Luna of Rogues - Chapter 3: Chapter 3

Seven years later.
A twig snapped in the forest. I glanced over to my right and identified Rhys approaching through the undergrowth. He was now seventeen years old and towered over me at well over six-two. I had stubbornly remained a midget.
"You took your sweet time," I told him, gesturing for the band of wolves around me to spread out and keep watch.
Rhys shrugged, casual as ever. "Ran into a few issues — nothing I couldn't handle."
"Yeah, yeah. Skip the shameless inflation of your ego and tell me what happened."
"The young Alpha was home after all. It took me a little while to persuade him that I'd be too much trouble to finish off," Rhys said, still grinning at me. For the first time, I noticed the bruising on his face.
We were just outside Shadowless Pack territory, under orders from Rhodric to find out as much as we could about their new Alpha — Zach. While our rogues had enjoyed an unofficial alliance with Zach's father, we were now on uncertain footing with our closest neighbours.
"So he beat you up but you managed to lose him," I summarised.
"Are you kidding Skye?" He gestured to the bruising. "You think this is bad, you should see the other guy."
"What, because I'd be astonished at how little you fought back?" I asked with a teasing grin. "Seriously, though, what did you find out?"
"Zach is a hothead," Rhys muttered. "He's fairly inexperienced with leadership. But I got inside the pack house, and that pup has some powerful connections."
"With which packs?" I asked. Rhodric had been hoping for another truce or, failing that, an easy target for raids. With no money or prospects, a rogue's only hope of survival is stealing. We did that by running onto pack land and 'requisitioning' their possessions.
As this particular pack was famous for ruthless and talented fighters, we had previously ranged further afield in search of supplies. Now that the young and impulsive Zach was due to take over, it opened a window of opportunity for our raiders — most famous of whom was Rhys himself.
"Enemies with Riverside and Lowland, truced with Pine Forest," Rhys said, and he hesitated before he told me the next part. "But he's close with his cousin — Jace Lloyd. Their packs are tied by blood."
I cursed under my breath. I had often heard Rhodric's wolves talking about Alpha Jace. He had taken over New Dawn Pack at fifteen years old when his father had died. But what worried me the most was that by all accounts, he was clever. In my experience, that was a very unusual trait for Alphas.
"Then Zach is untouchable," I concluded. All of our effort and Rhys risking his life turned out to be for nothing.
"Easy there," Rhys said, noticing my depressed expression. "It wasn't that important."
"Rhodric won't be happy, though," I muttered, and he nodded in agreement.
"We should get back."
In truth though, I didn't think it was possible for anything to make Rhodric unhappy. He was eternally cheerful, a trait that seemed to run in the family.
So we shifted and carried our clothes in our teeth to begin the long run home. At just over seventeen myself, I had spent the majority of the last few years acting as Rhodric's personal agent, which was often dangerous work. Not that I minded doing anything which helped my guardian, especially as it meant I could work with Rhys and Fion.
It was half a day's travel to reach the current camp of the rogues who marched under my adopted father's banner. Nestled in a valley, the neutral colours of the tents were almost indistinguishable from the forest around them. As soon as we were inside the boundaries of the camp, I felt at home.
After seven years, I was even used to the way the crowd parted like the Red Sea as we walked. It was mostly due to Rhys's imposing height and reputation. And, if I was really being honest, I had gathered my own reputation recently. Skye Llewellyn, they had started calling me. I supposed it made sense, especially as Rhodric insisted to anyone who would listen that Fion and I were his daughters.
With no one getting in the way, we arrived outside Rhodric's command tent in a few minutes. Getting an audience wasn't easy for most people — there was a permanent queue of rogues waiting to talk to their infamous leader. But all we had to do was walk in.
"So the pup is allied to Jace," Rhodric contemplated. It hadn't taken us too long to fill him in.
"Jace is a pup as well," Rhys interjected. "They're about the same age."
"The difference is, Jace is a pup who knows what he's doing," Rhodric corrected his son sternly. "You shouldn't underestimate that wolf. How he managed to stay in control of that pack I'll never know."
