Chapter 39
Blake ran into Ash and Nick in the garden.
“Hey,” Blake said.
“You okay?” Nick asked.
Blake nodded. “Yep, just busy. The council is turning up this afternoon.”
“That should be fun,” Ash commented.
“We are going to bring them up to speed on Barnabus, the pack attacks and the coming war. Ares suggested I get an assistant.”
“I thought that’s what Ash was,” Nick said.
Blake shook his head. “No, he is my Beta and Regent. We could both do with an assistant.”
“We really could,” Ash agreed.
“I’ll leave you to find one. Hopefully someone moving here would like a job.”
“I’m sure they will,” Ash replied. ”We should probably create a newsletter or something to keep everyone up to date on what’s happening.”
“That’s a good idea. Our new assistant can be in charge of that.”
Ash breathed a sigh of relief.
Blake and Nick laughed.
“You thought I’d make you put it together?” Blake asked.
Ash nodded. “I did. Thank you for not dumping that on me.”
“You also need to pick a day for the shaman’s trial and execution,” Nick reminded him.
“I’ll check with Puff and Tudor and see about holding it tomorrow.”
“Good, he needs to die,” Ash said.
“He really does.”
Blake looked around the meeting table. The council ministers had just got settled.
At the far end of the meeting room were three thrones with smaller ones off to one side, and the large, round table was in the middle of the room. There were more chairs in rows along the sides of the walls.
Baylan, Puff, Paris, Ashton, Tudor, Alex, Frederick and the two generals, along with Maletayah and Shiloh, were sitting with them.
Dane, Atticus, Mateo, Jaxton, Cade and Greyson sat at the side.
Drinks had been served, and tablets and laptops were opened and ready.
“Thank you, everyone, for joining Puff, Tudor and myself today. We thought we would bring you up to speed on what is happening.”
Council leader, Indigo Merryman leaned forward. “Is this regarding the email that a demon sent out?”
Blake nodded. “Yes. The demon Barnabus killed my father, Tom Hayes, and is currently residing in his body.”
A few council members gasped.
“How could that happen?” One asked.
“The idiot sold his soul to Barnabus. When my father failed to kill my mother or hand over Alex Adams to him, Barnabus killed him and took over my father’s pack.”
Baylan laid his hand on Blake’s leg in silent support.
Blake flashed him a half smile.
“As Alpha Tom, Barnabus has been attacking wolf packs,” Puff said. “The members of the attacked pack are given a choice: join him or die. Unsurprisingly, most of the wolves chose death.”
“We have three defence teams made up of mixed shifters and if a call comes in for help we send a defence team in Jason found information on the last pack that was to be attacked thankfully our defence team got there before Barnabus and his pack arrived.”
Alex touched Tudor's leg and he stopped talking and took a breath.
“We have, of course, heard of the attacks that have happened,” Councilman Merryman said.
“And how helpful the defence teams have been,” another added.
“But as you no doubt know, Barnabus is trying to build an army and start a war,” Blake said.
“He wants to kill Blake, Tudor and me, but he also wants to kill the gods. Something none of us want,” Puff said, sipping his coffee.
“As you can imagine we want to stop him from killing members of our family our war council that is the two Generals Frederick Shiloh Maletayah and others are devising ways in which we can stop him and Ares is training our teams to be the best they can be.”
Alex patted his leg, and Tudor breathed.
“What can we do to help?” Councilman Merryman asked.
“If you hear of anyone joining Barnabus, can you keep us informed? The first lot of council guards are arriving today. They will start training straight away,” Blake said.
Indigo nodded. “We can indeed. Just know we at the council are ready to stand with you if and when the war comes.”
“Thank you,” Blake said. “As you can imagine, we are anxious for this war to be stopped before it has started. There is no way humans wouldn’t notice a war going on around them.”
“We might need to have procedures put in place for if humans find out about us I can’t imagine human leaders will be impressed when they find out shifters are real,” Tudor said.
“Some governments already know, as a few have shifter military divisions. Indeed, I was formally a Commander in one,” Shiloh put in.
“There are already humans that know about us. I came across one not long ago, saying he was going to form hunting parties to kill all the freaks he came across. His words, not mine,” Alex said.
“That’s a scary thought, but that is a problem for another day. We need to deal with Barnabus and stop this war first,” Blake said.
“We do. I have some other items that need to be discussed,” Indigo said.
Hours later, the meeting finished and everyone stood up saying their goodbyes.
“Dane, Shiloh, can you show our guests out, please?” Blake asked.
“We can,” Shiloh said, gesturing to the door.
The council left along with Dane and Shiloh.
“Guys, I need a moment before you all leave,” Blake called.
Everyone except Blake sat down.
“We need to discuss the Hayes Pack shaman. We know he’s going to be executed because of his crimes, but how are we going to kill him?”
“I like Puff’s idea of hanging, drawing and quartering,” General Gasgoyne said.
“Another idea is we can put two boats on the lake tie him to both cover him in honey and let birds and insects eat him it will be a slow painful death,” Tudor suggested.
“We could flay him alive,” Cade suggested.
“Or skin him,” Mateo said.
“How about we whip all the skin off his back, then hang him until he is nearly dead, castrate and disembowel him, then tie him to the two boats?” Atticus suggested.
“Nice, then we can incorporate a bit of everything,” General Delinga said.
Murmurs of agreement sounded.
“So, all in agreement of this idea, raise your hand,” Blake said.
Everyone raised their hand.
“The motion is passed. Tomorrow evening, he will be executed,” Blake confirmed.
“We’ll need a scaffold built and a fire to burn his bits. A pole to string him up on so the whipping can happen, two boats and lots of honey,” Ash said, making notes.
“We can build the scaffolds and the whipping station,” General Gasgoyne offered.
“I can produce two boats, if you let me know what kind you want,” General Delinga said.
Blake looked at Tudor. “I’ll let you help with that, as it was your idea.”
Tudor nodded. “I can do that I saw the perfect ones when I was researching horrible execution methods.”
“Wait, Tudor,” Puff said, sitting forward in surprise. “You researched different methods?”
“I did I honestly didn’t know there were so many but there was pressing someone to death where a person was stripped naked laid on the ground and a piece of wood like a door was placed on them and then heavy stones or weights put on their chest crushing them to death then there was a red hot poker up the arse boiling them alive in hot oil burning at the stake. ”
Alex tapped his leg. “Breathe, my darling.”
Tudor took a large breath.
“Good for you, brother,” Dane said from the back of the room, having walked back in when Tudor started talking.
Tudor grinned. “It was interesting.”
“I can imagine,” Dane replied. “Just to let you know, some of the council guards have just arrived. Oh, I had a word with the farmer who was selling off some of his land and asked him how much for the whole farm. He’s getting back to me later.”
“Thank you, Dane. That was good thinking,” Blake said. “Alright people, we’re done. Thanks for coming. Puff, Tudor, we should go and greet the new guards.”
Puff nodded. “We can do that.”
Everyone stood up to leave.
General Delinga looked at the three kings. “Can I suggest that tomorrow you wear your crowns? ”
“That would make sense,” Puff replied.
“Unfortunately it does,” Tudor said simply.
Blake suddenly grinned. “Look on the bright side, Tudor, Alex and Baylan will be wearing theirs as well.”
“Well, crap,” Alex muttered.
Tudor patted his arm.
Baylan just sighed.