Destiny (The Chosen One Trilogy:Book Three) (6 page)

Dodge veered off and headed to the open
ground, circled back and hit the ground running just as the humans
came scrambling into the meadow. I pulled my swords and Dodge
folded his wings over my legs to keep them out of the way. One of
the humans gave a shout and the three of them came to a stop then
spun around as the rest of our pack charged out of the woods behind
them.

They put their hands up and stood back to
back. Our pack circled them. Rainen shifted so she could talk.

“Identify yourselves!”

One of them, the smallest of the three, it
was hard to tell the color of his hair because of the hood he wore,
jumped and tried to sprint away.

“Don’t!” This came from the blond human as
Matthew launched himself at the hooded one. He drove his shoulder
into the leopard’s side and knocked him off of his friend. The
third man, this one with hair so pale it was almost white, stayed
frozen in place.

Jasper crouched low, ready to spring at the
blond man who stood between the shifters and his friend. The latter
was still lying on his stomach, his head in his arms.

“Your pack,” said the blond man. He had his
back turned to me. “It’s different.” He looked from one animal to
the next. “There’re both kinds in it.” He ran a hand through his
hair. “God, what did she call them? Nommies? No. Nimals?” He shook
his head, frustrated. He turned to the light haired man. “You know
this!” His friend stayed quiet. “The other ones. It sounds like
magic. Mage? Mag. No, that’s not it either.” He took a deep
breath.

The more he talked the more familiar his
voice sounded. “Look, I’m looking for Hayden. You’ve got to be one
of her packs.”

Jasper growled low in his throat and stalked
closer to the human.

“What is your interest in Hayden?” asked
Rainen. She did a great job of not looking in my direction.

The man hesitated. “I just need to find
her.”

Jasper shifted still ready to strike. “If you
were to find Hayden, what would be your purpose with her?”

“I need to talk to her.”

“What would you say to her?”

“What? Umm. Well, honestly, I guess the first
thing I would ask her is if she’d had a chance to have a shower
lately.”

My heart jumped in my throat as the voice and
the sentence suddenly made up my mind about who the man was. I
sheathed my swords and slid off of Dodge. The man turned at the
sound of me landing on the ground and his hazel eyes locked with
mine.

“Hayden!”

William’s eyes widened as Jasper’s dagger
pressed against his throat.

“Don’t! It’s William! He’s the one I told you
about. The one who helped Brice get me out of Paradin.”

Jasper relaxed his hold on my friend but
didn’t remove his dagger from his throat.

“Why are you here, William,” he asked.

“I’m looking for Hayden. I’ve been looking
for her for the past nine months. I just followed the rumors until
they led me here.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,
William.”

“Jesus. You must be Jasper.” He swallowed
hard and looked at me. “Will you tell him I’m on your side?”

“Jasper. Hun. Please.”

Jasper’s eyes met mine and I could see the
uncertainty in them. They narrowed and he turned his attention back
to William. “Why didn’t you shift? Where are your stones?”

“We don’t have any. We just left. I couldn’t
stay there knowing that what he was doing was wrong!”

Jasper’s hold loosened and William pressed
on. “I was there, Jasper. I saw what it did to her when Braw
touched her with that staff. I saw what it did to the others. I
won’t be a part of it. I’m not much of a fighter. I’ve never had to
learn how, but I’ll stand by Hayden and do my best to help her
cause.” He pulled at his tunic and stopped when Jasper’s hold
tightened again.

“Look! Let me show you.”

Jasper took a step back and tears started
falling down my face as William pulled his shirts over his head. I
walked to him and traced the scars on his back he had gotten from
being whipped.

“You said they wouldn’t hurt you if we made
it look like Brice attacked you,” I whispered.

He looked at Jasper and back to me. “I knew
you wouldn’t go along with the plan if you knew what they would
do.”

I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him
tightly. He returned the hug. “It’s alright, Hayden. It was my
decision. Don’t go blaming yourself for this.” He turned to Jasper.
“I wouldn’t have put myself through that if I didn’t give a damn
about her.”

