THE ROGUE WOLF

by Klaire London

  Alex impatiently taps her fingers on the other side of the table, my heightened hearing able to pick up the rhythmic thud thud thud with each pat against the material. "May I ask how you know all of this?" She enquires, a frown ridden across her face.

  Damien nods. "An insider."

  Alex does not look pleased with his answer, as if she was expecting more information, but she does not press him for further details. She withdraws her hand from the table, her fingers no longer melodically tapping the wood.

  "Two days, Aurora. That's all you have to train," Damien clarifies. "If you're ok to do this, that is."

  All heads collectively turn in my direction, numerous pairs of eyes of varying shades gazing at me thoughtfully. Some of the Alphas stare at me like I'm a weak, seventeen year old girl as I appeared. Others, such as Alex, looked at me with respect, their heads held high, hands clasped in front of them.

  I can't help but smirk faintly. Despite my partial fear of the dark and the thought of the suffocating mine, on top of trying to kidnap Hunter's mate who was probably the most protected person in the whole rogue territory, I didn't want to appear weak. I'm a warrior. Warriors do not cry.

  "Count me in."

  12 | Storm

  ❝I run from wolves tearing into me without teeth.❞

  A freezing zephyr gathers in the courtyard, blowing across the cobblestone and whipping my delicate brunette tresses into my face, momentarily blinding me. The courtyard was lined with werewolves, each huddled in their own unique jackets to avoid the winter chill.

  Damien stands in a red cloak hanging precariously off his shoulders, his arms firmly situated by his sides. To everyone else, his face appeared blank and expressionless, buy I knew that the sullen look in his eyes signalled that he was worried. He was worried that the plan would fail.

  "Good luck," The King speaks to me and the other fourteen werewolves standing closely behind me. I couldn't see their faces, but I could imagine them: strong in the dawn of the task that would either result in death or success. Even from ten meters away, I could spot the strange gold flecks glittering solemnly in Damien's eyes. They were like minuscule drops of forbidden sunshine, trapped eternally in his gaze. Today they particularly stood out, and as I stood patiently, I counted four flecks in one eye, and six in the other. It was strange, but I had nothing better to do, and it distracted me from the dangerous task ahead of us.

  I bow my head at him. "Thank you," I utter quickly as a reply. Normally I would've rolled my eyes and told him that I didn't need it, even though I knew I did, but that wasn't a good idea in front of a crowd of his people.

  I gaze back into his wondrous eyes, and see something I had rarely spotted within the depths of his irises: worry. No, not worry - he was scared. Scared that I wouldn't come back, or scared that his plan would fail? Whatever the answer was, it drained all remaining hope out of my body like a tumbling rockslide, cascading to the ground in a hopeless pile. If Damien was scared that something would go wrong, then he was almost ninety-nine percent sure that it would fail.

  I tilt my head behind me, spotting the rest of my group bowing their heads to our king in respect. In all honesty, Damien wasn't a bad king at all. He was a strong leader who did what was in the best interest of his people, and no one had challenged his rule yet, which I took as a good sign.

  With one final glance at the crumbling city walls and the plain grey tiles below me, I take a deep breath to diminish my fear. The oxygen runs through my veins like a tsunami, making my cells buzz with a faint electrostatic feeling. Each footfall sends a jolt of electricity running up my limbs, spiralling into my bloodstream and settling as faint hope.

  "Aurora!" Damien blurts out suddenly. I whip my head around in a blink, wondering whether he had meant to call my name, or whether he hadn't said it out of choice.

  I raise an eyebrow, unsure of what he is going to say next. "Yes?"

  Damien's lip quivers, as if he is shivering. "Please be careful," he mutters, and for once I think that he is genuinely worrying about me.

  I show him a faint smirk. "When am I not?" And with my last remark hanging in the air like the severed chord attaching a puppet to its puppeteer, I saunter out of the castle walls and into the beyond.

  The group follows behind me in pursuit as we trudge through the light dusting of snow. It wisps around my ankles like weightless feathers parted from the creature they originally belonged to. Vibrant emeralds and dilapidated greens lie hidden beneath the veil of snow, the white power suffocating the branches of the trees as they sag towards the frostbitten ground. The world was mysteriously beautiful cloaked in white, and it was the one thing I loved about winter.

  The harsh crunching of snow being compressed alerts me to the presence of a running werewolf, and I sigh as the footsteps finally stop when they're beside me. Using my side-vision, I am able to pick out the dark orbs and messy brunette hair I had grown used to in the past few weeks.

  "Josh?" I question, my eyebrows furrowing.

  Josh waves in a childlike manner. "Yes, that's my name."

  I roll my eyes at him, watching as he smiles at me. "What the hell are you doing here?" I snap, my words perhaps a bit too brittle. "I told you to stay with Azra."

