Pushing past Aquila, I  burst through the door and dove into the crowd, ignoring the protests of high-ranking people as I rudely shoved them out of the way. Couples on the dance floor collided with me as I ran straight through the centre of the room, heading directly towards Princess Octavia who was stood in the arms of another Alpha.

She turned to see the panicked expression on my face as she heard my approach and the shouts of angry people behind me and stepped back from her partner, rushing towards me. "What's happened," she demanded as I took a hold of her arm and pulled her towards the edge of the room.

"Belladonna," I responded. "Someone dropped a bottle of it and I caught the scent. There may be an attempt on your life tonight, we need to get you to your chambers where you will be safer. There are too many people here." I rudely shoved an Alpha Warrior out of my way who growled angrily at me, but after seeing the Princess beside me quickly backed off. "Can you see Marcella anywhere?" I asked, preoccupied with scanning every single person who came near to search for her.

"I'm here," Marcella appeared beside us, taking hold of the Princess's other arm and drawing her sword part of the way, ready to fully take it out of its sheath if necessary. "What is the threat?"

"I smelled Belladonna in a side passage and the Princess' life is at risk. We are heading to her chambers to lock down." 

"Fast or safe?" Marcella questioned, referring to the two emergency routes we had mapped out. Fast was a route with a greater chance of attack, but also reached her chambers in very little time. Safe was a much longer route, taking many servant passages and hidden stairwells which were safer to use than a direct route through popular corridors.

"Fast," I decided.

Moving towards the main double doors, we found our route blocked by the Alpha King and General who looked at us with confusion and apprehension. "What is going on?" the Alpha King demanded.

"Sir, we believe there may be an active assassin in the palace," Marcella informed him. "We must get the Princess to safety immediately, whilst you have your warriors search the castle for someone with Belladonna in their possession. Now stand aside."

The Alpha King looked at her with shock and anger. "How dare you give me orders!" he cried. "I am above you in rank and by being a ma-"

We had no time for this. And so, without thinking of the consequences, I stepped forwards and shoved the King aside. With perfect timing, the double doors were opened to let a man enter the ballroom and Marcell and I dragged Princess Octavia through the doors.

Our boots pounded loudly against the floor as we hurried down the hallway towards the large staircase which led to the second floor and to another staircase, leading to the third floor on which the Princess' chamber was. But, as my foot touched the first step, I froze and turned back to stare at the doors we had just passed through.

Shadowed by the warm glow of the ballroom behind then, the figure stared back at me without revealing even the slightest detail of his face. I strained my eyes, desperately trying to make out the colour of those entrancing eyes which sparkled in the dim moonlight, flooding through a small window. Even without seeing any detail, the figure took my breath away.

Inhaling deeply to slow my erratic heart, I almost choked in the incredible scent which filled the air. Rich oak, salty sea air and wild garlic teased my nose gently, pulling my foot off of the stairs and closer to him.

Already, I knew I would never get enough of that scent. It had become a craving I never knew needed to be fulfilled before and I wanted more. I needed more.

"Artemis."

The voice was insignificant the blood rushing through my ears and the pounding in my heart. It was as though this figure had taken my full attention, removing all the distractions I had never been able to ignore before. It was just me and them, alone.

I did not know my feet were moving forwards until I felt the resistance of someone pulling me back. "Artemis! What the hell are you doing?"

My head snapped back, taking all of my strength to break from the hypnotic trance of those shadowed eyes, and catching sight of angry amber eyes.

"What the hell are you playing at? We have to go!"

Torn between the shadowy figure and the Princess, I hesitated. But my duty won over my curiosity and I dragged myself away from the addictive scent and up two flights of stairs, pushing servants and guests alike out of our way. Nothing was more important than the Princess' life; it was drilled into us from the very start of our training. And so, diplomacy, rules and the safety of others was completely disregarded.

Reaching the third floor, we wasted no time as we hurtled down the long corridor which would take us to our destination. The chambers were at the far end of the palace, a large distance from the centre where the stairs were and, despite this being the quickest route, we knew it would take several precious minutes to run the distance. As the Princess hitched up her skirts even more and kicked off her heeled boots, I found my hand sliding down her arm to grab onto her hand so the run was easier. 

