The Royal Pain

Chapter Six:

The wolf in front of me was scrawny. His grey fur was matted, and even missing in some places. His eyes had turned red, showing that he had become feral; there was no trace of the human who he once was. 

He growled at me and lunged. Somehow, he managed to clamp his teeth into the scruff of my neck, but I soon shook him off and threw him against one of the trees. We were deep in the forest, and the inky black sky was hindering my abilities to detect all the rogues. 

Sharp rocks and twigs dug into my paws and I yelped as something tugged on my tail. I spun, spitting and kicking out. I was surrounded, and the trees were too dense for me to escape. I lunged here, kicked there, ducked and growled. 

In the distance, I heard a howl. The howl was familiar and something clutched at my heart as I realised that someone on our side had died. I snarled and my eyes darkened considerably as the advancing rogues bared their teeth at me. 

My blood curdled and pure agony filled me. My heart was beating faster than ever and adrenaline rushed through my veins like a faucet had just been turned on.  I took down the lead wolf, tearing out his throat. I spat the blood out, mentally cringing at the taste of it. 

His beta was next as we threw ourselves at each other. We were both out for revenge and I bit down on his muzzle, breaking it. He whimpered and backed away, turning to leave. I ended his life mere seconds later. 

There was one wolf left and I howled, letting everyone know that we were victorious. I dragged the wolf, by his ear, back to camp. 

Men and women gathered around our small fire and I dropped the weak brown wolf down by the fire. As usual, people bowed their heads at my large golden wolf. My hackles raised as the rogue stirred and my muzzle pulled upwards. 

I shifted and grabbed Nathan's shirt from my bag. I pulled on the shirt and sat in front of the fire, waiting for the rogue to awake, with bated breath. Behind me, the rest of the team were all huddled in a circle, desperately trying to keep warm and mourning the loss of a fellow comrade.

The remains of an abandoned hut stood alone to the side of out campfire. That was where the rogues had stayed, using it as a hideout. It didn't take long for us to find it. 

We'd invaded in the dead of the night, throwing down our backpacks and tearing through the air, towards the hut. Three of my men had torn it down, whilst the rest of us chased down the wolves that had managed to escape. 

I had gone for the leader. 

From what I could tell, we had spent three days finding the place, as the area around us was so vast. Another day to scout the area and find the best attacking places, and then, the last day, we'd spent tracking down the wolves as we attacked their safe haven. 

***

As people began to drift off, I dragged the rogue back into the depths of the forest. Once I was sure that we were away from the small clearing, I kicked the wolf hard. He didn't stir, so I forced opened his eyes and blew on them. 

Making sure to keep a firm grip on his squirming body I ordered him to shift. 

"Filthy Royal," he spat at me as soon as he was in human form. I quirked an eyebrow at him and smirked. It was cold out and I was thankful that I'd decided to pull on some black jeans before dragging him out here. Once again, though, the sharp stones dug into my bare feet. 

I threw a shirt at the rogue - one of the male members of my team had lent it to me when I'd asked for a shirt for our prisoner.  The rogue sniffed the shirt, made a distasteful face, and threw on the shirt with a grunt. 

The rogue looked to be about my age. His hair was brown, like his wolf's fur, and it stuck up in all different directions. His body was caked in dirt, and although he tried to seem brave, I could see the fear in his brown eyes. 

"Listen here," I said, making sure to lace my words with venom. "We've spent five days chasing your little 'pack' and killing you all. You will tell me what you were planning." I leaned in closer so we were eye to eye and the boy smirked. 

"Oh, will I? And why's that? You can't force me, and you can't kill me, because if you do, you'll never know. I think the term I'm looking for is... Checkmate." The boy smirked and I felt rage rip through my body. 

"No, but if you don't tell me, when we get back to the Royals, they'll have you tortured." 

The rogue didn't even blanch, he just stared at me with stark black eyes that looked vacant. A humourless chuckle ripped through the cold night air and he smiled cruelly. "You think I care?" 

Narrowing my eyes and choosing to ignore his question, I dragged him back to camp, once again by his ear and watched over him for the entire night, making sure that he didn't try to escape. I went over his words in my head time and time again, trying to poke holes into what he'd said. 

To see if he was arrogant enough to give his plan away, but nothing came to mind. I growled, frustrated. I stared at his sleeping body and felt like tearing a branch off of a nearby tree and plummeting it through his chest. I restrained myself, and decided to let the slur of profanities escape from my mouth instead. 

I had to admit, my tactic was poor, and I didn't know what I was trying to prove. Usually, we only had to deal with one or two rogues, and once you'd killed one, the other would tell you anything you wanted to know. I should have known that with a pack of rogues this size, I'd have to dig deeper than asking someone if I wanted answers. 

I frowned as I thought back to what I'd said. We had spent five long, exhausting days killing them all, and I was wondering how Nathan was holding up; probably not too well. The King had said that it would take a day at the most. I guessed he'd miscalculated the size of the pack.

My limbs burned and my head trembled. I hadn't slept in five days, and I was running purely on adrenaline, that was fading fast. I envied the others who lay snoring. They'd done their job well, to only suffer the loss of one brother. 

They too, had not slept in a long time. However, I was grateful that they had the chance to do so now. Some peace in the midst of all this chaos. I stood, paced and chomped anxiously on my nails. I could feel myself falling into the dark abyss of sleep and I had to prevent myself from doing so.

I could compromise the whole mission; I could allow our prisoner to escape. 

Our prisoner. 

Something was tugging at my mind, but I couldn't figure out what, My heart slammed against my rib cage with so much force I was surprised that it was still in my chest. My head swam with words that I couldn't comprehend and my whole body burned fervently.

"I think the term I'm looking for is... Checkmate." 

That was what he had said. Something about that sentence jumped out at me and my lethargic mind took longer than usual to figure it out. 

Checkmate.  

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hope is the only thing stronger than fear. 

- Suzanne Collins.

  (Edited)