Everyone was quiet as the two men stared at
each other. Jasper was the first to move. He bent over, grabbed
William’s shirts and handed them to him.

“Sorry about the cut.” He gestured toward
William’s neck.

William pressed the heel of his hand against
it. “After what Hayden had told me about you I was sort of
expecting worse.”

Everyone shifted back and I introduced my
pack to him. He gestured toward the light blond haired man. “That
there is Steven.” He turned to the one he had risked his life to
protect. “And that is Emelly.”

Two small hands reached up and pushed the
hood back. Two green eyes blinked at me. Emelly ran a hand through
her short dark red hair. She looked to be in her early twenties.
Matthew, who was standing by her, looked down, his own green eyes
wide with surprise. He cleared his throat.

“Umm. Sorry about that.” He offered her his
hand which she hesitated before taking. He pulled her to her feet.
“Our main objective is keeping Hayden safe, you see. We thought you
were another pack Braw had sent to capture her.”

Emelly, who seemed about my height, looked up
at him. She blushed before looking away. “That’s ok. I was more
scared than anything.” Her voice was just a touch louder than a
whisper. She looked down at her hand which was still in his. “Does
it…I mean…does it hurt when you do that? Change?”

He shook his head. “No. You just think of it
and it happens.”

“I’d never seen it before. Not even when Braw
did his thing. I was born here, but my father wasn’t. He warned me
not to believe everything people in Paradin told me. That just
because I didn’t understand something didn’t mean it made it wrong.
I never did go watch.”

“He sounds like a smart man.”

“He was.” She looked up at him again and
swallowed hard.

“There were ten of us when we left Paradin,”
explained William. “I didn’t go recruiting, mind you. I didn’t want
to draw attention to my plan. We’re the only ones left.”

“Oh, my god! What happened to them all?” But
even as I asked the question, I knew the answer.

“Let’s just say that hunting you down is a
dangerous hobby.” He shook his head. “We lost three crossing the
Wedelven River. I don’t know what is in that thing, but I don’t
recommend going for a swim if you ever feel the need. I remembered
you’d said you were from Sageden, so we made our way in that
direction. Somewhere along the way, we ran into a pack of the…
well, the cat shifters. We lost one then. We then were redirected
toward Pinsaber, but before we got there, we heard you had headed
to Howel. We lost two against a pack of the dog shifters and then
we came across some humans and when we refused to join them, we
lost another man; Emelly’s father.”

Emelly was looking at the ground again, tears
flowing freely down her face. She looked about to collapse. Matthew
pulled her to his chest and held her as sobs raked through her.

“Shush. There, now.” He rested his chin on
her head and rubbed her back. He looked over to Jasper. “I’ll take
her to camp.”

My mate nodded.

Matthew wiped the tears from Emelly’s face
with his thumb and took her hand. “Come. I’ll get you something to
drink.”

We all watched as the two of them started
walking back in the direction we had just come.

“It took you nine months to get here?” asked
Harold. He was trying not to smile.

“None of us had ever left the Northern
Regions around Paradin.” William shrugged. “I told Brice he should
have come along, that we would probably get lost, but he insisted
on staying behind. He said you would need someone on the inside
when you decided to come for Braw.” He looked from me to Jasper.
“Are you? Going to go for Braw?”

I was too stunned to answer. My throat
tightened and my stomach was doing flips. I felt Jasper’s hand take
a hold of mine.

“What?” My voice barely made it out of my
throat. “What did you say?”

“About Braw?”

I shook my head. “About Brice.”

“Well, see, he’s in exile right now. I think
they would have killed him except that Braw thinks you might come
back for him. God knows they’ve come close a few times trying to
get information out of him. He’s bait. He’s been in the dungeon
since he got captured. He’s not allowed visitors, he just gets to
see a guard when it’s meal time. His psycho girlfriend came down
once, spit at him then left. Man, she’s a bitch.”

“Was a bitch,” I murmured absentmindedly. “I
killed her.”

“Well, I can’t say I’m overly hurt by that
fact.” He peered at me closely. “You thought he was dead.”

