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Chapter 14 || Black Intentions

Braeden

My entire being ached, only soothed where her warm body came in contact with mine. I felt her shift against me as if to get up. I tightened my hold, pulling her closer and burying my face in her hair.

"Braeden," came her soft whisper in my ear.

I groaned in response, not wanting to break the perfect moment we had created in the tent together.

"Shh leelah," I said softly, my voice husky with the gravel of sleep.

It was quiet for a few more moments, only the sound of our synchronised breathing punctuating the silence.

She shifted again and spoke the last words I wanted to hear at that moment: "I need to go."

I forced my heavy eyelids open and my brain to snap out of the grappling strands of sleep, because if she was about to leave I needed to be awake for the last few moments I could spend with her.

Her hair fell like a waterfall in heaven, the white strands illuminating everything that they touched.

I pushed myself onto my elbows so I could softly press my lips to her red ones.

She stilled in her movements and sighed against me, her faint scent of marigold teasing my senses.

"See me later," she whispered. "By the lake at midday."

I nodded whilst holding her against my chest, glad that I wasn't the only one of us who hated the thought of being separated from the other for long.

"Rest," she said against my lips. "I love you," were her final words before she swept out of the tent and into the dawn.

I fell back against my pillow, bringing my fingers up to touch my lips. How by the gods did an orphan fuckup like me get paired with the most beautiful and purest female in all the land? A few minutes passed and I found myself drifting back off into unconsciousness when a shadow became silhouetted against the side of the tent.

"Braeden," Asher's harsh voice came from the shadow. "Get your sorry ass over to centre tent now."

He didn't explain further but the sound of his footsteps padding away demanded that I follow.

Sighing, I gingerly escaped the cloth shelter, trying my best not to put pressure on my injuries from yesterday. I couldn't believe I had lost - in fact, I was doing everything I could not to think about it.

Unsurprisingly, most people were already seated when I arrived, chatting easily amongst themselves as they waited for the meeting to begin. Some of them gave me pitying glances as I entered, no doubt because of my less than wonderful performance yesterday. It wasn't the first time I had lost a fight, but it was the first time I had done so without good reason. I should probably be more concerned about this than I was, but Nereyda being with me throughout the ordeal really softened the severity of the blow.

Asher nodded at me as I took my place but didn't say anything further. I wouldn't call him a verbose character but he did usually speak more with me than he did with others. He was obviously still angry with me.

The meeting commenced, starting predictably with a run down of inventory. This was all rather boring for me, seeing as I was the one in charge of inventory and nothing he said was anything new.

It was only when he began to speak of attack plans that the meeting really began to draw my interest and when I was addressed directly, I had no choice but to listen closely.

My excitement was doused with ice at the words he spoke. "How exactly," Asher asked me, "does the Snow Princess come and go from the castle without anyone knowing?"

My heart stuttered in my chest and my teeth clenched with anxiety. I knew how she came and went from her castle, she had shown me once when I walked her home. She jumped into the goods lift and allowed it to carry her up to the top of the mountain.

Could I tell the rebellion of this secret? Nereyda had never specifically asked me not to tell anyone but then who was I kidding? If she'd known I was part of a rebellion that was gunning for her family, everything we had between us would evaporate.

"Braeden?" Asher prompted, watching me carefully like everyone else in the tent. He was testing me, trying to see where my loyalty lay.

My fists clenched and unclenched on my lap, a bead of sweat trickling off my forehead and landing on my hand. Surely just sharing this little bit of information wouldn't make that much of a difference. Besides, I doubted that the rebellion would be able to use the lifts as a means of getting into the castle; the rickety boxes probably wouldn't even hold the weight of a wolf. Plus, it wasn't like Nereyda would know where the information had come from. For all intents and purposes, the rebellion could have figured out the castle's weakness all by themselves.

"The goods lift," I spoke before I could convince myself otherwise, my voice wavering on the last word. "She comes down in the goods lift so she doesn't have to walk down the stairs."

Damn if I wasn't going to hell. The gods would curse me for betraying my other half; doomed to an eternity of perdition. My wolf was silent within me, probably still trying to come to terms with the crime I had just committed.

I faintly heard Asher thank me for the information behind the storm of torment in my skull. Why had fate positioned us as enemies in the mortal world? Two halves of a soul, made to live as enemies in opposition - what sins we must have committed in our past lives.

