Page 44 of Heart Broken Mate

“Are you going to be here for my ascension, Uncle Luke?” Jade asked, and Luke smiled at him.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he told him.

We both know he said that just to placate him, and heavens know what awaits us where we were going. Nellie took the child, and they walked into the house, leaving the two of us and Bonne, who handed the map to us. Luke collected it and looked it over. It was well-detailed and perfectly drawn out, starting right from the front door where we were all standing at the moment.

Bonne has spent the last couple of hours working on the map. Just as he promised, he decoded the marking on the other side of the medallion rather easily and got to work drawing us the map.The place we were going had no name, but it was somewhere deep in the woods, and by Bonne’s estimation, we would travel for about three days before we arrived. It would be a tumultuous journey, not just because we would still have hunters on our tail but because the road was dangerous. We would pass through mountains, valleys, and swamps. We were looking for a long-lost tribe that he said people assumed was wiped out after the royal house fell. I was still coming to terms with the fact that I was royalty. I didn’t feel like one. I had lived life as something less than a peasant. My parents never talked much about where they came from, and my mother rarely mentioned her maiden name. She only made sure I knew it, and she kept to my father’s. It probably was safer for her to use it.

“I really hope I got the map right,” Bonne said, looking at us. He seemed more anxious than us, but I knew that was because he wished he could come with us. He wanted to see the tribe and see how they lived. But to do that would mean leaving his family behind, and he couldn’t do that. Not when his kid's ascension was getting close. Also, if he came with us and had to travel and evade hunters, he would have to use his werewolf abilities. He didn’t want to do that.

“I am sure the map is just fine, Bonne,” Luke told him, and we said our goodbyes and headed out.

It wasn’t as cold as yesterday when we arrived, but the night was quieter in a way, and distant voices carried to me. This wasn’t just due to my enhanced hearing. There was something else going on. Luke and I exchanged a look, and we both had the intuition, but we didn’t stop walking. We didn’t even talk. We just pushed on, putting as much distance between us and Bonne’s home.

“Will they be fine?” I asked Luke as I looked back once more, the house now so tiny in the distance.

“Yes,” Luke said, but I could tell he wasn’t so sure.

Have we put that poor family in danger?

“Bonne knows how to take care of himself,” he added. We came to the end of the road and were now out of the street. We walked to the west, just as the map suggested. We were going to pass through different woods than we did before. We continued west.

I kept on taking sniffs of the hair, expecting an attack soon. It was inevitable. The people had been sent away for that reason, and I knew it wouldn’t be like back in the woods, where they were coming at us one after the other. We’ll get a bombardment here. I stood close to Luke, drawing strength from him. I felt like with him around, I could fight better. The stakes were definitely better.

We took just about ten steps further before the air was polluted by the smell of a werewolf. I knew it was Viper immediately. Luke and I stopped walking and turned around to see him shrouded in the dark. He wasn’t alone. I could sense others with him but couldn’t tell their number. I was surprised to see it was just werewolves and no human hunters.

“I heard you two were back in town and working together. I came to take a look,” he said and stepped out of the dark, a little grin on his face.

I could see him better now, and he looked different. Not the unsure boy I used to beat whenever James had us fight each other. He looked confident, cold, and in charge. He looked like an Alpha. The role fit him perfectly.

He stepped closer to us until he was just a couple of feet from me.

“Well, hello, Hayley. Long time no see.”

“Still need a posse to go to a fight, Viper?” I asked him.

“I’m an alpha now. I need a posse for everything,” he said and looked at Luke. “You know, I had great plans for you and your friends at the reservation. Now, all of you would have to die.”

He moved his hand up and signaled to the people behind them. They all started to troop out of the darkness, and I could barely believe the sheer number of them. They have to be around twenty of them. I looked around and saw some of the pack members. The people that Viper trusted. He seemed to have added to his posse.

“Do you want to go down this route, or do you wish to surrender?” he asked.

We can’t take them all. Not the two of us. I knew that. Luke did, and Viper did too. I guessed that was why he came with the large number and why he waited until we left Bonne’s and were in the street where we would have nowhere to run or hide. He’d always been the cunning one.

I took a step towards him until I was standing right in his face. The fear that used to be in there was gone now. He was very self-assured for a moment that stumped me, but I shook it off. It was just Viper before me. No one special. Then I slapped him.

Then, he got his answer.

Before he could react to the slap, the crowd behind him charged forward. Then he moved and tried to fight me, but he was stillslower than me. I evaded his attack and punched him in the chest. I went for him again, but someone got in my way and kicked me off. I didn’t care who it was. I turned around, grabbed them by the neck, and snapped it. The man dropped to the floor, dead. As he fell, another wolf attacked me from behind. I ducked just in time to miss the attack, but before I could respond, someone else punched me in the throat, and I fell to the ground. I watched as people reached down to pummel me. I growled and pushed myself up, flying into the air and lifting one of them with me. I extended a claw, and stuck it into the person’s neck just as I dropped to the floor.

We couldn’t keep this up. There were too many of them. I moved away from them and stood beside Luke, who had his claws extended and his eyes glowing as they circled us. We turned around and watched them. They won’t come at us one at a time. They will come at us as a group and weigh us down. Luke has killed just two of them too, and there were more. They started towards us, inching in and looking to choke us. Luke and I stood side by side, and I wondered how many of them we could take down before they got us. I was worried but didn’t panic. I looked beyond them and at Viper, who had moved to the back to keep himself safe. If I died out here, I would take Viper down with me. I know the council and the Tarloux family will replace him with someone else, someone they can control, but I would have rid the world of one more evil person.

As they made their way closer to me, I looked for a path toward Viper.

But then, a howl from a close distance distracted them. They all turned around to see what it was as three werewolves jumped over them and landed beside Luke and me. I looked up again as another set of three landed, but they spread themselves aroundthe werewolves. Now, Viper’s werewolves were caged between us.

It was Luke’s lone wolf friends.

“Were you just going to leave town without saying hi to us?” one of them said.

---