Chapter 48
-Farley-
"Is that the only thing he does?" Yam asked as he stared after Pax.
I snarled at him before running after Pax. I didn't get very far as wolves were soon throwing themselves at me. Ralph's pack scrambled and clawed at the wolves who were on top of me, but a few had landed some scratches. I couldn't say how bad the damage was, but going against more then three wolves wasn't something we practised often.
"Why are you hurting him?" Carme asked, sounding more distressed then she had moments before. "I don't understand."
"He's on their side," the girl with long brown hair explained. I didn't know who she was, but she was one of the four who were in their human forms. "If the black wolves are dead, all our troubles will be gone. We won't have any barriers."
"What barriers do you have now?" Ralph asked. "I go to the human world frequently, what is stopping you from doing that?"
"We have to hide," Yam stated. "We shouldn't have to hide who we are for the comfort of humans."
I snorted.
Yam turned to me. "Wha'ts so funny? Come on, you're so powerful in your wolf form, you can't even go against us." He barked a laugh. "Shift."
I did just that, quickly putting on a pair of shorts. "Okay, for one, you sound like a child." I pointed towards him as I spoke. "Secondly, what does Pax have to do with you shifting into your wolf in front of humans and possibly getting attacked? There aren't many humans who remember us."
"But they exist," Yam emphasises each word. "Didn't you hear me earlier? Or are you deaf? That would make a great partnership, wouldn't it?" He smirked.
I rolled my eyes at his comment, I was somewhat glad that Pax wans't here to hear it.
"Surely those who are able to remember arne't stupid enough to think that killing defenseless wolves would be the solution to anything," Ralph commented. "I've had my fair share of humans doing things for other werewolves, going so far as to poison one of their own. People are unpredictable."
I opened my mouth to tell him that he had contradicted himself, but I decided against it as my brain figured out what he was saying.
In the corner of my eye, I saw two brown-coloured wolves slipping away. The wolves were familiar, but I didn't know exactly who ti was. I crossed my fingers in hopes that it was someone from Ralph's pack.
"How many of you are with this?" Carme asked, using a much smaller voice as she addressed her pack.
One wolf stepped out of the crowd, followed by another, and another. Around thirteen wolves moved from Yam's side to behind Carme, who smiled weakly at them.
"Traitors," Yam hissed. "Oh, who cares? We have Dillion's pack, and we have what remains of Kian's." His posture was proud, his chin in the air.
"So, what? You're going to get all your wolves together to attack?" Carme asked, crossing her arms. "Attack a single, poor wolf?"
"If that's what it takes," the girl with brown hair nodded. "He's not just a single wolf anymore." Her eyes darted over to me.
"I mean, technically, we're dating." I shrugged. I tried to keep the smirk off my face as I knew that wasn't what she meant. "I haven't asked him to be my boyfriend yet though, so technically he's still single."
"Shut up," the brown haired girl demanded. "Yes." She turned her attention back to Carme. "And I hope that you're ready for a battle."
"We will be," Carme said.
I was shaking my head, my fists clenching and unclenching at my sides. "Wait, wait, hold up." I pointed towards Yam and the brown haired girl. "Why do we need to fight? Why can't we just keep doing what we're doing and talk it out?"
Yam smirked. "It's no fun," he said. "Besides, who knows if he's still alive as we speak?"
I huffed and turned my back to him. "I guess I better find out," I muttered and headed further into the trees. I was sure that there wouldn't be another fight, Yam's group were now outnumbered. If he were smart, he'd back away. Though, I was beginning to doubt his intelligence. I may just be biased, but I didn't see any connections between anything he had discussed, or maybe I was the stupid one.
I didn't find Pax, but I did find Beaumont and Rhodes, who had been looking for Pax since they slipped away from the confrontation.
"How could he have disappeared?" Beaumont asked, crouching down to inspect the dirt. "We weren't that far behind him."
