Chapter 65 - Space Invader

Kai stirred as he felt something cold and wet press on to his face. The damp feeling was shortly followed by a quick snort of warm air. Kai pushed it away with his hand but the cold wet sensation quickly returned and probed his face. Irritated, he slowly opened his eyes as a rough wet tongue dragged itself across his face.

*'A wolf?'* he questioned. What wolf would be brave enough to lick him? Kai wiped the wetness away with the back of his hand. When he reopened his eyes, a huge black wolf loomed over him and eyed him curiously.

"Pax?" he asked confused. Pax’s ears pricked up in acknowledgement to hearing his name being called.

Kai quickly sat up. If he could physically see Pax again, he knew it must be Adalyn and Tara's doing. They must be using their gift again. The memories of what had happened with him, Gabriel and Mya quickly resurfaced. They had forcibly separated him from his mate.

Kai rose to his feet and began looking in to the fog that surrounded him. If Tara or Adalyn had activated their gift, maybe he could communicate with them to find out where she had been taken to. "Adalyn?" he called out in to void. His voice echoed as he said her name but there no response. "Tara?" Kai tried calling this time. He listened again, but there was still nothing.

Pax pushed his snout in to Kai's chest showing his concern at their missing mate too. "I know big guy" he said softly as he patted his head. "We’ll find her. Can you scent her in here?" Kai asked. The last time they were in this space Tara had approached them, but this time around she was nowhere in sight. Pax moved his snout from Kai chest to the ground and started sniffing around. His tail and ears pricked up as he caught the scent of something familiar. He circled round Kai then suddenly took off in one direction disappearing in to the fog.

"Pax! Wait!" Kai called out after him. He ran in the direction that Pax went but he was struggling to keep him in his sights. Pax quickly disappeared in to the fog. "Shit!" Kai called out as he realised that he had lost him. Kai stopped running and panted as he looked around for him.

"Pax! Where are you?!" He called out again. His question was again met with a wall of silence. Kai looked around. He could faintly hear the heavy breathing of a wolf nearby and it was getting closer. Pax must have been coming back for him. “Pax?” he called again.

As the sound got closer and louder, Kai was suddenly swept up off his feet by a tan wolf. Kai was flipped up in to the air as the tan wolf used its nose to flick Kai upwards. Just as the wolf ran under him, the wolf slowed down a fraction and Kai grabbed on with both hands to its fur. "Tara?" he called out as he recognised his mate’s wolf.

Feeling him clinging on to her side, Tara accelerated again before he had a chance to get fully on her back. With the speed that she was going at, he knew something was wrong. "Where is she Tara?"

Kai tried to hold on as tightly as he could, but he could feel her fur slipping through his hands where he wasn’t perched on her properly. “Tara! Slow down!” As his hands gave way, Pax resurfaced from the fog on her side and nudged him up on to Tara's back with his snout as they continued running.

"Nice of you to remember me boy" Kai chastised him as he righted himself more centrally on Tara's back. He held on to the fur around her neck. Pax bumped against Tara's side to let her know that he was there then matched her pace. Tara briefly flared her nose in acknowledgement but continued to focus her sights directly in front of her.

"Tara, what's wrong? Where is she?" The fog started to thin as they got closer to whatever it was Tara was running towards. Finally up ahead Kai spotted something in the distance. One…no two people? One dark figure was crouched over the other. As Tara got closer she slowed down then stopped. Her hackles rose up and she growled then bared her teeth at the figure crouched over the other one on the floor. Pax quickly followed suit. Kai jumped off Tara's back and ran towards the figures. One of them had to be Adalyn, but who was the other?

As he approached he realised the person crouching down was male and the one laying naked on the ground was female. The male has his back towards Kai and was looking over the other figure on the floor. Kai looked briefly at the male but then observed the figure on the ground. Something in his heart told him it was Adalyn.

"Get away from her!" Kai called out. He ran towards the dark male figure and kicked him. The male raised his forearm to block the kick, but slid backwards as he was driven away from the naked figure on the ground. Tara and Pax quickly gathered in front of Kai to shield him. Feeling a bit more secure, Kai looked at the still figure on the ground. "Adalyn?" he questioned. His heart was telling him that it was her but she looked different. Her long brown hair was now a deep black and her freckles had disappeared. She looked like Adalyn but then not like her at the same time.

Another growl by both Pax and Tara drew his attention back to the dark figure in front of them.

"Well...this is unexpected," the male spoke. He casually brushed himself off and turned to look at Kai. "I hadn't expected to see you here. I guess that means you got to her first. How disappointing." He spoke to Kai with disdain as though he was annoyed by the interruption.

From this distance, Kai could make him out a bit more. He had long black hair tied back with a series of silver metal cuffs dotted around the front of his hair line. A common formal look for royalty. He had one brown and one blue eye making him look very distinctive *‘Colton?’* Kai questioned himself. He had never seen the Sirran King before but he had heard of his unusual characteristics. His height and build wasn’t too dissimilar to Kai’s with his tall lean frame, but his face was more angular with a sharp pointy chin. *‘How was he in this space? And what does he want with my mate?’* Kai asked himself again.

"What did you do to Adalyn?!”

"Adalyn?" Colton said her name curiously. His cold eyes narrowed a fraction as they moved from Kai back to her. "Is that the name she's using in Galas? Interesting..." His mouth curled up at one corner. "I much prefer her true name, Raeliana."

