CHAPTER 260: UNDIAGNOSED ILLNESS

It was a rather insensitive question. Especially the way Kade had asked it, with his tone full of incredulity, as if he thought that what he had been hearing was complete nonsense. Of course, he didn’t intend for it to come off that way, he was just really surprised. If were one thing if his spy didn’t know - there was a limit to how much a spy could safely find out. He couldn’t just go dig deeper into everything, as it would put him at risk of arousing suspicions. Only when the Bloodmoon Pack specifically requested some information, was he allowed to conduct an intensive search - but for Felix not to know any details about his mother’s health?

They weren’t living in the Middle Ages, when people simply died from being ’weak’! Modern medicine was well developed, and could diagnose most illnesses. Kade didn’t know much about medicine aside from what was common knowledge, but as far as he was aware, doctors would typically be able to give a diagnosis. Like an autoimmune disease, cancer, health, or lung failure, things like that...

And it’s not like the Moonhill Pack had no resources to seek a doctor. Although they were nowhere as affluent as the Bloodmoon Pack, Kade wasn’t so detached from reality as to call them ’poor’. He had been to their pack house, and seen their living conditions. They clearly weren’t one of those wild packs who had rejected human civilization. Rather, while they kept their distance from humans, they had fully embraced their technology. Kade didn’t know how good their health care was...

But Felix and his mother weren’t just any other members. Sienna Winterfell had been an Omega who had given birth to the pup of their leader at the time, and Felix was Wilder’s only son. Even if Wilder didn’t care about the woman, he clearly had plans for Felix - he wanted his son to become the next Luna. In such a case, shouldn’t he tried to provide them with proper care? For the sake of his plans, if nothing else.

Felix just shrugged his shoulders, though. "Yeah. She was weak, that’s all."

"You mean like an undiagnosed illness?" Kade asked to specify.

But Felix just shrugged his shoulders again. "I don’t know. Maybe? I wasn’t there at the doctor’s appointments, so I don’t know exactly what they said."

"Hmm." Kade only hummed under his nose in response, his face growing darker. Felix’s answer was far from reassuring. If it were any specific condition, then the doctors would know what to look for, how to take care of Felix to prevent his health from deteriorating, but an undiagnosed disease? It could be anything! He could only hope that his doctors were better than the doctors who had looked after Felix’s mother, and would notice in time if there was anything wrong...

"Anyway," Felix spoke up, interrupting Kade’s dark thoughts, and shifting the topic a bit, "What did your parents say?"

"Hm? About what?" Kade blinked, looking back at Felix.

"About... my father. And everything he had said during lunch earlier. Especially... the things about my and my mother’s health."

"Ah." Kade paused for a moment, before curving his lips in a light smile, and waving his head dismissively. "It’s fine, you don’t need to worry about it."

Felix just stared at him intently without a word, though, so he soon added with a sigh, "Truly. They were a bit... displeased with it, but not because of your past health issues, but rather about the fact that I hid it from them."

"Oh, really?" Felix lifted his brows, unconvinced. "If they’re really fine with it, then why did you hide it from them in the first place?"

"Well..." Kade’s eyes dodged to the side, as he scratched his head, hesitating. "You know... It’s a rather sensitive situation. Because they want what’s best for me, which is you, of course... But they also need to think for the pack. So I wanted them to get to know you first... And, well, I kind of didn’t find the right moment to tell them afterwards?"

Felix quirked his brows again. Honestly, he didn’t care if Kade’s parents disapproved of him as the future Luna of the pack, because he disapproved of himself as well in this aspect. It was just kind of amusing seeing this massive Alpha, who was also older than him, act like a kid who had ’forgotten’ to tell his parents that he broke a window at school with a ball, and now his parents found out.

And it was frankly rather weird that he could treat this whole situation as if it was nothing but some childish mischief.

Well, perhaps that just went to show how good Kade’s relationship with his parents was. Maybe that’s how a parents-children relationship was supposed to be like. All that was so unfamiliar to Felix, as he couldn’t have imagined himself having such interactions with his parents... With his father, for obvious reasons - their relationship could be described as ’cold’ and ’distant’ at best - and with his mother as well. He had always been careful around her, since he hadn’t wanted to worry or anger her when she had already been so sick...

That was not the point, now, though.

"Alright, so you’re saying that they don’t mind my past health issues?" he asked to confirm.

"Yeah," Kade nodded his head energetically. "They just told me to make sure that you’re being well taken care of, that’s all."

"Alright. What about... the fact that my fated mate bond with Jared has still... Mph!"

Felix didn’t get to finish his sentence, as Kade had practically slapped his hand against Felix’s mouth, clamping it up to stop him from talking.

"Hahah, what do you mean?" he laughed nervously. They were alone in the room, with only Vivi in her crib, currently ruffling the fur on Remi’s back, who was silently enduring this torture for the pup’s enjoyment, and the room was most certainly not bugged, as no one would dare to do something like that in a bedroom that was practically an extension of the heir of the pack’s room, but he still couldn’t help but feel nervous, instinctively stopping Felix from saying it out loud.

It was the one thing he didn’t want to talk about the most.

The topic of Felix’s fated mate bond with Jared, or, to be precise, of the fact that it still wasn’t broken, despite all of their attempts, was practically a taboo. Or at least Kade had treated it that way. Aside from their initial conversation after leaving the conference room, and then the incident in the guest room on the last day of Jared’s stay, when Kade had forced Jared to reject Felix over and over again, using the antidote to his curse as bait, they had never really spoken about it. Most of the time, Kade had acted as if that had never happened.

And Felix went along with it. He also found it unpleasant, and talking it over with Kade wouldn’t magically help them find any solutions. It went against everything they knew about the fated mate bond, and there wasn’t anyone around who could shed any more light on the subject. Most of the werewolves had only one experience with the fated mate bond: finding their fated mate, and getting together. In some cases, rejecting or getting rejected by their fated mate, and settling down with a chosen mate. Then, there were those who didn’t find their fated mate at all... And even rarer, those who found their second chance mate after the rejection.

Compared to all of that, Felix was already a unique case: he had been connected by the fated mate bond to two Alphas at the same time. Who could possibly relate to his situation? Although Kade had said before that he had found some precedents, they had all been in the past. As far as they knew, all the werewolves who had claimed to have multiple fated mates must have already passed away from old age at this point.

And cases of a fated mate bond that couldn’t be broken? Felix had tried to look it up, but had found no reports so far. Which was to be expected: rejecting the mate bond generally wasn’t something looked well upon, so werewolves typically wouldn’t brag about doing it.

Either way, with no clues to discuss, both Felix and Kade had remained silent, pretending that there was no issue at all. It had been fine...

Until now.

Felix took a deep breath, and let out a sigh. Then, he grabbed Kade’s hand, and peeled it off his mouth.

"I don’t want to talk about it either," he said, a bit impatiently. "But we can’t avoid it any longer. My father... He knows about it. And I think he might try to use it to bring me back to the Moonhill Pack."

Kade’s face darkened. He didn’t say anything for a while, so Felix continued,

"So, you need to tell your parents first."