Rejected By My Mate; Claimed By Lycan Quadruplets Chapter 171

Third person POV

The air in the healer’s clearing was still heavy with the weight of shock. The quadraduolet children, their voices still echoing the word mom, had vanished inside the small cottage again, leaving Kael, Atlas, and the soldiers standing frozen in the middle of the yard. None of them could quite believe what their eyes had revealed only moments ago. Lisa—once their castaway, their forgotten shadow—was standing before them, calm, collected, her face lined with something harder than mere time.

No one spoke at first. It was Kael who finally found the strength to break the silence.

“This… this is impossible,” he murmured, his voice hoarse, his eyes darting back and forth between Lisa and Atlas as though hoping one of them would laugh and say it was all a mistake. “Lisa?”

She didn’t answer him. Not with words, not with warmth. Her gaze swept over the group the way frost creeps over glass—slow, suffocating, and cold. She stood with her arms folded, shoulders square, her expression betraying nothing but the faintest curve of disdain tugging at her lips.

Atlas, for once, had no quick remark. He stared at her with wide eyes, his chest rising and falling unevenly. He had told Kael not to trust the woman, had insisted something about her aura wasn’t right, but he hadn’t expected this. He hadn’t expected her.

“You’re alive,” one of the soldiers whispered from behind them. His voice trembled with disbelief. “We thought—”

Lisa raised her hand, silencing him with the smallest of gestures. “You thought I was dead,” she said flatly. Her voice was stronger than they remembered, laced with an authority that demanded attention. “And for your comfort, I let you think so.”

Kael flinched as though her words had struck him. His throat bobbed as he swallowed, struggling to find a path through the tangle of emotion knotting inside him. “Lisa… we didn’t know. We didn’t understand. If we had—”

“If you had?” she cut him off sharply, her eyes flashing with fire. “If you had known, would anything have been different? Would you have suddenly remembered I existed? Would you have shielded me instead of watching silently while I was discarded like refuse? Spare me your ifs, Kael. I lived them. I know their worth.”

Her words sliced through him, leaving Kael staring at the dirt beneath his boots as though the ground could offer some escape from the shame crawling over his skin.

Atlas cleared his throat, attempting to regain some control of the moment. “We came here for help,” he said carefully. His tone was low, controlled, but not without its own weight of unease. “We didn’t know it would be you we’d find, Lisa. But the pack—our people—are dying. The sickness spreads faster than any of us can contain. You’re… you’re the healer. You can fix this.”

Lisa laughed. It wasn’t warm. It wasn’t filled with joy. It was bitter, short, and almost cruel in how it cut the air. “Now I’m useful, am I?” she asked. “Now I’m something more than the unwanted shadow who was never good enough to stand at your side? Tell me, Atlas, is that the only reason you’re here? Because your people are desperate?”

Atlas didn’t reply. His jaw tightened, his silence confirming the accusation she had hurled at him.

Kael stepped forward then, desperation flickering in his eyes. “Lisa, please. I know we failed you. I know we didn’t stand by you. But don’t punish the innocent for our sins. They need you. You have the power to save them.”

Lisa’s head tilted slightly, her arms still folded tight. “And where was that plea when I was the one needing saving?” she asked softly, the softness more dangerous than a scream. “Where were you when I cried out for someone to see me, to believe me, to fight for me? You didn’t care then. Don’t pretend you care now.”

Her words struck deeper than any blade could. Kael’s lips parted, but no words came out. His shoulders slumped, his strength unraveling under the weight of guilt.

The soldiers behind them shifted uneasily, their eyes darting between Lisa and their leaders. Fear and hope warred inside them, but none dared to speak.

Atlas, determined to salvage what he could, took another step closer. His eyes were sharp, but there was something vulnerable beneath his hard exterior. “Lisa,” he said firmly, “this isn’t about us anymore. It’s about them—the children, the elders, the families who will not survive another month of this plague. If you’re as heartless as you’re pretending, then walk away. But if even a shred of the girl we once knew still exists, then prove it by helping them.”

Lisa’s jaw tightened. The muscles in her face twitched as though she were holding back a storm of emotions. Her eyes darkened, and for a moment, she looked as though she might strike him.

Instead, she turned her back. “Leave,” she said coldly. “All of you. Whatever debt you think you can force upon me, I owe nothing. Not to you. Not to them. Not anymore.”

The finality in her voice slammed into them like a closing door.

“No!” Kael’s voice cracked as he surged forward, dropping to his knees before her. The sound of his knees striking the hard ground echoed, raw and desperate. “Lisa, I’m begging you. Please. Don’t do this. Don’t let our people die because of me, because of us. Punish me if you must, but don’t punish them.”

His shoulders shook, his pride stripped away until all that was left was raw, aching desperation. He had never knelt like this before, not even in front of his father, not even in front of kings. But here, before the woman he had once failed to protect, he was nothing but a man pleading for mercy.

Lisa turned slowly, her eyes narrowing as she looked down at him. “You dare kneel now?” she asked quietly, dangerously. “You couldn’t stand for me when it mattered, but you kneel for me now when your need outweighs your shame. Tell me, Kael, do you even hear yourself?”

Kael bowed his head lower, his hands pressed together as though in prayer. “I hear myself. I know what I am. But I would crawl through fire if it meant saving them. Lisa, I beg you—don’t let this bitterness be the end of them. You’re the only one who can help.”

Atlas’s pride warred visibly within him, but the weight of their circumstances and the sincerity in Kael’s voice cracked something in him as well. He clenched his fists, his jaw grinding, and then, slowly, painfully, he lowered himself to his knees beside Kael.

The soldiers gasped softly behind them. To see both of their leaders kneeling before the woman they had once abandoned was a sight none of them would ever forget.

“Lisa,” Atlas said, his voice steady but heavy with humility, “I was wrong. We were wrong. I don’t expect forgiveness, and I don’t ask it for myself. But I kneel now because I know my people don’t deserve to suffer for my pride. If it takes me lowering myself before you to save them, then so be it. I will kneel.”

For the first time, Lisa’s face faltered. Her lips trembled slightly, her eyes flickering with something unguarded before she quickly masked it again. She inhaled sharply, steadying herself.

The soldiers, moved by the sight of both Kael and Atlas bowing, began to follow suit one by one. Knees struck the earth in a scattered rhythm until the entire yard was filled with kneeling men, their heads bowed, their voices silent but their desperation screaming louder than words could.

Lisa’s breath caught. She had wanted to chase them away, to send them back broken and defeated, to make them feel the cold isolation she had endured for so long. But seeing them kneel—not just the leaders, but all of them—struck a chord she couldn’t ignore.

She closed her eyes, her heart warring against itself.

When she opened them again, the frost in her gaze had not fully melted, but a crack had formed.

“Get up,” she said finally, her voice low, almost trembling. “If I do this, it won’t be for you. It won’t be for forgiveness. It will be because the innocent deserve better than what you gave me. Do you understand?”

Kael raised his head slowly, tears streaking down his face, and nodded. “We understand.”

Atlas lifted his gaze as well, the weight of humility still anchoring him. “We’ll accept whatever conditions you set.”

Lisa looked at them all, her arms still folded, her body still stiff. She hadn’t forgiven them. Perhaps she never would. But for the first time since they’d arrived, she hadn’t turned them away.

And that sliver of hope was enough to keep them kneeling there, waiting, praying she would not change her mind.