3 Angel's Sonnet

After we cleaned up the entire courtyard, we had to go into the mess hall for breakfast before we are divided up into groups to begin preparing the entire courtyard for the soon to be king's arrival with his soon to be mate.

The hall was a large room where, if you stood in the middle, you would not be able to see either end of it horizontally. I don't think I even know ninety per cent of the people in the room.

According to the years of training you had, you are divided into groups and that is how you chose your table to sit on. Long tables with no gaps so you are pretty much with everyone else in the room with no chance to sit alone.

We would walk to the very front and are given trays of food already ready for us, those of us to be priests in that year are the ones that serve the trays before they get their ones.

Something about teaching humility and respect because, if you are to make a big impact in the world, you must first be willing to get on your knees and work for the people you would not even think to work for. I do admire their dedication.

You are not allowed to ask for more because the trays have a perfectly balanced meal already ready for you. Though, there are times when you wish to eat lesser so you can ask for a smaller portion instead.

Or, if you do not feel well at all, you can ask for the sick meal for yourself or your friend and take that to them. But only after you have a leader give you a card confirming that, indeed, someone is sick.

The sick meal is a box, unlike the trays, it has warm porridge, tea bags, little snacks to eat in case the person has no appetite and medicines. The sick meal box is delicious but, since you are only able to eat them when you do not feel like eating, you really cannot enjoy it as much as you would like to.

As werewolves, we hardly ever get sick, no matter how much I complained about that, perhaps I am just weak. So when someone is sick, it can mean only one of two things.

One, they are in heat. This is impossible as everyone in the temple is a Beta. Aside from the fact that we do not produce children, we also cannot get into heat nor feel any … 'sexual' desires, our body just works that way. Much to everyone's pitying looks on us but I talked about that too much already.

So it is the second option, we are entering a phase in our life that happens once a year, every year after we turn thirteen. This happens only to Betas and you could call it our version of 'heat'.

Heat is something like humans would call menstruation, though that happens only in females. For us, it happens to everyone and there is a reason why heats are so important, especially to Alphas.

It is because, heat helps you to: One, know that you are healthy and are able to breed. Two, heat usually helps them be a little stronger. With every heat that passed, they will grow a little stronger, physically and mentally.

But you stop having your heat the moment your body starts dying. So you keep getting weaker and weaker as the years go by until you finally die. Our healing ability is so strong that our body has to force itself to stop heaving heats to finally kill us.

I am slightly amused, if I think about it too hard.

As for us, Betas, our body becomes hot and we start to feel sick, almost like a fever but ten times worse. You can hardly eat, as all the taste in your mouth disappears and even sitting up hurts. You will feel like your bones have nerves in them, because it hurts that badly.

This might continue for a couple of days, but once we recover, we are always stronger than we were before we got sick.

This is our bodies' method of purifying itself so the Priests told us to try to cherish this time and take it as a blessing from the goddess who gave us the ability to purify ourselves.

The Omegas and Alphas have their heat and each other to help 'purify' themselves and we have the goddess's blessing so that is that.

Walking to the front of the place where a long table sat with a white cloth covering it and several trays of food laid on the table, I met eye contact with the black-haired man who had this crooked smile that makes anyone just suspicious of him immediately.

But he is not a bad person, he just lacks proper social skills and just looks creepy in general. But he is going to be a Priest soon so he should be alright, right? … Right??

"Hello, Orion, Nova. Excited?"

"Of course, I will get to see Orion dancing the Angel's Sonnet," Nova said, beaming at the man. "What about you, Ciro?"

"I am excited as well. It would be a blessing that we are able to have a new king and his mate initiated on the year that I am to become a Priest myself. Here are your breakfasts." He said, placing two trays in front of us. In the tray is an assortment of meat dishes with bread pieces on the side and some soup.

The tray is a lot bigger than it was in the previous days and I can kind of guess why.

"Quite an assortment today, I see," Nova said, looking at the feast in front of us.

"Of course. It is the busiest day of the years. We will also be having more people come in to pray on this auspicious day, who knows when we will be able to have the time to eat again today." He said, pushing the trays to us as more people started filing into the room.