Sword in one hand, princess' arm in the other, we felt confident that the threat in the palace could be taken care of easily. We had trained for moments like these our entire life and it was not the first threat to the Princess we would have to deal with. In fact, I had killed three assassins since I began my service as an Agem.

Now I was going to add one more to that list as we rounded the final corner and found two men blocking our path. Steel swords raised and snarls of joy as though they believed they would succeed in their plot, they moved towards us for the kill.

The first thing I did was push the Princess behind me, seeing the purple glint on their swords which told me the blades had been dipped in Belladonna. I was a werewolf and so this would do no more harm than an injury from a regular sword, however, it could potentially be lethal to Princess Octavia. And so, it was our priority to keep the blades away from her.

"Left or right?" I asked Marcella as I moved into my fighting stance. 

"Right," she chose the dark-haired, bulky man growling ferociously on the right to fight. I almost wanted to roll my eyes at her purposely choosing a challenge. The man was already enraged and would be violent and unpredictable. Well, as unpredictable as you can be to a 125-year-old werewolf who has spent her life fighting.

He attacked first, bringing his sword down upon her head like it was a club which she easily dodged and then retaliated with a swift stab through his chest. Then the man went down like a puppet whose strings had been cut, crumpling to the floor with a large thud. Satisfied, I turned to my opponent who brushed his ginger hair back with a shaky hand and lifted up his sword in the vain belief he could win.

I would have liked to have taken my time humiliating the warrior in front of me, but that style of fighting was reserved for training and challenges only. My duty was to remove threats as quickly as possible to get the Princess to safety and so I did. Leaping into the air, I swung my sword at his hand, letting the sharp blade sink into his flesh and slice through the bone. The sword dropped to the ground with a clunk, along with his hand, and he howled out in pain. It was too easy to dispatch of him, slicing his throat and letting him bleed out in seconds.

"Take the Princess," I heard Marcella command and let her pass me as I reached out to grab the princess's arm. Stepping over the bodies, we followed Marcella towards the double doors which were the entrance to the Princess's chambers and I watched as Marcella pulled down on the handle and tugged the doors open.

And then my heart stopped.

Sticking out of the back of her neck beneath the pinned up bun of auburn hair was a small shard of metal, dripping with blood. I stared in horror as her body shook slightly and she stumbled backwards, crumpling to the floor without saying a single word.

Instinct took over as my hands reached for the knife tucked in my hair, hurling it through the doorway. I barely even noticed the fact that the knife dug itself in the man's shoulder, allowing him to flee the scene as I rushed over to Marcella. With my shaking hands, I pulled the arrow out of Marcella's neck and applied pressure to the wound, desperately trying to save her. 

"Come on, Marcella. Don't you die on me," I begged. I could feel hot, salty tears pouring down my cheeks as warm, sticky blood oozing between my fingers and dripping onto the blood-soaked floor. The rational part of me knew that no one could survive that much blood loss, especially with the silvery sheen her blood was tainted with, caused by the silver arrowhead. 

She was dying.

And I was unable to stop it, yet again.

"Futue te ipsi," I swore. "You don't get to die. It is not your time. DAMMIT! It is not your time." My pleading turned into sobbing as my brain gradually came to the realisation that it was, in fact, her time. "Irrumator," I cursed. "You said you would wait for me. You said we would go to Aiónio Dásos together. You promised we would -"

I broke off into a choked sob as her body stopped twitching and her chest sunk in, no longer inhaling air. From the comforting hand which rested on my shoulder, I knew Octavia had heard her heart stop beating and I let out a scream of anguish.

It should have been me.

---

Hello again. I'm sorry this chapter took so long to write, but I wanted it to be perfect and so it took several drafts, some of which involved Marcella dying really slowly from silver poisoning whilst others involving her pushing Artemis out of the way and taking the arrow for her. But, this was the version I liked the best and I would love to hear what you think.

Sadly, this is not the end of my evilness, but I can promise I won't be killing off any important characters for a while. And I am probably going to let Artemis have a little happiness.

Do you guys like the family trees I have made? And would you like to see more of that kind of stuff?