"Maybe he had help," I suggested. "Wasn't there an older brother?"
"A sixteen-year-old half-brother who hightailed it into the hills as soon as their old Alpha died. He hasn't been seen since," Rhys told me, smug that he knew something I didn't for once.
"Returning to the matter at hand," Rhodric interrupted. "Shadowless isn't worth the trouble I'd get for attacking Zach directly."
He pondered that for a while, while my brother and I shuffled in place.
"Do you have another assignment for us, Dad?" Rhys asked seriously.
"Yes, actually. There's been disturbing rumours about a group of rogues patrolling the land between here and the southern packs. Infiltrate their ranks and find out what their game is. Ideally, I want them to join us or swear allegiance."
Sounds like a job for three moody teenagers with a talent for getting into trouble. We turned to walk out.
"Oh, and kids?" I stopped in my tracks and raised an eyebrow. "Take Fion this time. She's finished ... whatever the hell she was doing."
I knew exactly what she had been doing. Fion, the diligent little idiot, was keeping up with her education. Yesterday she'd attended a lecture at the local university on cosmological horizon entropy. Now, I didn't have the faintest clue what that was (I could hardly write my own name and Rhys couldn't even do that much), but Fion had a perfect run of A*s through every exam she'd ever taken, and cosmological horizon entropy wasn't too much of a stretch for an eidetic memory.
I walked into the same tent that Fion and I had been brought into on our first day in camp. It had been our home for the last seven years, whenever we weren't at the castle, of course. And today, it was particularly messy  — textbooks and paper sprawled over both beds. Needless to say, none of it belonged to me.
"Pack your stuff. We're going on a suicide mission."
"Finally," Fion said happily.
We were a bit strange like that. For some reason, the more likely something was to get us killed, the more fun it was.
"Enjoy your lecture?" I asked her.
"Oh, yes. There were some really insightful ideas about the Friedmann universe."
She may as well have been speaking another language, for all the sense it made. So I just chuckled, "Nerd."
"Ignorant pig," she snapped playfully.
"Condescending asshole."
She flipped me off for that. We managed to glare at each other for an entire minute before bursting out laughing.
We were so used to going on missions that we were all ready to leave in under five minutes. Maggie had given us the whole don't-take-any-unnecessary-risks talk. The three of us had a routine for getting through that without dying of boredom now. It was called the 'just smile and nod'.
Rhodric had, of course, told us the same thing as he always did before we went away.
"Be good, but if you can't be good, don't get caught."
As always, I followed that particular order to the letter.
***
Two days later, we stood in the land south of all the northern packs, but north of all the southern packs. I won't bore you with the details of the journey, except that Fion did a very spectacular face plant into a tree, the three of us managed to get into fights with wolves on four different occasions, and I may or may not have filled Rhys's sleeping bag with maggots. Twice.
"They're east of here," Rhys announced with his ever-present grin.
"Alright, Sherlock. Tell us how you figured that one out," Fion said.
"It's just a feeling I have," he replied.
"The last time you had one of your feelings, it turned out to be because you ate too much curry and needed the bathroom," I reminded him. Rhys looked indignant at the mention of the time when we'd chased around the woods for two hours looking for the 'rogues' his wolf had insisted were there.
"No, this time it's for real," he assured us.
But I was far from convinced. "What exactly makes you so certain?"
"For a start, that." Rhys pointed at a paw print set into the mud.
I crouched down to examine it quickly, embarrassed I hadn't noticed it before. Sure enough, it was pointing east and only a few hours old and belonged to a wolf who had to have Alpha blood to be that big.
"What the hell would an Alpha be doing so far from home?" Fion asked, also looking at the prints.
"I'm guessing we're about to find out," I muttered, and set off at a determined pace to follow the tracks.
After only a few hours of what I liked to call footprint stalking, I could scent a large number of wolves up ahead. There were too many for the three of us to beat into submission, so we would have to employ other, less desirable tactics.
"So ... ideas. How are we going to get them to trust us?" Rhys asked.
Fion and I exchanged a silent conversation of glances filled with conspiracy. "We were thinking..."