I nodded and wiped tears of relief from my
face. “We were almost at the river when one of the human packs
caught up to us. He stayed behind to fight them alone so I could
get across the river.” I leaned back against Jasper and he rested
his chin on my head.

“He’s alive, Shlova.”

I smiled. “He’s alive.” I looked at William.
“Tell me what happened.”

“When Braw sent his men out to find you he
gave orders that if you were to get away, they were supposed to try
and take Brice alive. I won’t lie to you, Hayden. I had just been
whipped and was still tied to the post when they brought him in.
When I saw what they had done to him I was glad I had gotten away
with a flogging. Acting dimwitted helped, I think. They thought you
had tricked me into letting you go. But with Brice, they knew he
had taken you on purpose. He ignored orders. He went against Braw.
He was tied to a horse with a long rope. He was dragging on the
ground. There was a trail of blood behind him. I thought he was
dead.” He shook his head. “They dumped him in a cell and left him
there. They didn’t even bring someone in to tend to him. I was put
back on guard duty right away. I did the best I could to try and
get him better.”

“But he’s alright?”

William nodded. “After two years, I think
they got tired of beating the crap out of him. They bring him his
meals and that’s it. Braw is just waiting for you to come and save
him.”

“I didn’t know,” I whispered, fresh tears
falling from my eyes. “I was sure he was dead. Had I known he was
alive, we would have done something!”

“I told him we should find a way to let you
know. He refused. He said Braw would be watching to see if anyone
looked about to go to you with a message. Brice didn’t want to lead
him to you. He also said that if you thought he was alive that you
might come for him cause you were stubborn like that. He didn’t
want you risking your life by coming to save his.”

Jasper chuckled behind me and I turned to
look at him.

“Sorry. I could just picture him saying that.
You know, he’d have that look where he rolled his eyes? That one he
got every time you would ignore what we told you and you would do
as you pleased?”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “I remember it. I
also know which look he’ll have on his face when we get him out of
that cell.”

Jasper smiled. “He’ll glare at you, take a
deep breath, then kiss you on the forehead and say ‘Hayden, you
have to start thinking before you do things. You’re just lucky
things worked out this time’. He never can stay mad at you.”

“No matter what happens once we get up there,
we have to get him out.”

He nodded. “We will.”

“Should we head to camp and pack up? We could
get another half day of travelling in before darkness falls.”
Rainen was looking up at the sky.

“Yes, let’s get going. What is it? Another
week until we get to Howel?” I couldn’t laugh at William for
getting lost. I was no better.

Rainen nodded.

“So, Steven, what’s your story?” I fell in
step with him. I looked up at him and took in his light hair and
blue eyes. Appearance wise he couldn’t have been more than twenty,
but the haunted look in his eyes made him look much older.

He looked back at me, his smile less than
cheerful. “I crossed over when I was ten. I was one of the lucky
ones that actually managed to survive long enough for someone to
find me that wasn’t human.” He looked back to the path we were on.
“I was sitting by a river, fishing, when a man and a woman came by.
They introduced themselves and asked me what my name was, where my
parents were. I remember trying to be brave and to act like I
belonged there. When I tried lying and saying that my family was
just a little ways away, I broke down. The woman sat down beside me
and asked me if I had crossed over from a different world. She said
it like it was an everyday thing here. I nodded and she looked at
the man. He nodded and the next thing I knew they had sort of
adopted me. They were Namaels. Cheetahs. They already had a
daughter who was eleven. For a while, life was great. I mean, don’t
get me wrong, I missed my mom and dad, but I got used to the idea
that there was no going back and Charlie and Patty were great to
me.” His eyes narrowed.

“We were out hunting one day. I was seventeen
then. Tess used to bug me because I was so slow, but I always
managed to help put food on the table. I’m decent with a bow and
arrow. We were busy gutting a deer we had brought down when six
beings came strolling toward us. Dad was polite, he always was, and
invited them to stay for supper. Our cabin wasn’t very big, but
they took him up on his offer to stay in the barn for the night.
They waited until we were all sleeping.” He looked at me and back
at the trail.