Chapter One Hundred and Eighty
For the next few days, Nick guided me on how to control my wings, and soon using them felt like second nature to me, they felt like an extension of myself.
Now we had to plot on how to stop Thane, and it was easier said than done.
“You can’t possibly think I can return back to the Nightshade pack,” I argued.
We were seated in a small meeting room. Nick and Gabriel were present. Gabriel was regarded as the commander and next in command after Nick.
“Hear me out, okay?” Gabriel pleaded. “You alone know the ins and outs of the Nightshade pack more than any other person, and with those wings, getting in wouldn’t be as hard.”
Gabriel knew about my wings. He had discovered them one of the days I trained with Nick. Turns out he also had an idea that Nick wasn’t just a werewolf. That day, Gabriel had walked away like he saw nothing and never brought it up until now.
Nick didn’t seem to like the idea of me returning back to the Nightshade Pack one bit. “Is there not any other way?” he questioned.
“There is; we send in the soldiers alone, and they meet their deaths,” Gabriel suggested.
We both knew he was right, and yet… yet I didn’t like this idea at all.
“I had been banished from the pack,” I reminded him.
Gabriel fell silent for some time as if in lost thoughts. “Then we should reschedule, if you attack by night fall it would be a better cover”
“Maybe I should go too,” Nick cut in.
“No,” Gabriel says immediately. “You cannot leave the pack; things could go wrong and if you are sighted that would be seen as an act of war, they would come for this pack.”
“But we are sending her despite that, right? I do not fear war, and you know that.”
“Riley only needs to get the soldiers into the pack and keep watch on the passage,” Gabriel says, but Nick wasn’t satisfied by that. “And I could go with her, but leaving the pack defenseless wouldn’t be a good idea.”
“You will take my place till I am back.” Nick insisted.
“If the Alpha King has you,” Gabriel began. “He could request anything of us, and we would have to deliver.”
“Nick. He is right. You shouldn’t come,” I say to him before turning to Gabriel: “I would go.”
“They will recognize you by your scent, so you would need the scenturia potion; its function is
to mask your scent, also a hood,” Nick says.
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Chapter One Hundred and Eight
I’ve heard about the scenturia potion; it was the rarest potion in the world; I had never seen it before, not even in the Nightshade pack.
“And how would you get this potion?”
“We grow velatum here in this pack.”
gemin
“But that is…”
“Impossible?, Not many are willing to go so deep in agriculture. We grow the rare gem in a hidden field; no one has to know about this,” he says, and I nod.
“Zed–The man who came here with his wife and the young boy is willing to offer ten of his soldiers to go with you.”
“So what is the plan?”
“As he had already stated: All you need to do is get those soldier in and out, that’s it.“, Nick’s gaze found mine, “You don’t need to do anything more. Zed believes his soldiers would fish out the information necessary. Any of the Nightshade soldiers that get in your way, you kill them,” Nick says.
I nodded again.
I couldn’t see myself hurting anyone from the Nightshade pack, despite everything that had happened
Mom walked into my room.
I may or may not have been avoiding her for the past few days. I couldn’t get past the embarrassing moment when I had to explain how ‘sore‘ I was, so I left early and returned really late. Now she had caught up with my timings, and here she was.
“You seem to be very busy with Nick lately… we don’t even have time to talk anymore.”
“I’m so sorry, is just… the last time…I…” I stammered out, unable to form a straight sentence.
“Is alright love. I know you like him, and I think he is good for you; he makes you happy, and you seem to be moving on. But the last time, you left a letter–that had kept me quite worried; you aren’t the type to leave letters.”
“Mom, I left a letter; no big deal,” I say, trying to breeze it off, but my mother knew me too well.
“Riley for some
ne reason it did feel like a goodbye. I might be overthinking, but I wondered why you would write to me when you could simply talk to me.”
“You are right. There is a lot happening now; there are people out there who believe in me, people out there who need help, and I want to help them, mom.”
Chapter One Hundred and Exhi
I expected her to argue with me, and she seemed to have wanted to say something before changing her mind. She only nodded.
I couldn’t be more grateful for her acceptance than I was now.
“You are leaving, right?” she says.
“Yes, mother. But I would be safe.”
“You are more than just my daughter, and maybe I should begin to understand that. I would leave you to rest now, but don’t forget to put some ointment on that scar on your back,” she says before leaving.
I didn’t realize there was a scar on my back. I stared at the mirror, trying to find the scar, and then I spotted it.
That was no scar. That part of my flesh was delicate due to the wings.
Well, I guess I would have to hide that too.