"Shit always happens when you two start thinking," he grumbled.
"...that we don't need them to trust all of us," I continued with a mischievous smirk.
We didn't even need to finish the sentence. Rhys instantly caught the implications.
"Oh hell no. Not again." He harrumphed. "I still have the scars from the last time we used that plan."
"But it always works so well," Fion said logically, giving him puppy eyes. I would have joined in if I wasn't too proud to resort to crude begging.
Rhys looked between us, then sighed. "Fine. You guys seriously owe me though. I'm talking pizza and ice-cream at the very least."
Funnily enough, we never did buy him that pizza and ice-cream.
So when, ten minutes later, a patrol of rogues passed through, they were greeted by an unusual sight. Fion and I were screaming for all we were worth, while Rhys attacked us.
Even I had to admit, my little brother wasn't doing a great job of making it look convincing. He gave me a pathetic shove, and while I knew he didn't want to actually hurt us, we really needed to sell this. I also knew the one and only way to make him fight me properly.
With an apologetic grin, I kicked him between the legs in what probably looked like self-defence. Rhys winced and crumpled for a second, but seemed to get my message. Even as he directed a sharp punch at my stomach, the rogues dragged him off us. Usually, Rhys would have to pretend that they could overpower him, but that wasn't an issue in this case.
The leader of the group was over six feet tall with dark hair and brown eyes. One whiff of his scent told me he had Alpha blood ... and a lot of it. The guy had Rhys in an arm-lock in seconds and pinned against a tree. Although Rhys would still have had a fair chance of escaping, he stayed unusually placid to keep up the act. Fion and I played the victimised females very well — shaking and sobbing hysterically.
"Are you alright?" the Alpha asked in a furious voice, even as he threw a punch at Rhys's gut to make him stop struggling. I tried not to wince in sympathy.
I stood up shakily and rubbed my stomach. It was taking every inch of my self-control not to murder this guy on the spot for hurting my little brother and it was well below my pride to be a damsel in distress, but I faked a smile. "Yeah ... I guess ... thanks."
Rhys made a fullblown attempt to escape from the man's hold, but the Alpha slammed his head into the tree. At that point, I couldn't stop my hands curling into fists as I watched my brother go completely limp. He was only just conscious.
"Who— Who are you?" Fion asked shakily. She hadn't budged from the floor.
"My name's Jay. I lead a group of rogues in these parts," he replied.
Then I knew for certain that something was wrong. This guy had a faint tang of packs to his scent, in particular New Dawn, who were led by Alpha Jace. Some rogue.
"You saved our lives. How can we ever repay you?" Fion asked. She had noticed that I wasn't exactly in control right now and was trying to draw attention.
"Don't worry about it," Jay replied, then changed the subject. "It's rare to find two females travelling alone. Who are you?"
"I'm Skye and this is Fion," I introduced us, having finally managed to swallow my anger. Now we just needed a back story. "We're from Pembrokeshire. Got displaced in all the conflict a few months back, so we came over here, looking for somewhere more stable to live."
Jay looked troubled by that, for some reason. "Do you know Emma and Kara then?"
"Um ... Emma and Kara?" I asked, starting to wish I'd just picked somewhere more obscure.
"You look like Kara. I thought you might be family... They passed through here a while back. Emma's from out west — the daughter of a Beta or something," Jay explained and narrowed his eyes at me ever so slightly.
Well shit. If I'd lived over there, I'd definitely have known the name of the Beta's daughter. Fortunately, that was where Fion's amazing mind skills came into play. She had a talent for exploiting the mind-link to get into people's head without them knowing.
One glance at Fion told her what I needed. Seconds later, she showed me an image of the girl stolen from Jay's thoughts.
"Oh, yes, I remember Emma," I exclaimed. "Dark hair. A little older than me."
Any suspicions Jay had seemed to vanish at my vague description. Despite nearly blowing our cover, it had actually helped make the lie we were spinning more believable.
"That's her," he said. It hadn't escaped my notice that he still had a death grip on poor Rhys, who had recovered from his possible concussion remarkably quickly. "You two can come back with us if you don't have anywhere better to go."
