Page 46 of Blood of the Fallen
Maki clapped his hands together once. “I’m all for postponing the trials and heading back. No disrespect, but it’s been quite boring since we got here.”
Chieftess Yura glared at Maki, looking aggravated at his offhand attitude. “Postpone, you say? How about we consider them over and let Desna be your alpha?”
Maki’s mouth opened wide, but no words came out.
Kall elbowed him. “When are you going to learn to keep your mouth shut?”
Rubbing his ribs, Maki looked as if he was biting his tongue not to say anything else.
The Chieftess rose to her feet. “No, we cannot postpone, cancel, or disrupt the trials in any way. Now, more than ever, establishing a tetrad is our most important task.”
“You can’t—” Bethel started, but the Chieftess raised a hand to stop her.
“Before you came in here, I’d already spent several hours deliberating what to do. Odinah, her husband and child escaped because their chieftess ordered them to run and get a message out. She wanted all the packs and covens to know what happened to them. Now, we must warn everyone we can, and we must prepare for the worst. As much as I’d like to, we can’t stay here until the trials conclude. But as I said, we can’t disrupt the proceedings in any way, so…” She regarded everyone with care.
“So what?” Bethel asked.
“So… I need to make an announcement to the pack.”
The Chieftess led us out of the wigwam, and, once outside, motioned over a group of children and instructed them to let everyone know she had an announcement to make.
The kids scattered, some running into tents and others out of the main camp area. Within a few minutes, a circle had formed around Chieftess Yura. Even Odinah and Delthomir joined.
I stared at the Fae male. He was so tall he towered over everyone, except Novuk. His strange-colored eyes roved over the crowd somewhat distrustfully. One of his hands, bony and long-fingered, rested on his wife’s shoulder, who held onto her baby as if it were an extension of herself.
Desna was there with her mother and siblings. She stood firmly, her arms crossed over her chest, her mouth turned downward.
Raising a hand up in the air, the Chieftess stopped the murmurs of conversation. “I have called everyone here to make an announcement. I have thought long and hard about this. I’ve considered our current situation as well as what may await us in the near future. I know we just arrived in Tanisi, and we’re happy to be home, but I fear we can’t stay.”
Immediately, unrest rippled around the circle. Most people murmured their discontent, while a few raised their voices. One of them—the loudest—was Desna.
“How convenient!” she spat as she threw a hateful glower my way. “Anything to stop the trials and stop me from becoming the triad’s alpha.”
The Chieftess listened without interruption.
“I’m the only one strong enough to win,” Desna went on, “so you want to give your daughter time to prepare and have a better chance. I only need to win once more, and you know she isn’t ready.”
“Are you done?” Chieftess Yura asked, only a slight twitch of her eyes revealing her irritation.
Desna blew air through her nose like an angry bull, uncrossed her arms, and held fisted hands at her sides as if she were ready to launch forward and strike.
“The reason we cannot stay,” the Chieftess continued, “is because we need to warn as many packs and covens as we can. Also, because I fear it will soon be time for everyone to make a stand against the Academy.”
Desna huffed and threw her arms up in the air, mumbling curses.
“That is why,” Chieftess Yura raised her voice and spoke her next words directly to Desna, “it is more important than ever that we find a leader for our triad.”
Desna seemed to deflate as all her posturing proved inconsequential.
Chieftess Yura addressed the rest of the pack next. “What I propose is that we speed up the trials. We will have the second one tomorrow morning, then we will make preparations to depart and will leave the next day. We will head back toward Blackcrest. Bethel can help us find others along the way to pass on the message for a Pack Rule meeting.”
A Pack Rule was a group of wolf leaders consisting of all the alphas in a certain territory. At least that was what I’d been taught.Damn, this was serious.
Fear rippled through the pack. A few glanced at me, some with rancor as if they blamed me for what was happening. Others with resignation and something else, though I couldn’t tell exactly what. Hope? No, that couldn’t be it.
A huge lump formed in my throat. The second trial would be tomorrow. Each one had been scheduled to be ten days apart. I was supposed to have time to prepare a little more, but now…
A hand slid into mine and squeezed. I glanced sideways at Kall, who wore a calm smile. “You’ve got this, Sheela. You just have to trust yourself.”