Kai's eyes widened as he heard him mention her name. He looked back down at her. She was surrounded by broken shards of glass. Was she in the cloudy bubble that Kai saw the last time that he was here, in this space? Had the seal that Gabriel spoken about now broken? And how had this invader entered her space uninvited? As he looked at her naked body, he spotted his claiming mark on her neck. It was her. Adalyn and Raeliana was one and the same. He could feel a lump forming in his throat as the full realisation of this fact hit him. His mate, his fated mate was also his chosen mate. She was alive! He had a million and one questions but he couldn’t answer any of them right now.

His focus turned back toward Colton who was reading Kai's face with amusement. Tara and Pax lowered their stance and continued growling at him.

"I asked you, what have you done to her?" Kai shouted. Everything in Kai's body was telling him this man was trouble, big trouble. He had a dark energy about him that made him feel really unsettled.

Colton sighed again. "Me? I’ve done nothing. You have yourself to thank for releasing her. Your 'bond' must have broken that annoying seal, that stopped me from locating her." He exaggerated the word 'bond' to almost mock their connection. "I suppose I owe you a small debt of gratitude for that, you’ve made my job a bit easier. How about I reward you with a few home truths. By now, I'm sure you've worked out that she is Raeliana Ione Lauriel, the youngest daughter of the former King Zeke, but more importantly my betrothed."

Kai’s eyebrows shot up "Betrothed?!" Kai bit through his teeth. "You're lying! She was my chosen mate."

Colton snorted. "Believe it or not, she was promised to me, long before she was ever promised to you, ask Maddox. If my own father hadn't fucked things up, she'd already be mine! And if you think that little puppy bite that you left on her neck changes anything, I'm afraid you're mistaken. I can and I will claim her."

"Over my dead body!" Kai growled.

"Ah! These are the kind of promises I could get on board with, but sadly I can’t risk killing you and potentially losing her. But don’t worry, there are ways around it. With that being said, I’d be grateful if you could avoid antagonising Matias any further, before you get yourself killed. I know how trigger happy he can be.” Colton waved his hand at Kai. “Now move away from her!”

Kai furrowed his brows. Colton knew too much about what was going on in Galas.

“I don’t understand, if you need her alive why do you have people in our council trying to kill her?!”

“Kill her?!” Colton roared. “If that bastard has betrayed me…” he looked down to the ground and growled in frustration.

So Gabriel was right, from his reaction it was clear that he did have people in the palace. But why would they want her dead if they were working for him?

Colton sucked his teeth. “I don’t have time for this. As much as I'd love to give you a quick history lesson Kaiden, I'm a bit pressed for time and I still need to confirm a few things before she regains consciousness. " He clicked his fingers. "Odin!" he called out.

"Odin?" Kai mouthed. He knew that name. That was the name of Colton's wolf. His wolf was here too? But where?

As Kai stood up to defend his mate along with Tara and Pax, another huge black wolf with a solid white tail came charging in from the fog directly from his side. Kai couldn't work out if he was going for him or Rae, but Kai placed himself directly in front of her and braced himself. Odin snarled as he leapt to attack Kai but Pax jumped in front of him and blocked his path. Pax was sent him hurtling backwards from the impact with Odin right on his tail.

"Pax!" Kai called out as he watched his wolf fall backwards. Pax quickly managed to right himself back on to his four paws as Odin chased after him. There was a flurry of teeth and fur as they brawled behind him.

Tara continued to snarl as she looked both at Pax and Colton, who was now casually walking towards her. She wanted to fight Odin alongside her mate but she couldn't leave Rae exposed. She focused her attention on the immediate threat in front of her, Colton. She sprinted at him and Colton stopped walking to brace himself. He smiled at her and clapped his hands to goad her on. It was like he was trying to encourage her to try her luck.

“That’s my girl! Come on!” He challenged as his sinister smile grew bigger.

Tara leapt in the air as she went for Colton's neck but he swiftly caught her by the throat with his bare hand and slammed her down in to the ground. Tara whimpered at the impact but continued to squirm against him.

"Now, now Tara. That's not very welcoming, is it? Anyone might think that you're not pleased to see me."

Tara continued to snarl and writhe under his arm. He tried to pin her down but she managed to gain some perch under her hind legs and twisted her snout up to pull his forearm in to her mouth. As soon as she felt his skin touch her tongue she clamped down. Colton almost seemed a bit surprised. His face twisted slightly as blood started to trickle down his arm but he held firm. The pain didn’t seem to affect him. It was almost as if he was enjoying it. “That’s it” he crooned. “Keep resisting, it will make forcing your submission to me even more pleasurable.”

Colton suddenly had the air knocked out of him as Kai charged him and knocked him off of Tara. They rolled on the floor a few times then stopped with Kai sat on his chest with his hands around his throat. Pax had disappeared and Kai’s eyes were now red as they reunified.

Colton looked slightly overwhelmed as he felt the restriction on his neck. Colton called out to Odin and he charged at Kai. Just as he was about to crash in to him, Odin’s form faded away.

"Shit!” Colton squeaked out. “Out of time already?” His human form was starting to disintegrate in to air as well and Kai’s hands passed through his neck.

"You’re a fool Kaiden! All you've succeeded in doing is delaying the inevitable. She's wasted on you! If I have to slaughter everyone in your territory to get her, than so be it!"

————

Kai gasped as he jolted upright. It felt like he had been underwater and had finally surfaced for air. His hands were wrapped around Arrow's throat.

"Kai! Stop! It’s me!" Arrow called out through a few strained gasps. Kai's eye dilated as he recognised him and his surroundings. He was back in the forest where he had collapsed. His eyes shifted from red, back to blue as he released his hold on Arrow's neck.

Arrow coughed and spluttered in relief.

"Fuck! I'm sorry." Kai panted as he quickly looked around to try and work out where his mate had gone.

“What the hell happened?” Arrow asked after he managed to catch his breath.

“She’s gone…”