I took one look at the tray in front of me and felt bile rising in my stomach. Gripping my stomach, I could not calm down the awful feeling that swirled around my stomach. Must be from the nervousness.

"Thank you-" Nova was about to take both the trays but I stopped him, taking my tray and handing it back to Ciro.

"Could you give me a smaller portion?" I asked, feeling my appetite leave me the longer I looked at the meal and smelt the food. Especially the ridiculous amount of meat that filled the plate.

On other days, I would have been so happy to get this but … I just cannot process this meal in front of me. Slightly disappointed in myself because I know that future me would love to eat it.

"You want a smaller portion??" Ciro asked as I could literally feel the countless stares on us, making me almost regret asking him for that.

Yes, I usually eat a lot. But today, I just can't bring myself to even eat more than just a little portion. In fact, this has been happening for the past couple of days.

I have not been able to eat well in a while, nor have I had the appetite for a proper meal in a few weeks. The stress of the practices and many, many other things has been getting to me, I see. It does not help that today is a lot worse than it was on the other days and I am very uncomfortable.

"Is he serious?" Ciro asked Nova who just chuckled.

"I am just glad that he is willing to eat right now. He has not been eating well for the past couple of weeks, Ciro." Nova said, shrugging. "I guess he will be better after this is all over."

Ciro looked at me sceptically for a second before sighing and trading my tray for a smaller portion, "Honestly, if I didn't know that you are a Beta I would have immediately thought you were pregnant."

"Impossible," I said immediately, taking the tray from him and walking away to the front of our table. My stomach still churning.

I always sat at the end of the chair, near the wall as Nova sits right beside me. Everyone there knows about my … 'injury' and it is still a little uncomfortable for many to see as I chew at the food. They know about it, but only a few have actually seen it, again.

The rumours are still there about me and I do not mind it. I kind of like it, in fact, sometimes. Just sometimes. I will talk about it some other time.

So, sitting sandwiched between the painted stone walls and Nova is the best option for me at the moment.

As soon as we sat down, Nova immediately looked at me, a sceptical look coming on his face.

"What?" I asked, staring back at him.

"Are you sure you are not pregnant?" He asked, eyebrow raised. "I have heard that it is possible to change from a Beta to an Omega. Obviously not an Alpha but an Omega is possible."

"Even if that is possible, why would you think that I might be pregnant? Why pregnant of all things?"

"I don't know." He said, shrugging. "You know most of us here are sheltered so we are not necessarily the best at things like these."

"And?"

"Well, you have to know the most out of all of us." He said, brows furrowing at me as I just returned it with an annoyed look on my face.

"We do not talk about that, Nova," I said, pointing a fork at the boy, frowning. "You know this already."

"I know. I apologise." He said quickly, going back to his tray before turning to me again. "If anything like that happens, you need to tell me, alright? Don't keep it to yourself."

"As a Beta, I doubt that would ever happen," I said, sighing before I saw his downcast expression. "But, if it does, I will tell you. Promise."

"Yay!" Nova threw his arms around me, smiling brightly. "You can always count on me. I hope you know that."

"I do," I said, offering him a nod of approval as begs began to ring around us, signalling the arrival of the Priests.

We all got to our feet as the ten of them entered the rooms, lead us into prayer and after that, we dug in immediately. I still had a hard time actually eating the meat but I had to eat something.

If I had no strength, I would not be able to perform the dance well and I would rather be pierced through the heart with a silver bullet than have that happen.

________________________

After lunch, we were all divided up into groups already assigned weeks before. There is the group that is in charge of the meal preparation for the people that will be coming.

Another group of people that have to make sure everything is well taken care of and in proper order.

Another group makes sure that the lodging places for the Alpha and his Luna to stay in for the next couple of days after they are initiated are prepared.

They will stay there for a week after they enter the temple and get the blessings. So that has to be taken care of as well as some decorations. Simple decorations.

Nova is helping in that while I, as the dancer, am to go back and practice once again.

They are going to arrive by the evening and the celebration will continue well into the night, perhaps to the next morning. We are just here to make sure everything runs smoothly, we do not partake in it personally.

Though … not all of us hold that sentiment. I should know, I am one of them.