Chapter 30

Roman’s POV

I waited till everyone had left the room and walked up to the door.

“What’s the real reason you want to join me?” I closed the door after Riley and turned to Tallulah who was still in the room.

“It’s too much for one person,” She shrugged, collecting all her files.

“That’s the only reason?” I raised a brow at her. Resting my hand on her files so she could stop focusing on that and focus on our case.

“I volunteered because I know besides you I am the best among everyone else. Nobody trained as much as the queen,” She tugged on the files and narrowed her eyes on me.

“Fine. We leave tonight,” I watched as she walked to the door.

“Do I need anything?” Tallulah turned to ask. I nodded.

“A whole bunch of things but don’t worry, I’ll just send you the list,” I sighed, thinking of how much I needed last time. At least now I know exactly what’s necessary and what isn’t.

“Is it that much?” The redhead raised a brow at me, clearly handling this as if it wasn’t a big deal.

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t underestimate this,” I looked in her direction as she walked to me.

“Just wondering man,” She shrugged, resting her hand on the handle of the door, waiting for me to step away so she could go out.

“Yeah, whatever,” I mumbled, stepping out of the way. She might think this is a walk through the park, but it wasn’t, and I knew I said she wasn’t my responsibility but that didn’t mean I wanted her to get hurt or worse.

I left and went to my room and began making a list of everything we might need. It was your classic camping trip necessities along with extra clothes, first aid kits, much more food than you think and not to forget weapons. More than the usual normal amount one would take. I took a photo of the list and sent it to Tallulah then went and packed my own bag.

I finished lacing up my boots and tucked in the dagger there then went to the cupboard and picked out the small bottles of alcohol and added it to my bag and zipped it up. I checked the time and went to go find Tallulah.

“What are a bow and arrow even needed for?” Tallulah asked, adding some arrows into the big brown leather bag.

“You’ll begin to see shit there and sometimes you don’t know what’s real and what isn’t so using this as your weapon will be a bit easier. If you got a great shot of course,” I explained, putting on my watch not that it would have many purposes, it stops working there for some reason.

“What do you mean you see things?” Uncle Tristan frowned, helping the queen put her two bags in the trunk.

“I’m not sure how to describe it. You’re in a stage between awake and dreaming—only it is more like a nightmare rather than a dream.” I put my own two bags next to hers and shut the trunk.

“Are you saying you saw other mythical beings?” Tessa frowned, wrapping her jacket around her body and walking down the steps to us.

“Yes and I wasn’t sure what was real and what wasn’t but one thing I did know was that they came onto me,” I answered, crossing my arms as I looked at my little sister. I was doing this for her, at her request.

“Okay, please be careful okay,” Uncle Tristan said, hugging his daughter.

“Thank you for doing this, Romie,” Tessa came to give me a hug, I nodded and hugged her back, “You’re welcome, Tess.”

“Be safe you two,” Riley said, looking over at me.

“I will,” I nodded and waited for Tallulah.

“Goodbye, and take care of the tasks okay, dad?” She took a step back from her father.

“I will, your highness,” He smiled and opened the door for her.

~~~

We both got into the car to the airport. We’d be taking her private jet to a small city nearby the mountain. On the way there we barely spoke, we each read our own book in peace. Once we arrived at the city I drove us to the motel we’d be staying at.

“What do we do next?” Tallulah asked, pacing around in the room, looking at the peach-coated walls. The motel room wasn’t exactly the prettiest, but it was closest to our destination.

“I just ordered us pizza. We just get ready for the night, then we’ll eat and hit the hay,” I informed her, throwing my phone on one of the two beds and sitting down on the chair behind me.

“Wait, we’re not going to the mountain?” She frowned. I could tell she was eager for the actual mission, but she’d have to wait a bit.

“Firstly we’re tired. Secondly, it’s best we go at night when no one sees us,” I explained, untying my shoelaces.

“Oh... “ She frowned and let herself fall down on the bed.

“Yeah, I’ll go shower first,” I said as I collected the things necessary from my bag and entered the bathroom. Whilst showering I heard Tallulah opening the front door and there was an exchange of words between her and someone else who I’m assuming is delivering our pizza. I hurried up and rinsed away the bubbles then went and put on my clothes.

~~~

Once midnight came our alarms went off and we began to prepare for the long hike. I let out a sigh as I looked at the path ahead of us.

“Roman, I was thinking we should probably mate,” Tallulah said, stepping over the branches and avoiding the pool of mud.

“Excuse you? Have inhaled the fumes I was talking about already?” I chuckled and looked over at her, though I didn’t smell anything yet, so I doubted it I still wanted to doublecheck.

“What? No, I’m serious,” She frowned, walking around the stone in the middle.

“Tallulah, I don’t love you and my wolf’s feelings are constantly changing, what makes you think I’d take you back?” I turned around to face her.

“You never rejected me back since you returned,” She caught up to me.