I passed the time in my own head and soon the meeting was adjourned. I made to hurry out of the tent, wanting to run into the forest and reflect on the extent to which I had betrayed my nature.

"Braeden," Asher stopped me before I got too far, and because he held authority over me I had no choice but to stop for him.

This conversation between us was long expected and I resigned myself to the fact that Asher was about to reprimand me once more.

I hung my head as I stood still, waiting for everyone to leave but not turning to face him. A hand came down on my shoulder, "Let's take a walk," Asher said.

He lead me out into the forest but instead of going in towards the centre of the city, started walking outwards to the border. I was confused as to why he would take me this way but I didn't question him; it was his choice if he wanted to look at nothing but a fence.

If he wanted to get an apology out of me, he would have to deal with disappointment. I was never going to apologise for going after my mate, and after the information I'd just leaked, I didn't see how I owed Asher anything.

Our feet crunched on the dying autumn leaves, his a few steps in front of mine.

"You remember when we met?" He asked rhetorically, looking out into the forest.

"You were so resolute," he continued and I winced. I never liked hearing this story retold, it reminded me of too many things that were better left forgotten.

I exhaled loudly, running a hand through my hair. "What's your point Asher? You know I hate talking about the past."

Asher stopped walking because the fence arose in front of us and there was nowhere else to go.

"My point," he sighed, "Is that you used to know what you wanted."

I didn't say anything, glaring at the guards patrolling the towering wall.

"What I think, Braeden," he waited until I looked at him. "Is that after losing...you know, your brother-"

A growl tore through my chest at his nerve. "Don't you dare," I hissed, my entire body shaking and my vision blurring red for a brief second. Asher being my alpha wouldn't stop me from taking my fist to his face if he dared mention my family again.

"Hey, sorry sorry," he said, lifting his hands in surrender. "I didn't mean anything by it."

I took a deep breath and turned away from him, my mood even sourer than it had been before - which was really quite an achievement.

"All I was trying to say is that maybe you feel like you need someone to fill that hole, and the Princess is just your way of doing that." He rubbed his left shoulder with his right hand, refusing to meet my eyes. And for good reason too. I was furious.

"She's my mate you bastard!" I could feel my eyes glowing with the anger of my wolf. "I didn't decide to fuck around with the Princess just for the fucking sake of it!"

I'd taken a couple of steps towards him in my wolf's fury and he retreated away from me into the forest. He sighed.

"I can't say I understand what having a mate feels like man, it's just... you only just came back to Lithia," he referred to Paladu by it's old name, "and I feel like we're already losing you."

And with that sentence Asher had totally thrown me.

"You can't see it," he continued, "but she makes you weak."

The confusion was quickly replaced by the outrage that returned with full force.

"Just listen," Asher interrupted quickly before I could throw a punch. "Why do you think you lost the fight last night?" He started pacing between the trees. "You were all over the place man! You had no focus whatsoever, even when you were in the ring I saw your eyes swinging around looking for her in the crowd."

He stopped his pacing and crossed his arms. "You should have won yesterday Braeden, there was no reason for you to have lost to that ginger oaf!"

I tried desperately to ignore his logic and the apprehension his words caused in me. "You're being ridiculous," I muttered.

"Fuck's sake!" Asher exclaimed. "That was a direct hit that took you out. His fist," Asher lifted his own to demonstrate, "coming straight towards your stupid face!"

I shoved him away from me, not looking at him.

"The only reason you wouldn't see something coming right towards your face is if you were looking in the totally opposite direction." He paused, breathing a little harder than normal. He ran a hand through his ash blonde hair.

"You understand that we're going to kill her."

"Over my dead body!" I shouted.

"Look Braeden, just try to understand. The longer she is a distraction for you, the greater the risk on the whole pack. The longer she lives, the more likely her death will be a brutal one - in the middle of a battle." He paused to give me a sharp look with his coal black eyes. "I put my pack first before everything, and you are endangering it. I'm ordering you Braeden; kill your poisonous mate before someone else does."

My whole body jerked, both from surprise and the power behind his words. I rested my hand on a nearby tree for support since my knees were suddenly weak. Hadn't Asher tortured me enough?

"You're telling me to commit murder and suicide," my voice shook violently with anguish.

Asher stiffened and his voice hardened. "I'm telling you to choose your species over your lover," he glared at my wired form. "And you will," he snapped before storming off back towards the camp.

