CHAPTER THREE: FAUNA AND THE TRAITOR
Fauna was more than happy when she was at the dining log that evening. She had just taken a bath before she took her place with the others.
She greedily snatched a whole fish, all of her manners forgotten as she bit half of if off. Saber and Hailey watched her, startled by her attitude, but she didn't care. She wasn't even done chewing when she shoved the rest into her mouth and reached for a deer's leg which Lord Bruce was about to take, but she growled at him and with furrowed brows, he left the piece of meat for her.
"Have you forgotten your manners?" Kali – the head hunter – addressed her, and she turned to him and bared her teeth. She wasn't usually so violent, but she could still feel the remnant of adrenaline in her, pushing her animalistic nature forward.
"The child is tired. Let her be," Bone spoke up and Lord Bruce chuckled.
"So it seems. I remember Saber was like this when I put him through training. It's okay, Kali."
Hailey – the head Scout – who was seated beside Fauna leaned in and whispered to her. "How are you holding up?"
"Fine!" Fauna said, her mouth full of meat. She looked down at her half-eaten meat and nodded before tearing off more skin from the bone.
"Slow down, else you'll choke," Saber who was on her other side told her, but she didn't stop until the only thing left in her hand was clean bone. She belched loudly and tossed the piece of bone aside.
"The Healers had her sit still for a while so her body could properly heal," Saber explained to Hailey. "She had sustained injuries faster than she could heal. Luckily, she didn't scar."
"Lord Bruce would have Bone's head if she did," Hailey whispered back with a brief laugh which earned her a glare from Bone.
"You do realize I can hear you, right?"
"Indeed." She nodded and returned to licking blood off her very pale, almost translucent skin.
"Fauna did try out there. I was there watching the whole thing," Zara told Ryker – the head Sniffer.
Fauna watched them all. She was slowly returning to herself as her body was calm and convinced she wasn't under attack anymore. She turned to Saber and spared him a huge grin.
"I managed to land a punch on Bone's face," she boasted as she puffed her chest and Saber smile, proud of her.
"You broke three of your fingers in the process," Bone reminded her, but Fauna didn't care.
"I landed a punch on his face," she repeated. "I just swung forward and I – ahh!" She suddenly screamed and clutched the sides of her head, her face contoured to show pure agony.
Everyone dropped their meal and moved over to inspect her. Bone turned to the Helper who always sat by the throne and immediately, she ran out to fetch a Healer.
Fauna could sense everyone's concern, but her mind couldn't fix on anything that was happening. Her head felt like it was about to split in two. She could vaguely hear Saber call out her name, but she couldn't force words out of her mouth.
She could smell her. She could feel her. She was everywhere, but at the same time, Fauna knew there was no way she could be here. It just wasn't possible.
But, what if?
Fauna could see her cynical face and soulless cyan eyes. She could hear the sound of her cold, obnoxious laughter which sent ripples of fear down her very soul.
Fauna felt pain that she hadn't felt before, and when she heard a sickening snap, she snapped back to reality. A Healer was holding her paw. Yes. Her paw. Her whole left wrist and palm had morphed and it put her in excruciating pain. She screamed at the snowy white fur that covered her arm and long, sharp claws that protruded from her paws.
"Make it stop!" She screamed in pain. She felt as though she had been thrown into a furnace and the flames were incinerating her flesh. "Please make it –"
Reality suddenly faded away and Fauna found herself staring at her. She was there. She was looking right at her. She was in human form and her cyan eyes were as cold as Fauna recalled. Fauna wanted to run, but her legs wouldn't move.
"I don't get what's so special about the girl. She cannot morph, she cannot fight, she's super slow. I saw her at practice today and it was quite pitiful."
"Practice?" Fauna heard her voice. She stood with her hands behind her back as she always did, her thin lips drawn in a straight line. Her golden hair is shorter than Fauna recalled, but every other thing was the same.
"That's what I said. Bruce wants to have her trained. Perhaps they think she can take you down. I don't really know the plan as he called a private council meeting and I couldn't eavesdrop."
