Ursanthropy
48. Old Stories

Doreen

“NO!” I screamed. “HELL NO!” I yelled.

A party I could get drunk on, so I was going to let that happen even though I was thoroughly against being naked in front of two complete packs, but willingly shift in front of I don’t know how many other people and packs, just to prove that I am the prodigy bear that everyone needs to listen too?! Na-uh! Not going to happen!

“Baby, just listen to me, please.”

“Baby? BABY?! You have never called me that, so don’t you fucking dare to start doing that now!” I roared and Jack actually gulped.

“Sorry, sweetheart, but you have already been naked in front of twenty of Maxwell’s people.” He pleaded, as I threw a pillow in his face, as we were now in our room.

“That was different!” I roared. “I was about to step into a boiling tank of water! My mind had been occupied by something more important than feeling ashamed of my body!” I yelled again.

“Well, just think of them as the same boiling water! If we are going to deal with your father, once and for all, we are going to need their help!” He said, trying to say it as smoothly as possible.

But I didn’t want to listen to him. I still need to do some massive amount of training before I could present myself as a strong bear in the first place, let alone that I could be secure enough of my body to let me get undressed in front of hundreds of people! I wasn’t even sure if I could freely shift into my bear at all! Of course, I had been partially shifting, when I was aroused and alone with Jack, but who could say that I wouldn’t get stage fright when I was standing in front of so many others?

I growled displeasingly, letting myself drop onto the bed.

“I never even had the chance of acting up as a Luna, so how are they going to follow my lead as a Queen?” I softly said and gasped as realisation came in. “I’m not a Queen! I’m just a tiny woman! I can’t be a Queen!”

“Calm down, love. You are my mate, so haven’t you realised that I’m going to be your King then? I will be with you every step of the way.” He said as he came sitting down next to me, holding me in a tight hug.

I took a few deep breaths, letting myself calm down as Jack just asked me. But even though my breathing is calm now, my mind was jumping back and forth in confusion and emotions. There is just simply no freaking way that I could ever fully accept or comprehend the fact that I am an heir to that throne.

“I need a walk.” I said, while jumping off the bed. Jack got off too, but I told him that I needed some time for myself. “Alright, love. I’ll be here if you need me.”

As I stepped out of the room, I tried to lock myself out of every sexual sound that I could hear around me, but that was near impossible as those sounds came from everywhere! “Don’t they ever cool down?” I asked myself, as I kept on walking down the hallway.

“Nope, they don’t.” I suddenly heard Maxwell say behind me. “Come, follow me. I want to show you something.” He said and I frowned at him.

His cheerful character from earlier this day was now long gone, and it was as if he wasn’t the person that gleefully tricked me into a deal where I had to get naked. Instead, he was looking rather serious as he determinedly walked in front of me.

He opened a door and it lead us into some sort of library, where several desks stood, big enough to put big ledgers on. There were two rows of high cabinets, filled with dusty old books, and there was someone in the back, putting books in order as I could see him driving a small cart with used books on it.

Maxwell kept walking further until he reached the back of the room, at another desk. “I was about to pick you up from your room, but I was glad that you already came out on your own.” He said, as he walked over to a book that was already on the desk, on the other side.

“Why? Don’t you want Jack to know that you’ve dragged me into the back of a dark room?” I said, maybe a little too snappy, but he smiled even so.

“Don’t worry Doreen, you won’t have to do anything here that you don’t want. But I just wanted to talk to you, because I know that you have been through a lot and I thought that this might cheer you up a little. Or maybe just make you understand shifters a bit better.” He said.

“Oh, thanks.” I said, a little ashamed for my snappy remark.

He took two chairs and made me sit on one, while he took the other as he put the book in front of us. “There are plenty of books that could explain all of the shifters and their unique ways of life, but I think you should start with this one.”

‘URSANTHROPY’ It read and it had a massive paw print on the front cover, edged in the deep dark leather in which the paper was bound.

I have read plenty of books in my life and knew that ‘Urs’ meant ‘bear’ in a different language. But the fact that there was a whole book on bear shifters was new to me. Jack could have used this book earlier, to help me through a lot of troubles in the first place! Why do men always have to make things so bloody difficult!

It is a massive book to get through as it is large in width and height, but it is also really thick, as there must at least be six-hundred pages. Maxwell said that it included the lifestyle, abilities and history of bear knowledge, but that it could be a little outdated as no one ever updated it anymore, ever since there was no royal librarian alive to do so.

Curiosity came to me, as he said that there hadn’t been a true King and Queen for nearly a hundred years. But before I could ask why that was, he urged me to start reading.