"Thank you. We'd like that," Fion said shyly, now playing the angle of being an impressionable teenager. Any female in her right mind would decline to join a group of strange, all-male rogues, for obvious reasons.
Jay now considered the fate of his prisoner for the first time and turned to the nearest of his friends. "Take him away and kill him."
I was pretty sure that wasn't a part of our plan. Rhys set his jaw and got ready to make a break for it, but then had a much better idea. "If you do that, you might as well be signing your own death certificate."
Jay looked like he'd heard it all before and retorted with a growl, "Really? And why would that be?"
Rhys gave an infuriatingly smug smirk that would make anyone want to straggle him, even if you knew he was doing it on purpose like I did. "Believe it or not, you're not the first person I've pissed off. And you really wouldn't want to deny Rhodric Llewellyn the pleasure of personally killing me."
He was playing a dangerous game — counting on being able to pull off that Rhodric wanted him dead, without Jay finding out his identity. I supposed it was less dangerous than being murdered on the spot, though. If it worked, Jay would be forced into a meeting with Rhodric and instantly empathise with him for wanting a guy who attacks defenceless girls wiped off the face of the planet.
The main aim of our mission was, after all, to get Jay allied to Rhodric without revealing our involvement.
Jay took a long time to consider the recent plot development. He was obviously torn between angering a very powerful man and getting rid of a nuisance. Finally, he seemed to make up his mind.
"Did he do either of you any permanent harm?" Jay asked. Aww, he was trying to play the gentleman. Too bad it would never work on me — I had no interest in manners or males in general, at least until I turned eighteen in a few weeks and would be able to recognise my mate.
"Only a few bruises," I replied with a dramatic sigh.
Jay clenched his jaw and gestured for two of his companions to restrain Rhys. "Escort him back to camp and secure him. Don't do any serious damage — I need him alive for now, understand?"
Both wolves nodded and started dragging Rhys away. I was beginning to reconsider the wisdom behind this particular part of our plan. But right now, I had to focus on making sure that Jay believed every lie we told him.
As the rogues led the way back to their camp, Fion slipped into step with me and spoke in an undertone. "When I was looking around in his head for stuff about Emma, I found something pretty interesting."
I gave her an inquiring glance and raised an eyebrow.
"His full name is Jaden. He also definitely used to be in New Dawn pack."
There were very few reasons to use a fake name as a werewolf, because your scent could be recognised instantly anyway. Unless ... unless he had a price on his head. That would mean he didn't want anyone hearing about his whereabouts.
"See what else you can get, but don't tire yourself out too much," I told her. It was very exhausting to mind-link without being detected, and it was limited to what the person was thinking about at any one time.
Knowing his real name would also be invaluable in event of blackmail. Now all we needed to know was why he wanted it to stay hidden.
I couldn't help but feel a stab of pity for Rhys, being shoved along with very little regard for his wellbeing. Fion and I were being treated like guests. They offered us refreshments and when we reached their camp, we were given our own tent to stay in.
After reaching the safety of the camp, Jay immediately started interrogating Rhys. "How do you know Rhodric and why does he want you dead?"
"I killed his younger son," Rhys replied, and I honestly felt like facepalming. My brother had just admitted to murdering himself. It became a huge effort not to burst out laughing.
"And then you escaped the consequences," Jay summarised, and suddenly looked very guilty. Fion was on his case in an instant, but from her muttered curses I guessed he had buried whatever he'd been thinking about before she could reach it.
"Yeah — I ran off and headed south to get away from him, which was when I ran into these two lovely ladies," Rhys continued with a creepy wink towards us, which earned him a clout from Jay. I gave a horrified shudder, while trying to stop myself grinning at our situation.
As well as he was selling the story, I couldn't help but wish that Rhys didn't have such an aversion to self-preservation.
"So Rhodric wants your head on a platter?"
"Yes, but he also wants to be the one to put it there, in case you get any ideas," Rhys muttered and rubbing his bruised jaw.
"In that case, we'd better pay Rhodric a visit," Jay decided, wearing a grim smile.