+++++

Nereyda's hair caressed my bare chest as she allowed me to hold her whilst floating around in the lake water. The level of trust she had to allow me to do this warmed my heart because at that moment I had the power to let her go in the water and leave her for dead. Something I was incredibly conflicted over.

"What was it like before the Quakes?" She asked, her warm breath fanning over my wet shoulder.

I couldn't say, I'd spent nearly all my time underground in Creta before the world started shaking. That didn't mean, however, that I hadn't heard stories about what it'd been like - namely from Asher.

"It was less restricted," for most people, "people were allowed to go and do as they pleased, as long as it didn't hurt others." That was generally speaking, I certainly hadn't been able to go and do as I pleased.

"Do you think people preferred the way of living then?" She asked innocently. I didn't blame her though, the mutilated world her father had created was the only one she knew.

"I'm sure of it." I softened my tone as much as I could to dull the sharpness of my words.

"Apparently," she gripped me tighter, pulling herself up in the water. "Apparently people are so unhappy that there are those who would rebel against the crown." She lifted her head back to look me in the eye, a frown marring her beautiful face. "Did you know that?"

I closed my eyes against the guilt that consumed me in a wave. I had to be one of the biggest bastards in the world right now. "I heard," I croaked, holding her tighter so I didn't have to look her in the eye.

Nereyda played with my hair as we were silent for a few moments, both lost deep in thought. I wasn't sure that I could be less worthy of the woman in front of me, I was a liar, a traitor, an orphan, a peasant, a thief...the list went on. And although she said she loved me, I knew better. She knew next to nothing about me, and it was impossible to love someone you didn't know. If she saw even a glimpse of my true nature she would be gone within the hour...and I would never see her again.

"Tell me more about what it was like before," she whispered.

I swallowed past the lump that had clogged my throat, and in a softly hoarse voice, began to tell her stories I'd heard about the old times. Times of music and laughter, drinking and fun.

The sun was three quarters of the way across the sky when Nereyda broke our companionable silence, saying that she needed to get back to the castle.

I pulled away from her in surprise but swam us to the shore nonetheless. "Why do you need to go so early?" I asked. She usually left at dusk so she could be back in time for dinner with her family but this was mid-afternoon.

"Oh, I have to meet with Lord Oscar tonight," she said flippantly as she trailed a stream across the ground towards the rest of her dresses.

"Lord who now?" I blinked at her in surprise as I pulled my shirt over my head, uncaring that it was immediately soaked.

"Lord Oscar, he's from Anell," she said by ways of explanation. I knew of Anell, it was tiger's land. I also knew that Nereyda's mother was a tiger, as her father was a snow leopard. My wolf started making demands inside me, demands that we hunt down this Oscar fellow to protect our mate.

I chose my next words carefully, "And who is he to you?"

She turned to look at me directly, a slight frown pulling her eyebrows together. Her next words stopped my heart. "He's my fiance."

I couldn't control the snarl that ripped out of me. "What?" I growled gutturally. She was promised to another this whole time? How could she not have told me by now?

She looked at her feet in what seemed to be shame.

I paced furiously up and down the lake shore, tugging at my hair with both hands. "Fuck!" I finally swore violently. If she married another I would lose her. As unworthy as I was, I was also selfish enough to want to keep her for all eternity. A wolf who lost his mate was committed to a lifetime of agony, and I didn't think I could take it if I lost her.

"I'm sorry," she stuttered, with what appeared to be tears in her eyes. "There was nothing I could... It was arranged... I can't-" She broke off on a sob, and I realised that she had been using her flippancy to mask her true feelings.

I was by her side in an instant, tugging her smaller frame into my arms. "Shh," I stroked her hair as she clung to my shirt, "It's okay," I whispered.

She took a shuddering breath before pulling away and hastily wiping her eyes. "I'm sorry," she sniffed.

"Nothing to be sorry about," I replied, trying a smile for her - but even I could feel the tightness of it.

She gave me a final sad look before bidding me adieu and vanishing off into the trees. To meet with the one she belonged to, I thought with great animosity.

I walked out onto the pier and gazed at the calm waters, wondering how in hell I would manage to kill the most important person in my life. 

--- A/N ---

Now things are getting interesting aren't they! I hope you enjoyed, vote and comment if you like! - Zoe :)