“Sweetheart, where are you?” Jack asked me over the link and I replied that I was in the library. “For three hours already?” He then asked and I looked at my watch and saw that it was near to midnight. I had been reading non-stop as it was so interesting that I couldn’t put the book away.

So far, I had learned about the biology of shifting; the etiquette rules of the Royal pack; the wars that had been fought over between other shifters species, about gaining more pack ground; the laws that every shifter had to oblige to and many other things. I was just now skimming through all the bloodlines and tried to replace my mother and her parents, and thus eventually the line of the King and Queen, but I hadn’t gotten that far yet. I was now looking at a page of the Alpha bloodlines from several other packs and tried to memorise them a little, in case I would come to meet some of them soon.

“Yeah, I’m sorry. I’m really hungry though, care to meet me in the kitchen, for a late night snack?” I asked Jack and he agreed to that.

I wanted to finish the page I was at, before I went to the kitchen, but it ended halfway a bloodline, so I turned the page and continued to read that one too.

This line was about the McCormack family, a line of brown bears that abruptly ended about fifteen years ago. Maxwell had already said that the information could have been outdated as there were no royal librarians alive anymore, but the other Alpha bloodlines had continued for several more years. So why hasn’t this one been updated also?

I got curious and started to read more into their pack’s behaviour and some records of their existence and growth. But there was nothing out of the ordinary, so what could have happened to them?

“…If you are looking for a naturally created pack, then you should visit The McCormack pack. The McCormack pack lies in the west of the country, surrounded by forests, a vast lake and the magnificent rising mountains, with snow on top. The hills in the forest has kept the pack safe for over several generations already, and the growing population of wildlife keeps the pack members fed for several more generations to come…” Even though this text was meant to explain the territory, it read like a sales pitch which annoyed me, but I wanted to keep reading, not knowing why I was so interested, until Jack suddenly came sitting next to me.

“Ah, here you are. Is it interesting?” Jack asked me, as he put a plate with a bunch of cheese, cut up sausages and some fruit on it, in front of me.

“Oh I’m sorry, have I kept you waiting?” I asked him. “Only for half an hour, but that doesn’t matter, love.” He said gently, as I looked shocked towards my watch.

“Yes it does matter! I’m sorry, I was just so caught up in this story that I guess I forgot the time. Why don’t we eat this outside and go for a walk?” I suggested and Jack took my hand and lifted me up from my chair.

“Oh wait! I wanted to see my mother’s bloodline, just a second.” I told jack and flipped through the pages to see where the royal bloodline was written down. Finally, I found the old manuscript type page where it was painted with golden letters and had gracefully enriched page borders.

There were over several pages where the Kings and Queens from old ages where mentioned, but the strange thing was, was that the lineage wasn’t being continued by their male heirs, but by their female heirs! This way it showed that the female was the leading person in guiding her Queendom. It has always been the destiny of the woman to take up on the ruling role and never the following one! It overwhelmed me a little to realise that I perhaps had to do that as well, but could I ever be able to lead people?

My fingers touched the female’s pictures and names, as with each new generation, a new male came into the picture, where in ‘normal’ situations and in ‘normal’ bloodlines, a new female came in place!

I noticed that each and every woman had black hair, some were curled and others straight, like mine, but there was no single blond- or ginger haired female in the list. And where in the old ages, several daughters had been born from one family, it had become lesser by time. I could see that my apparent great-great-great-grandmother had been a single child and just like her, she and her grandchildren had only been granted with one female as well. But when I turned the page, to see where the line would lead me to, I hoped it was to my mother, I saw a picture of someone that looked so similar to her, if it weren’t for the crooked nose that she had.

And her oval shaped frame, that was around her picture, hadn’t been adorned by a tiny golden crown above it just like all the other females before her. And next to her frame, the frame of her male mate, had been blackened out. And the picture underneath it, referring to their child, hadn’t been finished. There was just an empty frame there, without a picture painted inside the frame at all. Only a name stood underneath it. “Ophelia Eglantine Berestine.” And that’s where the line ended.

I know that my mother was called Ophelia, but I never knew her last name was Berestine. To me, it had been natural that a woman took the last name of her husband in marriage, so I never got to see or hear her last name as I had been too young to bother myself with it. To me, she had always been Mama Deveraux, nothing more, nothing less. And I had continued the last name, as it was written on my passport as well. Doreen May Deveraux.

But I guess that has never been my true name…

“Doreen May Berestine.” I softly said, trying to hear what it would sound like.

A/n: So many questions, still unanswered!