Page 9 of Blood Pearl

Wren passes the message to Borose who is behind her. She gives a small nod and passes the message to Paige, who is straining to hear what we are doing.

Fragina walks out of the cottage and struts over to the first row of females and gives them all a sneer. My temper is rising. I’m sick of this bitch and it’s time she was shown some of her own attitude.

I watch as she goes from one row of females to another. Until she gets to ours. Then I stare at her, refusing to lower my head or my eyes. I may not have my wolf, but I’m still a good fighter.

“Lower your head and eyes,” Fragina snarls as she stands in front of me.

Do I lower my head and eyes? No, of course not. I stare that bitch down, and she knows she’s not going to have me cowering. She lifts her hand to slap me across the face and I duck, slapping her face so hard her head flies to the side and spittle shoots out of her mouth.

Everything goes deadly quiet, and I’m ready. I’m seething that this ugly bitch has the nerve to slap me. I have my fighting stance and am ready for whoever wants to have a piece of me this morning. Wren steps up to the side of me, taking her fighting stance too.

Hearing a giggle, I flick my eyes and see Rue, Jinny, Borose and Paige all in a fighting stance. Now, we are showing them we’ve had enough, and are willing to go down if needed.

“What’s going on here?” Arric arrives from somewhere to our right. But none of us turns to look at him. We all continue to stare at Fragina, who has gone pale seeing we are all making a stand.

“She won’t lower her eyes, and when I demanded it, she slapped me,” Fragina whines, stamps her foot and throws the tantrum we forced her to.

The whole area gasps at the lie she spills, and it’s not gone unnoticed by Arric. I give a crooked smirk at Fragina, and she can’t maintain eye contact with me, which shows how weak she really is. It also has shown every wolf in the area that she’s not fit to be a Luna.

Throwing his arm around Fragina, Arric whispers something into her ear. She loses every ounce of color from her face, and pulls away from him, rushing to the cottage and slamming the door behind her.

Then he turns to look at me, but I am able to hold his gaze for quite some time, before I feel myself shaking with the effort, and have to drop my eyes. Chuckling has me gritting my teeth, but what he says next not only shocks me, but has me wanting to purge my empty stomach.

“You have a choice, female. You can become my Luna or you can go to the cell and not eat for a week and only have two drinks of water a day for that week. Then we’ll revisit the situation.”

Turning, I walk directly back to the cell and close the door behind me. That’s my answer to Alpha Asshole. A guard brings me a drink of water and I swallow it quickly before handing him back the cup. He gives me a pitying look before walking away.

At least the others have something to eat and drink, and we can plan what we will do next. The idea of getting Fragina knocked into the mud is still an option, but it’ll have to be someone other than me that does it. Maybe Rue was a good choice, but I’ll have to wait and see.

Five days pass and each day one of my cell pack members does something to Fragina, causing her to look less and less of a Luna. It would be amusing if we were not all on short rations. I’m not eating, and others are also not eating now. But we all are amused by the fact Fragina has been knocked into mud, then showered with water. She’s been eyed by every female and I do mean all, not just us. It seems the other she-wolves have cottoned on to the fact we are discrediting Fragina and are helping in our quest.

Arric is watching everything and dishing out punishments, but we all see he’s not helping her recover from any of the tricks we are playing on her. In fact, today I noticed he had a sneer on his face when he looked at her.

That is a good thing on one hand, but a worry on the other. There are only two days before I have to face him again with the becoming Luna issue. I’ll die rather than be his Luna. I can’t imagine having to get up close with him and his rogue stench. At one time, I would imagine he was a handsome male, but not anymore. Maybe he needs to get with the program and see he’s not anyone’s prize.

“Have you noticed Fragina has not taken her wolf’s form the whole time we’ve been here?” Borose asks nobody in particular.

“No, I haven’t seen her in wolf form,” I respond.

“No, I haven’t.” “Nope, I have not.” “She’s lost her wolf.” “She has to have done something bad to have lost her wolf.”

All these comments are thrown out, and we all look from one of us to another, until the full impact has us all grinning. This makes her on a level ground to all of us with our wolves being suppressed with the wolfsbane. Any of us have a chance of killing her, and if we get the chance, we’ll take it.

Chapter 6

AURORA

“There is no cover, so we’re going to need to be covering our scent and getting into the trees. We don’t have an option, and we are going to need our wolves to be extra vigilant or we could end up caught along with your pack members,” Gerry mumbles, making sure his voice is as low as possible.

‘Do you understand how important this is, Aztec?’

I will be alert. Asher is ready, too. Aztec growls in the back of my mind.

‘If we cannot get our pack out, we find enough information to take back and make a plan for rescue. We are not waiting any longer.’

I agree, pack have been hostages too long. I feel Aztec settle back in my mind, but she’s alert and ready.

“I’m ready, Gerry. Let’s hit the stream, shall we?”

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