"He's fast," I stated. "He knows the forest well; he knows exactly where to go in order to confuse people or where the thickest cover is." Which wasn't helping those who were on his side either. "At least the ones most familiar with him are confused?" I offered as a positive.
"I suppose that's one way to look at it." Rhodes sighed. "Well, we bst just keep looking."
"You don't think he would've gone back to town, do you?" Beaumont asked after a while of walking. "That would make it even more difficult."
I mentally cursed. Please Pax, don't be in the town or city. I never really knew the difference between the two, I suppose it was more of a city.
"If he is, we're all screwed," Rhodes replied. "But we haven't looked everywhere yet. He might still be here."
He wasn't, we looked in every corner of the forest, spooking some animals as we went. We met back up with Moss, Channon, Channing, and Tempest, who told us the others had returned to Pax's house and were taking care of Rowan. There was the exception of Randall, Oran, Lowell, and Melina, who were heading back to our house and making sure everything was locked. They would be meeting my parents there and bringing them up to date with what was going on.
I couldn't get Pax's face out of my mind, and in my mind he was terrified. I didn't know where he was, even though I felt like I should. He couldn't have crossed the bridge again, so he had no other choice but to go South.
"Farley?" Tempest's voice brought me back to reality. "You alright there?" She had a nervous look on her face, as though I were a child she was afraid would start crying at any moment.
"I'm fine," I told her. I hadn't moved in a while, my thoughts kept me rooted to the spot. "Where are we going?" I blinked a few times, the trees just looked all the same.
"We're re-grouping," Moss answered. "We're going to get Rowan home and then we'll make better groups to search for Pax."
"But what if he goes back to his house? What if he's in the city? What if the enemy already has him?" I asked each question as they came to my mind.
"We'll find him," Moss said and put his hand on my shoulder. "It'll just take some time."
Time which we don't have, time which could be used for the enemy to take the chance and scoop him up into their claws.
Moss' hand on my shoulder tightened. "Farley."
"What?" I met his eyes and sighed. My thoughts weren't going to calm down anytime soon. "Sorry."
"It's alright, but it'd be a bit more efficient if you could keep your thoughts on track."
Tempest punched her partner in the shoulder, causing him to wince. "Bit more emotion, will ya?" she asked. "Don't worry about him, Moss I mean. He's not good at channelling emotions and making words leave his mouth."
I just shook my head with a small smile and followed the group to the house.
We still hadn't found him by the time we got home. We met up with those who were around my age, Lowell, Oran, Melina etc, and decided to stay in the hideout. It was safer than staying in our house, and it was less suspicious then a massive group of people meeting at the park.
A knock came from the door to the library, causing me to perk up from my position on the floor. I was in my wolf form, as it was easier to fight that way. Nobody really had anything to say so I just brainstormed any places where Pax could be.
"Lana, Brin, good to see you," Caspian said through the door. They probably couldn't hear, but it told me who was outside.
I darted towards the door before it had opened and circled my parents as they entered.
"Oh, Farley," my mother said, reaching down to hug me. "I'm so happy you're safe." That reminded me of Rowan, who was lying on the bed which Iris had been sitting on a few days ago.
My father reached down to hug me as well.
I stayed close to them as they made their way through the sea of people. Sea might be exaggerating, but there were over twenty people here, and the room simply wasn't big enough.
After a quick discussion about what happened, and my mother fretting over everybody, the room was filled with silence again.
"We can't ask anyone for help," Caspian said out of the blue. "That would announce to everyone that he should be around here, and that he's alone."
I hated the fact that he had a point.
"There's three packs here," Karim pointed out. "We should really be able to find him." He ran a hand down his face, his scars seemed even more prominent in this lighting.
"He could just be wondering though," Iris pointed out. She hadn't left Rowan's side since we got here. She made sure that he had everything that he could need, not that we had a lot. He had the pillows from all of the beds and chairs, as well as every blanket piled next to him, apparently it was too hot to use them at the moment. "There might not be any reason to where he's gone."