“And that means I still love you?” I raised a brow at her. I turned around and continued leading the way up the mountain.

“No but you know the goddess had this set out for us, maybe we shouldn’t ignore it?” Tallulah suggested. I turned around to face her.

“You got the—watch out,” I said when I grabbed her hand to stop her from falling back.

“Thank you…” She mumbled and dusted down her clothes then followed me again.

“As I was saying, you also had nightmares didn’t you?” I asked. Why else would she be so desperate to fulfill our prophecy?

“Yes. An apocalypse or whatever and I keep getting blamed for not playing my part…” Tallulah admitted quietly, almost ashamed.

“I had the same one all right,” I sighed, just last night I had a brief experience of our finest gift by the goddess.

“And you still don’t want to mate?” She sounded confused.

“No, I do not,” I answered her. After what she had done it would be difficult to.

Third-person POV

Tallulah just nodded, deep it felt like she was shot through the heart. Is this what rejection felt like? She decided not to focus on her feelings at the moment and instead followed him up the mountain carefully. The critters hidden in the bushes they passed gave her the chills. She buttoned up the coat she wore to help her against the chilly night breeze. The queen looked up from her watch, almost bumping into Roman’s back.

“Why did we stop?” Tallulah asked, looking at a big pile of dirt, surrounded by more mossy dirt. This didn’t exactly look like a cave to her.

“We’re here,” Roman explained, turning around to face the redhead.

“What? I thought there would be a cave,” She frowned, looking around again to be sure they were at the right place.

“There is, but first we have to make an offer to the goddess,” He smirked, looking down at her.

“What type of offer?” Tallulah asked, gulping. She wasn’t aware there would be an offering and it seemed rather horrifying.

“Blood offering, it’s the only way she clears the path for us wolves,” The blonde explained.

Roman pulled a knife from his pocket and slid the palm of his hand, the very hand that had the old mark. Now she knew how he got it. She took the knife she was handed and wiped it before cutting herself too.

“You let it drip over this soil,” He held his hand over the soil where the white flower was planted. The blood dripped down onto the dirt and got soaked immediately.

Tallulah mimicked what he did, soon she saw the white petals turning into a bloody red one. Roman smirked, watching Tallulah’s eyes twinkle. The bright purple mist mirrored in her eyes. The mist cleared the dirt in the mountain, paving a clear path for them into the cave Roman spoke of.

“Come on,” Roman wrapped a piece of cloth around her hand than did the same for himself.

Tallulah followed him in. The moment they stepped foot inside it became murky, she soon felt light-headed and could barely keep her eyes open, her breathing became heavy as did Roman. He pulled her to sit down, knowing they’d pass out soon. A few hours later Tallulah woke up and felt a heavy head on her shoulder, she looked over and saw it was Roman. She shook him awake, he jerked up and rubbed his temple.

“Are you alright?” Roman groaned, standing up. He had a throbbing headache.

“No, I passed out,” Tallulah groaned, taking Roman’s hand to get up.

“Happened the first time too,” Roman answered, looking around. “We should get going,” He began to walk again, “Yes,” Tallulah dusted off her bottom and adjusted the straps of her backpack. She noticed Roman looked around with a dazed look on his face. “What’s wrong?” She asked him.

“The path seems different than last time…” Roman answered, frowning as he looked at the path, last time he followed this exact path, yet it seemed so different now.

“Maybe it was too long ago to even remember?” The redhead pointed out, shooing away the mosquitoes.

“Could be,” He mumbled and followed through on the path he went on last time. “Prepare your weapons, from here on now we’ll meet with some monsters that could either be real or just our imagination but either way be prepared,” Roman checked his pocket for his knife then pulled out his gun.

“Oh, okay,” Tallulah did the same and became much more cautious of her surroundings.

With that, the two embarked on their journey that lasted three days already, constantly fighting with beings they’ve never seen before whilst being completely light-headed. Little by little Tallulah came to realize why Roman called this place hell on earth. Roman became frustrated, this wasn’t the path he was on more importantly those two naps they took his nightmare got worse.

“We can rest here,” Roman checked out the tunnel they found, it had clean water and was somewhere private and hidden so they wouldn’t have anything to worry about.

“Now I fear even resting, last time the plants came to life,” Tallulah removed the heavy bag from her back and let out a soft moan then slid down against the wall.

“Better than the potential ogres,” Roman chuckled, opening up his bottle and filling it back up with water.

“Oh yeah, those could have us for dinner easily,” Tallulah took off her boots and massaged her feet. “I don’t get it, why are we being led astray?” She finally asked, she could tell Roman was already lost and it looked like they kept going in some sort of circle. It was as if they weren’t meant to find the place.

“Because we have another thing to do, fulfill our prophecy…” Roman sighed, turning to look at Tallulah. He knew this was exactly what the goddess wanted but he tried avoiding it as long as they could, but it had been too long already. They had to be quick to make it back on time.

“Are you suggesting that we mate?” The redhead frowned, standing up.