfully sorry.

"The day Nora was born, Princess Lilyan and my mother just couldn't keep the barrier much longer. A few hours later... Vampires entered our city. They had been accumulating for months outside... There were too many of them. Princess Lilyan only had a few minutes with Nora. She was diminished after the birth, so she asked my mother to pass her power to her daughter. I was with her... until the end... I was holding Nora in my arms when Lilyan..."

She's crying for real now, and I feel my own tears coming, too. I feel Nora's heart, echoing my own, breaking slowly as we both finally listen to the truth about our parents' death...

"Your parents, Selena, and my mother, they told us to run away. Gabriel told your mother to take you and go. Althea was a human, she couldn't fight. You were just two years old back then... Althea was the bravest human I ever knew. She told you not to cry, soothed you and ran with me. It was the most terrifying night of my life. We spent such a long time hiding, running, hiding again, desperate to replace a way to escape... At some point, it became clear she was easier to track because she was human. She told me to run away, she... your mom knew Nora and I would have died. So I parted ways with her, and I used the few of my powers to hide us as I could, and run, carrying Nora with me."

I can't believe it... Sylviana shouldn't have been older than ten years old, back then. She managed to run away, carrying newborn Nora with her, saving both their lives!

Meanwhile, I don't know how but according to Reagan, my mother and I actually managed to survive until the fight was over. How? From what she says, Sylviana doesn't seem to know either...

"When I arrived at the scene," says Nephera, "Everything was over. My home was burned to ashes... Mother had sacrificed herself, in a desperate attempt to save the twins' children. I hid from the remaining vampires, who were still fighting the survivors or feeding themselves, and crawled all the way to our source of magic there. I saved as much time as I could to replenish my magic, and while I did, I found something... The traces of another, younger witch." Her glare to Sylviana makes no mistake about who she recognized...

"I couldn't believe my mother had another daughter while I was gone! I knew you were a young Earth witch, I looked through my mother's things, the few she didn't burn to ashes... I tried using my magic to replace you, the twins or their children, but you were all gone..."

Reagan had probably taken me away prior to Nephera's arrival on the site. She said she arrived shortly after the fight was over, too. Thank Moon Goddess we left this hell before this crazy woman showed up...

"I was so furious," she continues. "After so many years, I was finally back home, to the place I had left so many years ago, but only to replace everything burnt, destroyed! After everything I went through, after all of my sufferings, my own mother had died to save someone else's child! She hadn't saved me when I endured the vampires' venom for weeks, but she killed herself for Lilyan and Gabriel Blue Moon! For their children to live! I resented those damn twins even more than the vampires!" Moon Goddess, that woman is... damaged. I can see the madness in her eyes. She's completely broken inside.

She suddenly points a finger at Sylviana.

"And you... Knowing she replaced me with another daughter. No wonder she never cared about me for twenty years!"

Sylviana shakes her head, frantically. I've never seen her so shaken up before, but for once, she actually looks her age. Her voice is so hoarse right now, I can barely recognize it.

"You're wrong! Nephera, our mother believed in you until the end," she says, sobbing erratically. "When everything happened, I went for the south... I knew that's where mother had sent my older sister, with Cynthia... I walked for days, with Nora, hiding in human towns and trying to replace Silver City, until I finally reached it, many weeks later. But I couldn't replace any trace of you or even a pack called the Blue Moon. I didn't know they had been renamed the Sapphire Moon, I had never met any of them... I didn't know what to do... It had been over thirty years. Cynthia had died, there was no trace of my older sister or any witch being around, I just didn't know whom to ask. All I knew was that I had to keep Nora's identity a secret. Vampires could still chase after us. I don't know if it was my fear as a child or my instincts that made me think that way..."

She was so young... I have no idea how I would have reacted if I had been left alone. I was lucky Reagan found me and took me here... In a way, Sylviana had the same reasoning, but she was an eight or nine years old witch, no matter how mature she was, with little knowledge of the world and a newborn baby to take care of. It's already a miracle she got to Silver City at all, but basically anyone that could have helped her in Silver City was gone... Nephera was gone. There was no way she knew what had happened to her older sister, they had never even actually met!

"Even as a witch," says Sylviana, "it was hard to take care of Nora, I was way too young. So I used my powers to replace what would be the best home for her. I knew I had to conceal her identity, so it didn't matter which pack it was, as long as she could grow up with her kind, with werewolves, as if she had been born there. I knew werewolves care for their own, especially the pups. So I left her on a doorstep, with a note to ask those people to take care of her, with her name and birthday, trusting my magic would help me pick the best home for her..."

Holy f**k.

She didn't replace the best home for Nora. She found her actual biological father's home!

Moon Goddess... says Nora. Alec said I had appeared on their doorstep when I was a newborn... I thought... I thought my Dad had brought me there for them to raise me without his wife knowing I was his...

Turns out the guy... I mean, your father really didn't know. Sylviana's magic did the job, picking the house with your actual kin in it... This is crazy...

He probably realized later that you were his real daughter, though, just like his wife... I wonder if he even knew your biological mom had gotten pregnant with you...

I'm just as speechless. I can hear Nora's crying, I can't tell if it's sadness, relief over her father's truth, or due to her contraction pains... Her family's story, and Sylviana's, is even sadder than I thought.... Nephera doesn't seem sorry one bit, though. She is looking at Sylviana with eyes of utter disgust.

