My sleep was interrupted early in the morning by snarling and shouting. I shot out of bed, heart racing, and peered out of my room. Outside, tables were flipped and chairs were in the process of being crushed. I watched as two wolves the size of small horses rolled around with each other, aggressively nipping and scratching at each other with long claws and canines.
"What's going on out there?" Silva asked from behind me.
"A fight or something," I answered, keeping my eyes on the two figures. The people in the room were backed up to the wall, although it looks like most of them had cleared the room entirely, afraid of getting hurt.
I considered going out there, but it was unlikely anything I did would stop them from their fight. It was morning, surely the guards would be in here soon. I looked over to the barred wall to see plenty of guards watching the brawl from the other side. I don't blame them. I would wait this out too, but it had been going on for several minutes now and I was wondering if it would ever stop.
From the top bunk, I heard a chesty growl. Blasius jumped out of his bed and stalked past me into the main room. "Hey!" He shouted with a loud, authoritative voice grabbing the attention of the two taking part in the altercation. "Shift. Now."
Unsurprisingly, the two wolves obeyed, shifted and turned into two men.
"State your name, pack and position." Blasius ordered. Again, they did as they were told.
"Dashiell Bisset, the Sabercrest pack, Beta," one said, curtly.
"Asola Herrera. Beta for Battlemaw pack." The other chimed.
"Battlemaw?" Blasius repeated. "You should know better. As Alpha of Battlemaw pack I demand you both stop fighting and if I am to hear it again from anyone," he dragged his finger from along the small fearful crowd, making sure to make eye contract with everyone looking his way, "you'll be dealing with me. If any other Alpha here disagrees with me, feel free to challenge me. Just know you'll lose."
After a long glare directed at both of the men who were fighting only a few moments ago, Blasius made his way around me back into our room. He hopped up into the top bunk and pulled the blankets over his head.
Not even noticing I had let my body follow him, I turned back around when I heard the clang of metal. The two men were being handcuffed and taken out of the room.
✯ ✯ ✯
"Where do you think they were being taken?" I asked to Blasius who was now far less grumpy than he had been earlier when woken up without notice.
"You're the clairvoyant, shouldn't you be able to figure that out?" He replied, nonchalantly. "But if you're asking me because you're not interested enough to get an answer that's definitively correct then I think they've been executed."
"You think they've been killed?!"
Blasius' attractively broad shoulders shrugged. For a moment, I peeked down to admire them. After being flustered—and worried I would be caught—my gaze caught his again.
"Sure. That's always been the king's way of handling things."
"So when you said you thought they were going to kill all of us, you weren't joking..." I trailed off. I thought back to my family again. They'd never see me again at the rate this was going and my heart physically ached at the thought.
"No, but I want to do everything in my power to prevent that from happening and I can see in your eyes that you want the same. The two of us and your friends, we could make a great team—a force to be reckoned with," Blasius raised his hand and stuck his pinky finger up towards me, "so let's say we work together to make that happen?"
I looked down at the large hand outstretched towards me, but low enough that the guards couldn't see it due to the tabletop. I looked back up at his face to see a confident smirk gracing his mouth. His aura of conviction seeped into me, my facial expression mimicking his in a convincing sense of assurance. I stuck my pinky finger out and looped it around his much larger one.
"Let's do it."
Suddenly, I heard a jingling of metal coming from behind me, the doors of the cell opening. I whipped my head around to see a single guard making his way in my direction. I turn back around trying to ignore the unknown guard and see Blasius with squared shoulders and squinted eyes. He was watching the guards every move, and from what I could tell only by the watching Blasius, he was only getting closer and closer.
Turning back around to face the guard, and perhaps my death with the way things had been going lately, my eyes trailed from his jaw to his hands which were holding the paper and ink I asked for what seems like days ago.
With a curt nod, when the man got close enough, he handed me the papers without a word and turned around to leave. I muttered a thank you but by that time he was already gone too far to hear me. When I returned my gaze to Blasius, I caught him looking at the paper in curiosity.
I hadn't told the others why I wanted it. Of course, I would eventually, but I wanted to make sure all of our lips were sealed until I could at least get a basic draft of the castle's layout. Once I told them, I'd need to guarantee they understood we could only talk about this in whispered voices and secluded areas. Furthermore, among each other, only. I didn't know if any of the other prisoners would mind throwing us under the bus for some better treatment, and I certainly didn't want to find out.
Blasius, Silva, and Menas were smart though. Trustworthy, too. I could feel it. Some part of me deep down inside just knew I could rest my complete faith in them, and my intuition was never wrong.
With a deep breath, I picked up the pen, dipped it in the jet black ink, and closed my eyes.