63. Chapter Sixty-Three - Wilder
We reach the wolf encampment in record time after leaving our car near the train station and going through the desert on foot.
Navigating through the vast sea of tents, the new moon cloaks our movements.
The soft white sand muffles our footsteps as we slip past the guards.
Their vigilance is no match for our intimate knowledge of the terrain.
The guards are focused on the distant horizon, failing to notice what’s right under their noses.
We move like shadows, silent and stealthy, more akin to specters than soldiers.
Ahead, the bonfire Bennett mentioned flickers, illuminating the surrounding wolves.
They sit in human form, their laughter ringing through the night air.
Some indulge in drink, their eyes glassy, and movements sluggish after the long journey from Lua, while others remain alert, their sharp, pointed ears attuned to any signs of intrusion.
Catching Brigid’s eye, I nod, my lips in a grim line.
Without a word, she understands my unspoken plan.
With a silent signal, she retreats into the darkness.
The night quickly swallows her as she sets off to create a distraction.
According to Bennett, the prisoner tent housing Stellan and Queen Jorina lies between the princes’ grand structures.
When I spot it, my fists tighten.
It’s small and unimposing, yet Leigh’s grandmother has been confined in it for days.
While Corona’s leaders were distracted by internal grievances and distrust, they failed to realize the pawprints at the border belonged to an advancing army.
I dread what condition we might find them in.
As we draw closer, a sense of unease prickles the back of my neck.
I take a deep breath and signal Gianna and Marlowe to follow me.
We circle one of the largest tents, possibly Alden’s, where Leigh should be with him now offering the cure in exchange for Corona’s freedom.
I pray she’s successful.
In the distance, smoke billows into the night sky, carried on the desert breeze.
A few wolves around the fire take notice, their heads snapping up in alarm, but it isn’t until flames engulf a nearby tent, the crackling sound of burning fabric filling the air, that someone yells, “Fire!”
The wolves leap to their feet, yipping with panic, and race off to tend to the flames that Brigid has unleashed.
“Now,” I whisper-yell to Gianna and Marlowe.
We dart into the prisoner tent.
Rough canvas brushes against my skin as I slip inside.
Darkness engulfs me, pressing in from all sides.
Slowly, my eyes adjust to the pitch-black surroundings, and shapes and shadows gradually form in the gloom.
In the corner, two slumbering forms catch my eye.
Their bodies curled as if seeking comfort in sleep.
It’s Jorina and Stellan.
There are no guards, and my nerves are set on edge.
Were they so arrogant not to expect an ambush, or did we fall into a trap?
Jorina and Stellan sleep with their heads against a wooden beam, their hands bound by cuffs that glint in the faint firelight filtering through the tent’s entrance.
The design is like the ones used at Kratos to stifle a witch’s magic.
Heat twists in my gut.
“Melt their restraints,” I instruct Marlowe, who, to my surprise, hasn’t abandoned us like I had anticipated.
Despite now having what she wanted—a weapon to protect herself and a pardon from the queen—she remains by my side.
There’s still time for her to change her mind, though.
Flames ignite in her palms.
“Don’t move, Your Majesty, or I might accidentally burn you,” Marlowe says.
Queen Jorina blinks awake.
“Are you here to save us?” she asks, her voice hoarse.
“Yes. Now hold still.”
I watch the tent’s entrance with bated breath as Marlowe works behind me.
To my left, Gianna’s fingers twitch around her knife.
The seconds tick by, each one an eternity stretched taut, until finally, there’s a soft hiss of melting metal accompanied by Marlowe’s whispered warning to Jorina to stay silent.
Stellan flinches as Marlowe approaches him next.
He blinks his weary eyes while she works on his restraints.
His gaze shifts to his daughter, and Gianna’s lips curve into a half-smile that says, Yeah, even after you abandoned me, I came for you.
A shadow flickers over Stellan’s features as he returns his attention to Marlowe, but not before I notice the tears in his eyes.
He seems to understand he messed up, yet we still risked everything to rescue him.
Our being here doesn’t necessarily ensure our survival or freedom—that will depend on Leigh’s ability to negotiate with Alden—but at the very least, it buys them some time.
When his restraints fall away, Stellan massages his wrists, chafed but not as raw as Jorina’s.
“Let’s collect Brigid and leave,” I whisper.
I crouch to help Jorina stand, acutely aware of her cane’s absence.
Her clothes hang limply against her willowy, frail frame, the fabric worn and stained—a pungent odor of sweat and grime clings to her like a second skin.
“Where is Leigh?” Jorina asks.
“Safe, Your Majesty,” I tell her.
Gianna offers Stellan her hand.
He takes it and rises, towering over her.
“You look so much like her,” he notes.
I assume he means Maria.
“Let’s go,” I say.
“Wait,” a soft, accented voice calls from the shadows.
“Take me with you.” The words are barely louder than a whisper but carry a desperate edge.
We all pause, and Marlowe and I share a narrowed look.
Neither of us noticed another presence in the room.
I grip Jorina tighter as I turn toward the voice.
Peering into the darkness, I find a young woman with long, matted black hair stuck to her dirty skin.
Her clothes are ugly and torn, and her hands and feet are restrained.
Who the fuck is this girl?
I shift toward her.
“I sense a trap,” Marlowe rushes out.
But something about the girl seems familiar, as if we’ve met before, but I know we haven’t.
“Please,” the girl says.
“Don’t leave me with him. He’s a monster.”
My grip tightens on Jorina.
“Who is a monster?”
The girl licks her cracked lips.
