Chapter 136 A match
Ruel’s POV
My leg aches with every step, forcing me into a slow, uneven limp.
Carefully I tighten my hold on the pup in my arms and lower my voice, murmuring soft, comforting words against his ear.
His grip on me doesn’t loosen. His small claws dig into my bruised skin, clinging as if he understands what just happened.
“Easy,” I whisper, though my own breath comes rough. “I’ve got you.” I add, trying to stabilize the pup I doubt is up to a year.
The ground beneath my boots is ruined and wet. Bodies lie scattered around me, rogues stretched across the dirt in twisted shapes.
Some of them stare blankly at the sky, unmoving. My nose wrinkles at the smell of blood sitting thick in the air.
Releasing another shaky breath, I blink. But then the trees around me blur.
For a second I think it is my sweat, but when I drag the back of my hand across my face, it comes away wet and dark.
Blood. I know it's blood. Now that I see it, I can feel it slide down from my hairline, slipping past my eye.
I blink again, harder this time, trying to clear my vision.
The pup shifts weakly in my arms, and I tighten my hold on him.
I lift my gaze, but immediately lose my focus as my head suddenly feels too light. My ears pick up a sound and I squint, my steps faltering when I spot movement at the opposite end.
Two figures break through the trees, running toward me.
“Omar? Elric?” I mutter weakly, staggering.
I open my mouth to tell them to relax as the remaining rogues already retreated when I nearly killed them all. But my lips feel extremely heavy.
Suddenly everything tilts, and the ground under me shifts.
When I wake, the first thing I notice is the weight of my own body.
It feels heavy, like something is crushing me into the ground. I hiss as a terrible pain follows a second later, spreading through me.
My head throbs, my ribs ache, and my leg burns with every small shift. Goddess be damned! Am I in hell or what?
I realize I'm not the moment my eyes flicker open. A dull orange light flickers against the wall, the gentle breeze from outside makes the lamp sway unsteady.
My hands protest as I push myself up before I can think.
“Stay down.” Elric’s voice cuts in immediately, startling me a bit. His hand presses against my shoulder, firm enough to stop me. “Your head is not fully healed yet.” he adds.
I blink again, trying to steady the movement of the room. “W..what happened?”
“You fainted,” he says. “Right after the fight ended.”
I frown slightly, trying to piece it together, but the memory slips. I remember growling at the retreating rogues, I remember walking, I remember seeing Omar and Elric running towards me but I don't remember falling.
I swallow. “And the pup?”
“Alive,” Elric answers at once. “He is currently with his parents.”
I let out a slow breath, some of the tightness in my chest easing. But not all of it.
A quiet, hollow ache spreads through me, deeper than the pain in my body. It settles in my chest, refusing to move.
Ira.
The space she left has not closed. It lingers, threatening my sanity. I hate that I still feel her absence beside me. I hate that even when I don't want to, the memory of her touch still burns my mind.
“She betrayed us.” I internally growl at Krist. “She chose him. She never truly cared, Krist.”
Krist stirs faintly at the back of my mind, releasing a low, broken feeling that presses harder against my thoughts.
“Stop this madness.” I tell him. “We don’t need her. And when we do find her, I'll make her pay.”
He only whines again, before going quiet.
I let out a long breath.
“Are you okay?” Elric asks, his voice sounding suspiciously quiet now.
With a groan I push myself up anyway. The room tilts, but I grit my teeth until it steadies. “Why are we still alive?” I mutter.
Elric shifts on the stool beside the pallet. “The Alpha King hid...”
“Like a coward. I know.”
“Well,” He leans forward, placing his elbows on his knees. “You pulled off some real alpha shit out there. That wasn’t the regular alpha strength and you know it, the whole pack now knows it too. Everyone is comparing you to the alpha king. They’re asking for a match.” he drops with a quiet gaze.
My brows furrow. “A match?”
He nods, his mouth curving into a slow smirk. “A challenge for the throne.”
I stare at him for a while. “No.” I eventually mutter.
“Ruel?”
“No.” I shake my head. “I’m not doing it.”
He studies me for a long moment, even the smirk on his face fades. “This is our chance. Finally, Alpha King Andre has openly failed the pack by abandoning his alpha duties.”
“Think of it. All the time supplies never arrived when we needed them. How he mocked you in every meeting, threatened your position… And didn't you find it fishy that Gestrid never told you your past?”
I look away from him but he doesn't stop. I can barely grasp the concept of what I am.
“Ruel this is our chance to unseat that asshole. Heck, he was going to have you…”
“Stop.” My tone hardens.
Elric raises both hands. “Don’t tell me you're still considering staying loyal to him.”
“I don’t care.” I drag my good hand down my face. “I’m not competing for his throne.”
He nods slowly. “I know. With what you showed today, you wouldn’t even need to compete. It's gonna be an instant defeat cause he's not even a worthy opponent. You have no idea how majestic you were out there. Ruel you took down more than a hundred rogues alone. All together we only defeated a hundred and fifty-two, so you eliminated far more than the pack force.”
I exhale hard. “Then we will use this to our advantage, not to take his crown and gain more enemies. We'll bargain.”
Elric’s brows lift. “Bargain?”
“For our freedom.” I meet his eyes. “We tell Andre we’ll leave the pack. In exchange he grants us safe passage, calls off the hunt, and lets us vanish. We can start over somewhere he can’t reach.”
Elric stares at me like I just suggested we hand ourselves over for execution. “You actually believe for one second that he would honor that? And then what? You think he won’t send assassins the moment we cross the first border? What happens the moment the pack members can no longer see us?”
I don’t answer right away, still thinking it through. Maybe Elric doesn't need to follow me. After all, I now know there's more between him and Omar.
He leans closer. “Why are you so bent on running after Ira? After everything she did?”
My jaw locks tight as my eyes redden.
Just then the door opens and Omar steps inside.