  Josh shook his head as his hand carefully checked for the knife in his belt. "You really thought that I'd sit there and wait for you to return when you could be getting killed instead?" Josh raises a bushy eyebrow at me questioningly, but it only causes me to roll my eyes once more.

  "Yes," I state through gritted teeth. Ever since we had kissed, our conversations had been more or less normal, but as soon as the topic came up, we both went quiet. It was a strange feeling that my best friend had kissed me, and I was still pissed off with his actions.

  "You clearly don't know me then," Josh exhales loudly. He stops, and I follow his lead, halting my steady walking pace to come face to face with him. I swiftly cross my arms over my chest, narrowing my eyes at him. Josh takes a step forwards, resting his hands on my shoulders as if I was a child, but I don't shrug them off. "Aurora, when you first came into the dining room during the Alpha Trials, I made myself a promise to protect you. I don't know why - we hadn't even talked - but I knew that you were special. You were born with a special electricity in your veins, and raging fire in your heart. I'm not going to let that go to waste," he speaks clearly, and I watch as his mouth bravely forms each word, his lips twitching for each syllable.

  My eyes are still narrowed at him, but I drop my arms clumsily to my sides. "I don't want you getting hurt, Josh," I begin, and I see the gleam of love ignite in his eyes. Shit. "Go back now, before it's too late," I finish, and ball my hands into tight fists as my legs voluntarily jog after the group of werewolves who had walked past our argument without even waiting for their so-called 'leader.'

  Yet again, the snow crunches under his feet as he regains his place by my side. "I'm not going anywhere," he comments, his tanned face focusing on the challenge ahead of him. Before us stood a great mountain with snowy peaks, and the odd silver of rock underlining the area where an avalanche had been born. It was the same mountain which stood next to the Scarlet Bone pack - the place where we were supposed to be going, and the one place I never wanted to return to.

  Brittle sunlight cascades around the tress like a falling curtain, and I can't help but notice the way the delicate snow refracts the piercing light. I take in a deep breath, filling my lungs with clean air, the scent of pine needles and animal hide pinching my nose. Without realising it, I become absorbed in the beautiful world around me: the towering trees; the deserted landscape stretching out before us like an ancient glacier, the ice forever shifting on an endless journey towards the pull of gravity.

  In fact, I had been so absorbed in my surroundings that I didn't notice the darkness pouring into the forest like a massive wave produced when the ocean swelled after a hurricane. Long and stretched shadows were slowly being etched across the scene as the final glimmers of sunlight faded, the limbs
of trees elongating into ruthless teeth and claws. Many people thought that the forest was alive and buzzing during the day, but it was in fact the night when the habitat chirped with a strange, ominous life.

  A cool object is slowly pressed into my hand, and I tentatively look down to see Josh's slim yet muscular hands push a metal bar into my own. I rub the patterned surface with my thumb, finding a small bump on the metal. I click it, and almost jump out of my skin as the path before me is illuminated with bright rays of torch light.

  "What the hell?" I questioned, still in shock at the object in my grasp. "Where did we get torches from?"

  Josh scrunched his nose, as if he was a child. In that moment I wanted to sprint up to him and give him the largest hug I could muster, but I didn't. There was still an awkward air settling between us. "Alex. Someone from her pack had them in their rucksack when they fled from the pack grounds. She figured we would need them in the tunnel."

  Normal Aurora would've said something snarky along the lines of if I was running for my life, I would definitely think 'oh let's get some torches while we're at it,' but this wasn't normal Aurora. Nor was it normal Josh. Whatever the kiss had done to us, it had diminished our friendship slightly, but it was still my last shining beacon of hope. I had no one else except Azra, but they came as a pair. If I lost Josh, I would lose Azra too. Then I would truly have no one - unless you call Damien a friend that is, which I - quite frankly - don't.

  Instead, the strange Aurora muttered, "She was right."

  Josh tilts his head towards me, clicking on his own electric device. I didn't know how long the batteries would last for, but I hoped that they would at least keep the torches lit for our duration in the mines.

  "We're here," a gruff voice states, and I blink to clear my vision as a looming cave comes into sight as we finally reach the top of the hill we are climbing up, our eyes cast down into the valley below. The night had ascended fully, leaving the snow suffocated world in a diminished view. The opening to the mine was an outline of splintering wood, with a pitch black hole leading into the unknown. "You know the route, right?" The same man asks, and I slowly nod my head.

  "We take the second left, then the first right, and we should be there. The mine was rarely used, so there is a minimal amount of paths," I say matter-of-factly. Josh raises an eyebrow. "Damien made me memorize it," I answer to his strange look, which causes him to bow his head slowly, as if his reactions were being delayed for some reason.

  Josh sighed, flaring his nostrils in the process. He doesn't mutter another word as he begins to descend, and with a light flutter of my eyelashes, I follow after the group. Even though I was supposed to be the leader, it didn't feel like it, and for that I was glad.