She also had a very good point.
I lay next to my parents and rested my head on my paws. The only place I could think of would be the gym, and that may be too risky for him. I couldn't have imagined going there after it had been attacked by the enemy, nevermind the fact that he doesn't work there.
"At least for us, we knew who our enemies were," Aiden muttered. "I hadn't actually seen packs be torn apart."
"Well, I think they'd been considering it for a while," Carme said. "Apparently building alliances is harder than I thought."
"Were you trying to build one with Dillion?" Ralph asked. Carme nodded in response. "He seems like a questionable type, if I'm honest."
Aiden smacked his arm. "He helped us..." he trailed off. "But yes, he was very stern and cold."
"He was sweet," Carme argued. She turned to look at the five people who had followed her here, all of which avoided eye contact. "What?"
I didn't know the man too well, I had met him once or twice, but I hadn't had an actual conversation with him. A fact which I'mr rather happy about now.
"He wasn't the nicest," a girl spoke up from the group.
"And his training was super difficult," the boy next to her added. "He was very violence focused."
"I think I know what happened," Emi spoke up with a smirk. She winked towards Carme, who blushed.
"That wouldn't interfere with anything," Carme claimed. "He was just kind enough to offer to help out."
I understood what Emi meant now. Carme had a thing for Dillion. That was obvious now that I thought about it for a few moments.
"Maybe we should go and find Arkin?" Iris suggested. "He might help us figure out what Kian was planning to do, or how to fight the...others?"
It was rare that Iris didn't have the correct word. She had dark circles under her eyes and her hair was frizzy.
"Arkin?" Tempest asked. She perked up and a grin came to her face. "We could go and get him."
"We could," Moss agreed. "It'd be nice to see him again."
I knew Arkin, I'd met him a few times as well. The conventions that we went to meant that I knew the majority of alphas at least. Arkin lived in a forest, like Kian, but the pack was more oriented around family, a very small family. His pack was smaller than mine.
"It's not a bad idea," Caspian said. "We'll be splitting up again, something which we really shouldn't do..."
"We'll be fine," Channon said, his brother nodding behind him. "It'll just be a small group."
"Yeah, they won't even recognise us," Channing added.
"A small family trip won't hurt." Tempest gave her partner the puppy-dog eyes. "It'll help?"
Moss sighed and nodded. "Yeah, we'll go and talk to them. They know us pretty well, so it shouldn't be too difficult."
"And we can beat them up if they attack us." Channon held his fists in front of him. I suppose he was right, the family of four seemed strong enough to battle an entire pack by themselves.
"Be safe," Ralph instructed and stood up, patting them on the shoulder as they left. It was a strange sight to see, Tempest and Moss making the decisions and then the alpha just wishing them well. It was a refreshing thing to witness after so much focus is put on alphas being controlling.
"Always are," Moss replied and put an arm around Tempest. "We should be back by tomorrow night."
There were a variety of agreements and goodbyes as they unlocked the door and slipped through. I rolled over to one of the holes in the wall to watch them leave.
"That's one positive," Aiden muttered. "What about Ashton?"
Ralph shook his head. "I don't think that's the best idea. We don't know where he stands." He sighed and ran his hands down his face. "There's many wolves who have it out for Pax's family, and we don't know why, or to what extent."
"The black wolves were respected," my father argued. "They were loving and caring towards the community. They wanted nothing else but to live peacefully. They were the ones which were wiped out."
"What actually happened?" Ralph asked. "How could the community's view on them change so suddenly?"
My father sighed and took his hat off, running a hand through his thinning grey hair. "I was told not to tell, but I suppose it is important."
Hello lovelies!
I hope that you're all doing well :D
I realise that it's a little late, but happy pride month!!
The question of the chapter is; what's your favourite boardgame?
I quite like trivial pursuit- especially when playing with my cousins. I do get quite a bit competitive with things like that though, and extremely annoyed at myself. But that's part of the fun :D