“Zeus.”
“We can’t leave her,” Gianna commands.
“If we don’t, we will all end up like her,” Marlowe hisses.
Outside, the wolves grow louder, their voices too close for comfort.
Our window of escape is closing fast.
“Don’t go without me, please! I beg you,” the prisoner girl pleads.
“If we bring her with us, Zeus will be angry,” Stellan says.
I scoff.
Fuck Zeus.
We don’t cater to him.
“Who are you to Zeus?” I ask the girl.
“My name is Sama.”
“She is Ravi’s sister,” Stellan supplies.
I flinch.
If she’s Ravi’s sister, she’s also Leigh’s family.
The tent flap opens, and we all brace for action.
But it’s Brigid.
“Are you all trying to get caught? The time to go was five fucking minutes ago,” she seethes.
I peer behind her to where there are still no guards, and the sense of dread roiling inside me expands.
Something isn’t right.
“Ugh, fine, but if this goes wrong, I’ll say I told you so.” Marlowe groans.
She hurries to Sama, who recoils as if afraid Marlowe will strike her, but instead, she works on melting her restraints.
At the glimpse of the old Marlowe, I smile on instinct, then stifle it.
That person is gone.
“Thank you,” Sama says.
“Thank me when we are miles from here.”
We slip beneath the rear flap of the prisoner tent and cautiously make our way toward the exit, putting distance between ourselves and the commotion caused by the fire behind us.
Our goal is to reach the car undetected.
I hold my breath, not trusting myself to not make a sound.
“No, this way. Fewer wolves guard the western exit.” Sama tugs Brigid’s hand in the opposite direction of the car.
Another entrance comes into view, and for a moment, I believe we’ve made it.
But the sound of howls at my back shatters that illusion.
More howls and barks follow, a chilling chorus, making Jorina stiffen in my arms.
I hurry after the others, but even with my help, Jorina is too slow.
“Leave me,” the queen says.
“I am jeopardizing your safety.”
“No.” Leigh would never forgive me if I left her grandmother behind.
I would never forgive myself.
“There they are!” someone in the wolf army yells.
Sama’s yelp pierces the air, sending a jolt of adrenaline through my veins.
With a desperate tug, she yanks Brigid forward, propelling them several feet ahead of us.
“It’s Zeus,” Sama cries out.
“You need to hurry!”
Sama waves her hand in a swift, fluid motion, and tendrils of shadow, like a phantom fog, swirl around the two girls, enveloping them in a veil of darkness.
The shadows dance and twist, obscuring their forms from view.
Meanwhile, the wolves’ predatory gazes remain fixed on the rest of us, their eyes gleaming with a hungry intensity.
Stellan and Gianna run side by side, and I study Gi’s face—the fear in my friend’s eyes.
We won’t all make it.
“Stellan,” I croak.
He looks at me, and it takes every ounce of willpower to trust him after what he did to betray us in the first place by putting his faith in the enemy, but I need his help if we want Gi and Jorina to make it out of here safely.
“Take the queen.”
Stellan’s gaze lingers behind us.
“You are the only person strong enough to carry her,” I explain.
He nods, then takes Leigh’s grandmother from me.
“No,” Gianna growls.
“We all go, or none of us do.”
The wolves get closer, their howls growing louder with each passing second.
If they don’t go now, all of us will be taken as prisoners.
“Gianna, go find Leigh. Tell her I trust she’ll negotiate my release,” I say.
I have to.
Believing in her is our only option.
She will save me.
Marlowe doubles back.
“If you stay, then I stay.”
We hold each other’s gaze, and I find myself at a loss for words.
A part of me wants to tell her no, to insist that I don’t need or want her company, that this sacrifice to regain my respect is nothing more than an empty gesture.
But the words never come.
They get caught in my throat as conflicting emotions wage war within me.
Lost in the moment, I barely register the approaching danger until it’s too late.
By the time I come to my senses, the wolves have already arrived, their menacing presence sending a chill down my spine.
Gianna needs to leave.
“Go, now. We will distract them,” I tell her.
Gianna squeezes my bicep.
“Stay alive, you big idiot,” she says before racing away.
Marlowe and I turn around in tandem, our hands raised in surrender.
Hundreds of wolves and a tall, sinister-looking man resembling Alden with the same light eyes, but darker hair emerge from the shadows, their presence overwhelming in the clearing.
“Well, well,” Zeus sings, his voice dripping with malice.
“Isn’t this special, Alden? Two commanders for the price of one.”
Alden nods, shouldering through the crowd of wolves to stand beside Zeus.
His eyes, usually so expressive, are cold and unreadable.
Was Leigh able to get into his dreams?
Did they talk?
Is he on our side or his brother’s?
“Guess it’s our lucky night,” he says, as if bored.
Zeus howls to the absent moon, and the sound prickles my scalp.
His followers, in human and wolf form, surround us.
They force Marlowe and me to our knees.
Magic-reducing cuffs clamp around our wrists with a sickening finality.
As they haul us to our feet, I catch Alden’s gaze, searching for any sign of the man who once claimed to seek peace, but his eyes remain shuttered, betraying nothing as his men drag us back to camp.
With each stumbling step in the sand, my mind races with a single, terrifying thought: if Alden has abandoned us, if Leigh failed to convince him, then our fate is sealed.
The wolves’ cruelty knows no bounds.
But even as fear claws at my heart, I cling to hope that our sacrifice will not be in vain, that our friends will make it to safety and find a way to end this war.
Either way, Alden will reveal his true colors between now and morning.