  I don't think twice about my slight fear of the dark as we are plunged into the endless tunnel. There are only three torches between the group which cast yellow splays of light across the dank mine. The walls were slick with water that rolled down the jagged walls in tainted droplets, appearing green against the faded rock.

  The walls seems to press on me as we continue to walk, every breath sending an icy flood of water into my lungs. I rub my arms to try and warm me up, but it doesn't work, and instead I bite my lip to divert my thoughts from the dropping temperatures. The cave walls continue to narrow, causing my breathing to quicken with a slight jolt, and feel as though all the oxygen in my lungs has been used up. How long would it be before I didn't have enough air to stay standing?

  Time blurs into a whirlpool of amber light and slimy rock, and each new point in the cave looks exactly the same as the previous points had done. The world was a hurricane of stone and granite, my head pounding as I tried to figure out where we were, and whether we had gone the correct way. I try to think, but I can't. I can't think. I can't see.

  Finally, when the real torment is about to begin, I walk into someone's back and nervously look up to see that I had walked into the sturdy back of one of the warrior werewolves accompanying me on this mission. He turned back, his harsh gaze meeting my own before his eyes flicked back to the entrance ahead of us.

  I sigh in relief, spotting the faint glimmer of crimson torches burning into the night ahead. The others quietly click off their torches, and I am soon to follow, placing the metal object in the belt around my waist, where the rest of my weapons were situated.

  "Is this it?" I ask, only to receive blank stares. I was the person who was supposed to lead them in the first place, and I hadn't even accomplished that.

  A smooth hand shakes my arm, the skin tingling under the man's touch. "Aurora, are you ok?"

  I gulp. No, I was not ok, but only because my fear of the dark and small spaces had got the better of me. I throw Josh a smile to try and persuade him that everything's alright, "yeah, why wouldn't I be?"

  He bows his head slightly and raises his eyebrows. "You're hyperventilating," he points out, and that's when I realise how quickly my chest is rising and falling, as if possessed by a mutant who could run at the speed of light.

  "Oh," I mutter, and immediately try to slow my breathing rate. I succeed after a minute, and watch curiously as everyone else turns their attention to me. I flick my hair over my shoulder, and confidently place my hands on my hips. I might be the only girl here, but I was stronger than all of them realised - at least I hoped I was. "Is everyone ready? This has got to be quick. Hunter's mate will be in the main dwelling, which I'm hoping is easy to spot. Try to blend in with the rogues when we enter their camp: you know what they act like," I instruct, still gaining some clueless stares. I roll my eyes - wasn't I clear enough? "Just follow my lead."

  I don't give them time to think over my words, and swiftly wind my hand around the grip of my sword, drawing it from its holder with satisfying ring of metal on metal reverberating in my eardrums.

  The snow crunches under my boots once more as I lead the group out of the cave, glancing from side to side to check that the coast is clear. When I notice that there are no rogues to threaten exposing us, I stride forwards into the forest before us. A path has already been carved into the fauna by years of trampling, and my hand begins to sweat around my sword as we get closer and closer to the rogue dwellings.

  What if this went wrong? What if this whole plan failed? Then what? Would we all be killed or held as hostages? How would we be able to weaken the rogues if we didn't have hold of their leader's mate?

  Josh wanders beside me, biting his lip as he refuses to speak. It's the quietest I've ever seen him, and the first time I didn't really want to talk to him. Of course we had to be silent for the mission, but even he would defy the rules and whisper a joke about the beard or random body part of one of the rogues teamed up with us. This Josh was different, and I hated it. I wish that we could take the kiss back. It wasn't my fault, but I wish that it had never happened - at least not until I was sure that I loved him back.

  Five minutes tick by in silence. Then another five. Time whirrs on like a fan, but finally the flame torches begin to brighten, lining the outside of an enormous clearing filled with tents.

  All of the dwellings were identical with white fabric in a taut triangle shape, numerous wooden poles inside the tents holding up the secure fabric. They were all arranged in rows, stretching out into the night like the universe we were eternally trapped in. But in the middle of tents was a more rigid structure: a castle, in fact. The stone didn't consist of turrets, just a large construction with high arching windows and an abundance of light tumbling through the gaps. A flag violently flapped in the torrent of wind. The flag was a plain scarlet: the colour of blood.

  The only problem was that the place was silent. As the zephyr picked up, throwing the flag into an even greater frenzy, all that I could hear was the whistle of the air as it effortlessly passed through the campsite.

  "Something's wrong," I state in awe. Where were they? Were we walking into a trap? "It shouldn't be this quiet."

  "Maybe they're all asleep," Josh suggested, but I roughly shook my head at his i
dea. Rogues didn't follow rules, and they would certainly not have gone to bed this early into the night.