Chapter 17

KIRA:
I’m in the middle of nowhere. Let’s just say I have landed myself in a place I have no idea about. All I know is that I still have my clothes gripped under my pit after running for so long, as far as my legs could carry me.
It wasn’t until I became weary did I choose to stop. Am I distressed? Of course, I am. I just got chased down by the unknown and the pressure from knowing I am in a position where I cannot figure out my location was another thing to couple to it. Today turned out to be a bad day.
I’m not sure what to do now. Should I make a run for it once more? Perhaps I should start to head back to where I came from. I could as well try to figure out the path I had gone through.
“This isn’t looking good, Alexia. What do we do now?” I ask the entity in my head, solely expecting her to come up with an idea. At least it was her who alerted me when danger was lurking around me. So she should have an idea what to do to get us out of here. “What was even the thing that was chasing us?”
I gasp for air as I speak. It was a little hard trying to maintain a proper sentence with the weariness in me. But at least I tried.
I did notice something, though. I was saying ‘us’ and ‘we’ instead of just ‘me’. Have I come to accept Alexia totally? Feels too fast I must say. Could be my subconscious taking control of the situation.
Wait, Alexia hasn’t given me a response yet. What the hell is going on?
“Alexia?” I call her name, trying as much as possible to be quiet about it. The last thing I wanted was to attract the attention of another unknown entity.
I try again and again to get in touch with Alexia but it seems she wasn’t there with me anymore. But it is the sudden chill of the air, or maybe it is just a sensation in me, that shifts my focus away from her.
The sudden urge to turn around overwhelms me. So I find myself doing it in no time. And it was rightly a good timing because I see someone approaching me from a little afar.
My instincts kick in and I start to move back slowly. Although what or who I can see is a man, an uneasiness settles in me which is why I have to act wary of the present situation.
“Stop right there!” as if on command, I oblige immediately. Did I really just stop for a man that I know nothing about? It is the authority that comes with his tone that made me do that, I guess.
The man was almost close to where I am standing and I get a much better view of him. Even though I am still in panic mode, I can easily decipher his features.
The first notable thing about him was his skin color. He is a man with a dark tone and on his face is the nicely shaped beards that run with his hair that looks sort of locked in some way. Why could he be, though? I don’t think I gave chanced upon him before. That is if I am still in my territory... which I am starting to have strong doubts that I am in.
“What are you doing on my territory?” the man, already a few feet away from me, confronts me. Instantly I get the whole situation happening right here. I am now in the Night Blaze pack. And this man right here... he is the Alpha of their pack.
How did I know that? Because I have sighted him on various occasions when I had snooped into their territory, before despite not recalling his face at first glance. But now I do. And I think I am done for.
“I’m sorry,” I start to say, “I– I didn’t mean to trespass. I only happened to get lost when I was being chased down by something,”
He looks at me with narrow eyes which seem rather curious to me. Is he trying to study me or what?
“And what was chasing you?” he asks. Fortunately for me, he doesn’t sound angry or even look close to being angry. It doesn’t change that I am overwhelmed by his domineering aura.
“I didn’t get to see it. But I know what it was fast,”
“It was fast, and you managed to outrun it which landed you here, is that right?”
I nod in return to his question and then he takes a step or two closer. But I cannot even move an inch away from there because I am a bit terrified of his presence.
“Let me guess,” he puts a hand to his chin and takes it off almost instantly, “you are from the Green Dales pack,”
To answer and not to answer was bothering me. If I tell him I was indeed from the Green Dales pack, wouldn’t he order for my arrest? Because words might have reached him about the trespassing that almost got me caught about a week ago. And if I ignore his question, or probably tell a lie and he finds out, wouldn’t it be tantamount to instant death?
My mind is foggy at the moment. Making out possibilities was the only thing I can do right now to save my mind from going into disarray. Because at this moment, I can tell that I am at the point of being done for.
Maybe I should have told Bradley about acquiring a spirit wolf already so he would find a way to link me with the pack’s general mind-link so I could inform them that I am in trouble at the moment. Because no way that I am getting out of this. At least not alive.
“Have you suddenly lost the ability to speak?” the Alpha’s voice snaps me out of my troubled thoughts, and it makes me flinch.
“N– No, sir,” I struggle with the words but they still manage to come out fine.
“Then speak. Are you from the Green Dales or not?”
“I am,”
The reaction from him is so confusing. I am not sure if it involves mockery or if he is showing me that I have gotten into his hands. Anyone it is, I am shit scared.
“Do you know what it means for a member of the Green Dales pack to ve found on the turf of the Night Blaze?” he asks, and perhaps I am overthinking because I can swear that I heard an acidic tone in his voice.
“I’m sorry,” I manage to say, putting my head down in shame.
I stay that way for a while, expecting him to make the final judgment on me. I know that I am not going back to the Green Dales today. The only thing that hurts me from this is that I didn’t get to kiss my parents goodbye. And my annoying brother too. And Bradley.
“Do me a favor and put on your clothes,” I suddenly hear him say which prompts me to look up at him.
“What are you going to do with me, sir?”
“Just put your clothes on first,” he reiterates his initial request and I have no other choice but to nod and then proceed to do as asked.
Under his watchful eyes, I get dressed and within two minutes, I was done with all of that. All through the time that his eyes were on me, I didn’t feel anything close to discomfort. It was just embarrassment that I cannot tell came from.
He is still staring at me with those watchful eyes. Gives me the opportunity to notice how unique it is despite it being one of the most common colors among us.
His eyes are hazel but they come with something that I cannot really explain. A glow or something. They look like a galaxy of stars were harboring in his eyes which, for a second, has me mesmerized.
“What’s your name?” I am brought back to reality by that question which I answer instantly.
“Kira,”
“And how old are you?” he throws a rather strange question at me which only has me furrowing my brows at him. Suddenly I do not feel the need to be terrified again. Should be because I have accepted my fate.
“Sixteen,” I tell him, and he slightly reacts to it. A frown or something. But he is back to his neutral expression in no time.
“Do you know who I am?” he asks.
“I do,” I nod alongside.
“So tell me who I am,”
Okay, I think I am beginning to feel a tiny bit of unease. Why all these questions? Isn’t he supposed to take me in or something already? Why is he interrogating me, so much that he wants me to tell him who he is after confirming that I know him?
“Alpha Reid?” I manage to say, acting like I was not too sure about his name.
“Good. Now, Kira, you know that for trespassing, you could be killed right here and right now,”
The statement brings back memories of the chase down of last week. His supposed beta had literally told me the same thing he is telling me now and I won't lie, I hated that statement because it seemed rather crazy that a being can utter such a thing about death without remorse.
“So I heard,” the sauciness in me is back and I fail to hide my disgust as I respond to his question. I’m sure he notices my sudden change of attitude because a twitch occurs on his face.
“Now what am I to do with you?”
“Look are you going to finish me off as you ought to or you’re going to let me go?” I lash out at him because I am sick of being here with no clue about what's going to happen next.
A flash of surprise on his face, and he says, “You realize I still have the upper hand here,”
“And I don’t—”
But I fall short of my statement because I suddenly see someone that makes me take a step backward...
The beta.