"It took me a while to replace them... First, I had to fight the vampires. Trust me, I enjoyed that the most. They are surprisingly weak to water magic, you know. So, once I had replenished my magic enough, hiding in our mother's lair, I decided to use that vermin the same way they had used me. I corrupted them slowly to my side, making their Vampire Queen my slave, poisoning her mind. She already hated the werewolves, it was almost too easy to persuade them to target the Royals that had escaped. I have never imagined that you would have brought the children back to Silver City. How ironic was that! I spent such a long time searching for you, I even thought you might have actually died."

I don't know much about magic and stuff, but Sylviana being an Earth Witch, I'll bet she surely wasn't the easiest to replace in all the forest between our birthplace and here... Between the time Nephera took to conquer the Vampires, and the time it took her to search for her sister and us, it probably saved us a few years...

"I had almost given up, you know, when I felt it. A wave of Moon Energy, an awakening to the Moon's power. So similar to Lilyan or Diane's signature aura... It came from the South. Never in a million years did I think you would have been able to reach Silver City, Sylviana." Nora's power.

Nora's sudden awakening to her wolf was what guided Nephera right here... She went from a quiet girl to fully open to her Royal potential. Everyone in Silver City felt the Luna's slow rise... No wonder that witch felt something. Nephera sneered. "You're more talented than I thought, Sylviana. You made sure I couldn't replace her until she would be strong enough to fight me, didn't you..."

"What did you do?" I ask Sylviana.

"I put some... sort of lock on Nora's mind," she admits. "I sealed her Royal power, to a place deep inside her mind, were it wouldn't awake unless she had a strong stimulus."

Let me guess... Like meeting her fated pair?

Holy Moon Goddess... So Nora meeting Damian was the trigger? No wonder she went from a kitty to a tiger after that!

It could have been the r**e attempt, too. She lost control when she was in the most danger. Or her first shape-shifting, too, everyone felt her unique wolf's Royal aura after that.

I did feel something changing after meeting Damian, admits Nora. But I.. ugh!

You doing okay, Nora?

Yeah, I'll manage... Just... Please be safe.

Be safe, she says... I want to cry internally. Even if she says that there's no way she didn't feel William's passing or all the others... And despite all the talking right now, this fight is still far from over, let's face it.

"I hoped Nora could be hidden until she was old enough to defend herself," continues Sylviana. "I stayed away from her, and secretly established myself, watching our surroundings. Since I was born, I had been told to watch out for people trying to attack the Royals, especially vampires... I actually met with Reagan on one of my trips to the outside a bit later... I was relieved you had survived, Selena, though I have no idea how that happened. But once again, I decided it would be better for me to stay away, and I knew Reagan was watching over you."

"You did a pretty good job of hiding them... I would never have found them if it wasn't for her child's awakening"

I was probably harder to replace due to my human heritage, too... My mother really protected me, even after her death. However, unlike Nora's seal or my human blood, Estelle was born without anything to hide her inner wolf, so, as we feared, as soon as her inner puppy awakened, she slowly became another target... I exchange a glance with Nate. Only a few minutes have passed, but it's enough for everyone to catch a little break. I don't feel any rested, though, this is just too much information at once... Who knew we were still missing such a big part of the story, and all this time it was Sylviana's...

I need to keep her talking, though. I don't care what that woman went through, she's still targeting us.

"The first attack was after Nora's awakening, right?" I ask.

Nephera turns her eyes to me, and I realize their color is changing. Like Sylviana, her eyes can change between several shades depending on her emotions. That woman is so thin, too, and her skin so pale, it's like her big blue-grey eyes are the only color on her, making it even more obvious.

"When I realized you were in Silver City, I just... lost it. Of all places, in the City I should have been, I should have owned! It was painful to return, after all those years. I hated the idea of seeing Judah again, but as it turns out, that rotten man had already died, didn't he?"

She glares at all three brothers, who growl together, warning her back.

"Oh, your auras are so like his... I was speechless, but it added to the pleasure of attacking this damn place. I lead the Vampires, telling them I wanted the Royal, not even knowing there were two of you!"

No wonder the blood-suckers targeted Nora specifically back then...

"Yet, I couldn't enter. I attacked from afar, unsure about the whole situation. First, I didn't expect Silver City's pack to act altogether. But then, the real shock... The Earth Witch! Of all people, I sensed our family's blood's magic here, my own half-sister, suddenly protecting Silver City and running to the werewolves' side! Now that was a big surprise!"

I bet... She probably had forgotten about her half-sister at all. I don't get how she recognized her sibling without even seeing her face to face, but I guess that's another witch thing I'll never get.

"I have to admit, I lost that day. I left most of my vampires to die, and ran away. I knew I couldn't win against you, Sylviana. You had the stronger element, you were younger, more powerful... And you had years to extend your protection to Silver City. I underestimated you, Lilyan's daughter and those three... Plus you, Gabriel's daughter, the one I couldn't even detect. When I felt how strong you all were, and how the vampires couldn't match, I decided to turn away."

More like we kicked your a*s and your damn vamps bad enough that you had to run with your tail between your legs...

I glance at the brothers' side. They are growling, still tense. They know the fight can resume any minute now. I try to feel Nora, but she's overwhelmed by the pain. Moon Goddess, I hope her baby will at least be born without complications... We really don't need more issues...