Chapter 12

ACHILLES. “Mama told me it was dangerous there.” Claudia’s tiny voice rings in my head as I sink deeper into my dream. This time, I see her as her much younger self. We’re standing at the edge of the forest behind the palace, facing the tall trees and wondering how we could get in without being caught. I remember this. The night my life changed. I still had a voice, and I heard myself saying, “It won’t be so dangerous if you’re out with me. Do you trust me, Claudia?” She looks up at me, her eyes too big for her small innocent face. “I trust you.” With that, she reaches for my hand, and together we go into the forest. The shadow of the trees seems to swallow us whole, opening like a big black mouth devouring every single ray of light. The leaves crunch under our feet, brittle and loud. The air seems to be colder here like it’s secluded from the rest of the world. I remember Claudia’s hand tightening around mine. I remember her breathing getting shorter and more rattled the deeper we went. I remember giving her one of the wooden swords that we played with. And I remember the horror on her face when she looked at something behind me…. After that, it was all black. I wake up, my breath hitched in my throat. My covers are all bunched up against my feet, and my pillow is almost drenched in sweat. My pulse is merely a thrum with how fast it’s going, and for some reason, my whole body is sore like I just ran a marathon. I bury my face in my hands. What was that dream all about? I know that that was the night that changed everything for me, the night I lost my hearing and my voice. It’s been a recurring nightmare my entire life, but how come I still don’t remember anything past that point where Claudia saw something behind me? ‘Fuck,’ I mouth to myself, ruffling my own damp hair. I look at the clock and see that it’s barely even three in the morning. I should be sleeping in preparation for our mission tomorrow, but here I am trying desperately to remember details of something that’s been lost for decades. Might as well do something with my time. I get up, splashing my face with cold water and putting on a robe. I go out of my room and head to the library, only to see that there are very few guards patrolling. This causes a direct stab of pain in my chest. “Alpha,” they greet me, and as they bow to me, I hold up a hand. I shake my head to say, ‘No need to do that.’ They all seem confused, but I don’t feel like it’s necessary anymore. It doesn’t feel like I’m the king of anything right now, and maybe I like it better that way. I need to make things right before I deserve the kind of respect they give me. I’m about to enter my study when I see Carlos walking along the hallway, clutching a mug. He seems surprised to see me, but he approached me nonetheless. “Alpha. Why are you up so late?” ‘I could ask you the same,’ I sign to him. ‘I couldn’t sleep, so I figured I would go to my study and figure out some things I left since the meeting. Maybe it would help us with our new goals. You can come help me.’ He smiles, seemingly happy just with being given something to do. Together, we head to my study. There on my desk is a book left open, on the page that talks about Rogues. Carlos frowns at the crude illustrations. “Why were you researching about them?” ‘Because I wanted to know more,’ I tell him. When he still looks confused, I continue to sign, ‘Did you ever wonder why they didn’t come forward and make their intentions known? Is this issue even considered a revolution when we don’t know what they want?’ “So what I’m getting is… you want to talk to them?” He tilts his head in confusion. “I mean, have you ever seen those Rogues in their human forms? Do they even have human forms?” ‘They do.’ I point at one of the drawings. ‘That was exactly my plan. Negotiate. Do they want their own land? Do they want their own government? Because I don’t think they’re perfectly content just scavenging and hurting people. They’re very easy to kill, so I guess more battles would hurt their numbers too.’ I catch his blank expression, and I sigh. ‘I know it sounds stupid, but none of our plans worked so far. I don’t think Tristan’s genocide approach would work either. That’s what we’ve tried to do for the past years, just kill them when we see them. How did that work for us?’ “Not good,” Carlos finally agrees, but his eyebrows are still furrowed. “They have been insisting on just killing every Rogue on sight for the past two years. I know you proposed some sort of diplomacy the first time around, and they rejected it.” ‘Yes, they told me it was a show of weakness,’ I confirm almost absently as my mind starts to work overtime. A plan is starting to form. “Alpha?” Carlos asks. “Are you alright?” I nod, for the first time cracking a smile. ‘I’m more than alright. I have it all figured out. We have to face the Rogues head-on, but we don’t have to mindlessly kill them. They might just be attacking our villages out of revenge. We can go to the places where they are most concentrated, then we find their leader.’ I wait for Carlos to shoot this idea down, but to my utter surprise, his face lights up. “And once we find the leader, we can strike the deal, or openly wage war if that is needed. But this time, we can organize troops better.” ‘First, we need to find where most of them are.’ I look at the maps I’ve marked down. ‘Silver Hills is where Rogues are spotted a lot. We sent most of our troops there last time too. The village is still there.’ Carlos and I look at each other, and we immediately know what to do. I leave a letter telling Kiernan about our plans and leaving him in charge for the day. We both head to the armory to get some weapons, but I purposefully tell him to choose the older, more dated ones. Because instead of going there with a royal cavalry, I decided that it was going to be a two-man mission. Just me and Carlos, pretending to be common people, getting past the villagers to see where in those hills the Rogue lair is. We both get on our horses and leave, and by the time the sun starts to show, we arrive. I can’t say that I have been to many places in the land, especially with just my Beta and a couple of horses. I must say that it feels enlightening already, to be out here with everyone else. I hated that I had to follow the rules and stay sheltered when everyone else told me to, but that is going to change. “We have to go on foot now,” Carlos says, tying our horses to the trees. “We need to—oh, no….” I want to ask him what it is, but then I see him looking at something above me. I follow his line of sight, and my jaw drops too. Hanging around the arch of Silver Hills are flags with the insignia of a crescent moon and a dagger. The insignia of the Moonlight Grove Pack. The battle for dominance has started, and it seems Alpha Tristan has already gained his first territorial claim.