She barked out a laugh that seemed to make the air colder and birds fled the spot, sensing the danger. "It's okay. You have done well. Just keep your eyes and ears down and report whatever you find to me."
"Why do you want her? She's practically a human child."
"Trust me, she is no human. The girl is very valuable and has the ability to –"
"Fauna!" Fauna heard someone call her name and she snapped her eyes open. She wasn't out in the open forest. She was at the dining log with Lord Bruce.
Her head was hurting, her chest was hurting and she looked down at her hand, surprised to see it was back to normal. She reached for a bowl of water which she immediately drank before she looking around, her chest rising and falling rapidly.
"She's here!" She was sure it was real. It felt so real! "She's right here in our territory. I saw her!"
"Who is?" Ryker asked, paranoid as ever. His violet eyes darted from side to side, his nose upward as he searched for some unknown threat.
"Sabrina," Fauna spat out the name like it was poison. "She's in our land."
"Impossible!" Ryker growled. "My Sniffers aren't incompetent." He felt insulted. If there was another break-in, what did that say about him when he personally trained all the Sniffers? They should have smelt danger and called out to the Soldiers.
"You don't understand!" Fauna leaned forward and grabbed him by the shoulders, pulling him towards her. "She was let in. One of our Sniffers is a traitor!"
Ryker pried her arms off of him and stared at her in contempt. They didn't believe her. They didn't want to believe her. She wasn't even sure she believed herself. She could have been hallucinating. She didn't have the ability to read minds.
However, she knew what she felt and it was too intense, too real to be a hallucination. She felt the wind against her skin, she had heard every sound of the forest better than she should have. She perceived things better than her senses would allow. It was as though she was stuck inside another person's heard and that person had a pretty neat snout.
The Healer present realized this was a situation she shouldn't get herself involved in, so she bowed and exited the throne room.
"This is total nonsense," Hailey the albino tigress spoke up, her pink eyes showed her disbelief. "No tiger would turn on his own specie."
"True! We know better than to trust lions," Kali added. "What could a lion offer a tiger to make him turn his back on his family?"
They were all scared. Fauna could feel it. She was also terrified, but she tried to project calmness through the room. They needed to be sane and level-headed in order to check out the threat.
"I know what I saw!" Fauna insisted and Hailey bared her teeth at her, causing Saber to growl in her direction.
"You will address my sister; your Lady with respect!" He commanded and Hailey crossed her arms and stares at Saber with her jaw clenched.
Fauna wasn't upset though. She knew it was the fear talking and no one wanted to show they were afraid. Fear is weakness, but anger is power.
"How are you so sure of this?" Bone, level headed as always questioned. He didn't look scared and Fauna couldn't feel any wave of emotion from him. As always, he was an unreadable book.
"I saw it happen. I can't explain. One moment, I was here, and the next, I saw myself outside talking to Sabrina. It was as though I was in this tiger's head."
"Now you're just spewing absolute nonsense!" Ryker threw his arms, but Bruce held his arm up, silencing everyone at the log.
"I know you aren't lying to me, Fauna, but even you must admit your claims are preposterous," Lord Bruce spoke in his calm and collected tone. "You had a fever. You could have been hallucinating."
"Pardon me, Father," Saber spoke up, "but the longer we stay here and debate, the longer we are doing nothing to confirm or dispel her words. We could all sit here and argue like cubs, or we could venture out and find out whether truly a lioness was on our property."
Saber took Fauna's palm in his and smiled to her, silently telling her he believed her. He trusted Fauna with his life and knew she would never lie to the clan.
"Fine! Who is this traitor? Let's go and interrogate him," Hailey offered and Fauna pinched her brows as she tried to think back.
She heard his voice – was it even a he? She wasn't sure. All she was sure about was that she saw Sabrina.
"I'm sorry, but I don't have the answer to that." She slumped her shoulders. "I was paying too much attention to Sabrina."
Bone shook his head at her, showing his disapproval. Wasn't he just teaching her hours ago that she needs to learn to focus on multiple things at the same time?
"Okay then. Where did you see the lioness?" It was Ryker who asked.
"At the border."
"So, the South-side. Let's go," Kali spoke up and started to rise, but Fauna shook her head.
