Rejected Mate and Following Fate - Awakening Book novel Chapter 107

We know. Vampires are trailing off and heading your way. Get inside the manor and find the control room to try and disable it.

Colton’s fast response is ragged and strained and I can tell they are really in the thick of it and not doing so well. I can feel his fatigue, hear his stress levels in just one link. Without seeing what’s going on, I can tell the valley must be a bloodbath right now. They are fighting hard to stay in control and god knows how many have died already.

Are you okay? I reply in panic, not knowing how to feel with the way things seem to have suddenly combusted and are no longer in our control. Our plans have gone to hell and I feel useless and somehow cut off from what’s going on. No sense of what to do or how to help.

We’re holding on and pulling villagers with us. We’re coming to you as soon as we can but just do as I ask. There are more of them than us and half of the Valley wolves are weak and sick.

We shall Alpha. Be safe… Luna…. He’s right. We need to disable it.

Radar breaks into the link, which Colton sent using the sub pack bond before I can formulate a response. I’m still rooted to the spot as I let this sink in and try to think. The urgency around us hemming in on me so I feel instantly suffocated and my brain doesn’t want to cooperate. It’s spiraling.

Take care of her for me. Colton ends the link and goes back to fighting to save his people with one last commanding order.

“He wants us to go inside and disable the tone that’s making the wolves weak.” I relay to those around me who weren’t part of the pack link.

“Get these boys up, they’re coming with us. Move. We don’t have time to wait around.” Leyanne’s commanding voice comes at us from behind, startling me, and it’s only now I realize she wasn’t with us. She’s moving fast, followed by a high-flying stream of crows as she paces at us, her robes flapping in the speed of her own motion. I have no idea where she went but she’s good at doing the disappearing and reappear act.

“The manor?” I ask with uncertainty and am caught by the wrist as she passes and tugged towards the house with hurried force. “What about Juan?” I yelp in fright with the sheer strength of her maneuver.

“He’s not important right now. The wolves are losing because of his damned weapon. We need to turn it off but leave the defense intact so they vampires don’t use theirs. My magic can’t do a thing with technology.” She for once sounds ruffled and majorly annoyed. Dragging me from the center of my pack and with her towards the stairs. My guards seem momentarily shocked that she would haul their Luna this way and then scramble to follow while dragging our prisoners with them. Carmen doesn’t question but hops behind me, Sierra on her tail and I can tell that like me, they are now uncertain and worried. It’s only a matter of time before the frequency affects us too and we don’t know how long that will take. Like a slow poison invading our systems.

“The control room for the cameras used to be on the ground floor near the sub common room.” Carmen flits to human form, pushing in front of us with speed as we get to the door of the manor and halts before she grabs the handle. The door isn’t boarded or blocked but she hesitates and holds up a palm behind her to stop us moving forward.

“What?” I blanche in irritation.

“Wolfsbane…can’t you smell it.” She leans in and around the door, her nose inching close, scrounging up her face in disgust and then moves to the handle with caution.

“Really?” I snort in amused disbelief “He would swoop as low as tainting handles with wolfsbane. What’s wrong with him?”

“What’s right with him?” Carmen retorts with gritted teeth and moves aside to let the witch try the door. Wolves are harmed by wolfsbane even with the simplest touch. It’s one of the few poisons that merely grazing our skin can burn in the most agonizing way.

I flinch a glance at Radar from the corner of my eye and watch that proud wolf form tense slightly. His eye scar came from a combo of using a silver dagger and wolfsbane and I know it’s one of the few things in life that still makes him nervous. Even in the grimoire library we banned it from the house as it’s so potent against us we cannot be around it safely. It’s our Kryptonite and yet Juan has smeared his own front door with it. It sums him up entirely.

“I guess he never ventures out this way, or out at all.” Leyanne observes and one of our wolf prisoners let’s out a wry laugh.

“Why do for himself what he can make others do. Juan only takes the likes of us in, and we don’t come back out.” Taemin snarls and then slumps against Radar, who is still holding him tight as though he doesn’t even have the energy to hold himself up anymore. They have been exposed to the frequency for god knows how long and I’m worried about their usefulness and health if we take them further. Carmen seems to gaze into the distance for a second, her body stiffening and I know she’s momentarily lost in memories of what was done to her in this house.

“Hmmm…. Seems he doesn’t care all too much about protecting the way in. This wolfbane is nothing more than a deterrent.” Leyanne shoves the heavy door open after a few taps on the lock and a spark of light, which I assume is some magical unlocking ability and swings the heavy wooden slab back into the once familiar hallway.

Inside it looks the same as when we left, only dark, dusty and unused as though it’s sat dormant and empty for months. The air is stale, and the lights are all out, leaving an eeriness in as Leyanne lights the way with the glow from her hand to cast some illumination. It’s too still, too empty. We know Juan and his minions are inside this manor, but it seems they care little about protecting the main door or leaving life down here.

“Where are they?” Sierra also turns human and moves in beside me, taking my hand in hers as we creep in quietly. My guards let go of the prisoners and flank around us in a semi-circle immediately. Realizing they pose no threat when we are literally walking into the lion’s den. Aiden moves to the nearest couch and sinks down exhaling heavily and seems to instantly pass out. Taemin and the last wolf edge back to the door and stay there seemingly afraid to come in. They’re spent and they have no fight in them anymore. They won’t help nor hinder and my guards leave them be.

The hair on my neck stands up and my skin goosebumps all over as we move further in, tiptoeing, and yet we all sense something and stop abruptly.

“I don’t like this” I point out with a nervous waiver in my low tone.

“Me either” Carmen whispers almost into my ear as she moves in against my other side and takes my free hand. Squeezing it tight as though needing assurance or giving it.

“Let’s find the control room and quickly.” Radar also turns human, moving past us fast and heads down the dark passage to what once was our daily route, keeping eyes on our surroundings and using his ability to sense for others. To our once loved common room and place as a sub pack we liked to be together. For a second I long for Meadow and Colton beside me to go through with this and cross my fingers that both and the rest of our pack are safe. They’re warriors and some of the fiercest fighters of the Santo pack, but I’m still scared to death about what they are enduring right now, out there. I need Meadows presence here to fire up my own courage and regret not asking Colton to send her by my side too.

We move as one fluid unit in rapid speed, alert to our surroundings even though it truly seems deserted. We get to a small door just past our old corridor and Radar kicks it in with ease, breaking it from its hinges and the heavy door falls backwards into the pitch-black space with a grind and thud before finding a resting place against shelving. Leyanne moves in behind him and lights it up with both her palms glowing bright white. That room of monitors and keyboards and endless wires and tech. This used to be manned around the clock and now it sits here ticking on its own, like some lonely forgotten entity. A dark empty and airless space with only small red lights blinking quietly to themselves to indicate some things are running.

“Where is the one who was controlling the camera out there.” I ask quietly remembering one of them was operational and trailed our movements. Someone was definitely watching out there.