"There were boulders. The North-side."
"That makes no sense. Ari's pride lies on the other side of the South-side. Going around and coming in from the North would take hours to go around." Lord Bruce raised his head. "Are you sure about this?"
"Well, it makes sense. There's a whole lot more Sniffers at the South-side as it is the closest to the pride. So, it would make sense that she would try the North-side," Saber defended Fauna and Hailey scoffed.
Before they could come up with a plan, Hailey and Ryker sped off. Kali stares unsurely at Lord Bruce who waves dismissively at him, knowing he wasn't one for confrontation. Kali smiled and wandered off.
"What are you slow-pokes waiting for? They're going to have all the fun." Zara grinned widely and chased after Hailey and Ryker. Bone stood and grabbed his staff and together with Bruce, Saber and Fauna, he raced after the others.
Fauna's heart was pounding in her chest. She wanted to be wrong. She would rather face their incredulous stares than have to deal with a traitor in their midst.
They arrived at the scene moments later and found Hailey staring at them, a triumphant glint in her pink eyes.
"Look around, Fauna. Do you smell any lion here?"
Hailey was right. There was no lingering scent of lioness and she wasn't upset to be wrong. Ryker however wasn't at ease. He looked around, his brows pulled tight as he paced, his nose in the air.
"Do you guys smell that?" He suddenly stopped and sniffed harder before coughing. The others walked up to him and smelled the air. For a while, they don't smell anything, until Saber walks up.
"It's... It smells familiar, yet so strange."
Zara hummed and walked further and sniffed before she suddenly coughed, her face scrunched in disgust. "It's smoke. You know, from a fire."
They all snarled in disgust as though she just said the worst thing. Werefolks hated fire as it could easily get out of control and destroy nature. They had also heard so many stories of humans use fire to smoke out animals.
No werefolk would attempt to start a fire. They didn't even need fire for anything, so it made no sense that someone would set fire in their territory. Fauna shook her head, not liking where this was heading.
"This way." Ryker pointed and they followed him past the boulders and towards the very edge of the territory. Each one of them had the same thought in mind. 'where was the Sniffer that was supposed to guard the North?'
They walked for about a minute; the stench slowly becoming overpowering until even Fauna started to cough. They finally found it; a whole area of scorched plants and ashes.
"Did you see smoke or fire in your... vision?" Bone turned to Fauna, slowly starting to believe him. For the first time, Fauna could feel something from him. Apprehension.
Fauna shook her head. Negative.
"You just saw the vision, and this fire looks like it was burning for a while. Perhaps what you saw wasn't a vision, but a memory. If Sabrina was here, she's long gone," Hailey spoke up, her voice small as she inspected the scene with wrinkled nose.
"Why would anyone set fire? We have stern rules against burning things." Bruce was angry and whoever set the fire, whether they were conniving with the lions or not were going to get punished.
The forest was home. It was a sanctuary and was to be treated with love, care and respect.
"Perhaps the lions wish to roast us all," Ryker suggested but Zara shook her head.
"The lions are savages, yes, but very smart. As much as they want Fauna, they want our land, our food, our resources. They wouldn't destroy it."
Everyone stood and contemplated. They knew it couldn't be a human. They hadn't seen a human in years and were days away from human settlement. Moreover, no human would go to camp, start a fire, quench it almost immediately and take off so late.
They had all run out of ideas and Saber suggested they returned to the throne room to contemplate, but Ryker suddenly stopped them.
"Sniff. What do you smell?"
They all did as were instructed. Stuck their snouts in the air and took in a whiff only to erupt into fits of cough.
"Smoke, smoke, more smoke. I think this has already been established." Hailey coughs, a frown on her face.
"Yes, but who set the fire? Where's the scent of the Sniffer on duty? Can you smell the animals that passed?"
Realization dawned on them at Ryker's words and suddenly, everything made sense. How couldn't they have noticed this before?
"The fire was used to cover up scent," Lord Bruce said what was on everyone's minds and Ryker nodded in affirmation.
There was no doubting it anymore. Fauna was right. There was a traitor in their midst and they had to put an end to the madness immediately!