Rejected His Miracle Luna (Dorothy and Ignatius)

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Chapter 63

*Time sk ip 4 Months"

-Angie-

"Holy s hit." I whispered it, and Fae who was crouched beside mejslowly shook her head in appalled disbelief.

"There are way more of them than we suspected, she kept her voice low as she gazed through the foliage we were hiding in "But how? It doesn't make any sense. How have they grown their numbers so quickly?"

We were huddled together in the tall grass of a hilltop, gazing down at the most recent dwelling grounds of the Tally Pack.

Things were looking grim. The Tally had grown from an enigmatic pack with no more than a dozen oddball shifters to an army that was over a thousand strang. But how?

Surely there couldn't have been that many shifters willing to turn their backs on their people to join the unpredictable Tally gathering.

Gazing down into the valley where they had set up, I could spot dozens of large, bulky shifters lumbering about between the mismatched canvas tents that were set up all over the place.

They scurried around like ants, carrying various large pieces of wood and stone as well as what looked like the bodies of multiple deer. I could see the hundreds of broken antlers peeking from under a large tarp that lay near one of the larger tents. The whole area reeked of rot and decay.

"Something's going on at that little tent."

I nodded towards an ominously lonely tent that stood close to the forest on the opposite side of the valley. A long line of shifters had formed some distance outside the dinky canvas enclosure and every one of them looked sickly and unusual.

They were bedraggled and drawn, drooping in their formation as if merely standing was a chore. One by one, we watched each dismal-looking shifter enter the tent and then exit nearly ten minutes later looking as good as new.

"A super-skilled healer?" Fae suggested, but I shook my head, staring intently at a shifter that had just exited the tent. He stalked across the ground with a reckless gait and flexed his bicep, staring at his b*dy as if inspecting new wares, "It's something more than that."

We both fell silent for a while, watching the enemy go about daily life from our hidden perch. It was clear they were preparing for something, a move perhaps? Certain tents were being packed up and thrown onto an ancient-looking cart.

Shifters loped about, gathering belongings and flinging them into giant tarp bundles. Some just sat around the small fires that were dotted all over the area, staring blankly into the flames with slouched shoulders like wooden puppets waiting for their master to appear and tug on their strings.

There was something particularly odd about those individuals. While the other shifters that moved around them all seemed outlandish and impossibly large, these shifters seemed downright unnatural. From their completely still forms to the way their eyes never blinked, looking at them made me uncomfortable and my wolf growled low in my chest. Something was very wrong there, although I couldn't put my finger on what it was exactly.

"What are they doing down there?" Fae wondered out loud and followed her gaze to where a single ominous white van was parked. Some large shifter approached the back of the vehicle and threw the doors open.

I was surprised to see a wolf spring from inside the van with a how that we could hear clearly from our perch on the hill. The wolf snapped at the beely Tally shifter and made a break for the tree line on the other side of the valley before being detained by an onslaught of Tally members.

The wolf howled its frustration and I itched to rush down there to answer such a dismal cry with help.

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158 Fri Jan 26 Chapter 63

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Far sensed my call for action and placed a cautioning hand on my knee. "Not a good idea. I know you want to help but there are two of us and hundreds of them. We don't even know if that guy is on our side."" She had a point but the protector in me yearned to rescue the thrashing wolf that continued to fight its captors long after it

had been shackled in silver.

"We have to do something" 1 hissed, lowering my voice as I noticed a single shifter turning to gaze up at the hillside where we were hiding. "We can't just sit here." "This is a recon mission, not a rescue mission."

We lowered ourselves even closer to the ground when the same shifter turned again to scan the hilltop. We would have to get moving soOIL.

"When did you become so afraid of a fight?"

"When Johan almost bit your head off."

There was nothing I could say to that. I hadn't occurred to me that the fight with Johan might have taken a toll on Fae

"I'm sorry," I said reproachfully, glancing at her from the comer of my eye. "I never properly thanked you for saving me that day.

Fae bumped her shoulder against mine. "You don't need to apologize. And it was nothing, you'd have done the same for

Her trust in me was a precious thing. Every one of our successful missions, tight squeezes, and close calls had involved Far and her unrelenting loyalty.

The shifter who had been examining the hill began to move towards us and I nudged Fae. "We should go. I think this guy suspects something."

We sidled away from our hideout and made a beeline for the forest shifting as we did so to move more carefully through the trees. A loud, anguished howl had me glancing back over my shoulder in the direction of the campout.

The restrained wolf was begging for freedom, trapped in a pack filled with monsters. It went against everything I believed in, leaving the unidentified captive behind, but Fae was right. There was nothing the two of us could do to save him.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, hoping that somehow it would travel through the grass and reach the agitated shifter's ears. "We'll be back for you. Just hold out for a little bit longer. We'll be back

All of my efforts had not been enough. In the end, I had been overpowered by my attackers and dumped into the back of the gruesome white van like a sack of potatoes. They didn't kill me like I had expected them to

Instead, they cuffed a large salver collar around my neck, trapping me in wolf form before they closed the doors and left me in the dark with dozens of corpses to keep me company.

Ren, who was at the forefront of my mind in my animal form, had us howling in frustration as the van rattled to life and we were driven to some unknown location. The rank odor of rot and death filled the small clunky space and was made worse tenfold by the brightened senses of my wolf form.

I turned my heavy head away from the many blank eyes that gazed at me from the deepest part of the van. Sticky blood coated the floor of the vehicle and made it difficult to stand in the slick muck as the van swerved and rattled along what I assumed was a very rocky road.

"What do we do now?" I asked Iten, aiding her in suppressing the urge to throw up what little food we had eaten as the swaying of the van and the nasty smell made our stomachis turi

"Fuck if I know," Ren snapped and I felt hers nervousness at being trapped in such a confined space. Tin surprised they didri't just kill us on the spot. Why aren't we one of the the pile over there?

10:58 Fri, Jan 26 G).

Chapter ti

"They mentioned something about Johan. Apparently, he wants as alive for some reason.

I used over the name as the van jolted and I fought to keep my balance, splaying all four legs out to keep from toppling. into the wall of corpses behind me..

"Wasn't that the name of her previous partner?"

"Why?"

Mavis I shuddered when the van turned a sharp corner and one of the lifeless bodies rolled across the blo ody floor. "My mate. Ex-mate, I guess.

Ren was silent, it had pained us both to reject the person who was supposed to be our one true love. It had hurt Ren especially as Mavis inner woll was a partner that she had fought to be with for countless lifetimes.

They had been devoted to each otter for cons. It seemed that in this life, however, Mavis herself was stronger than her inner wolf and she had become someone that we couldn't possibly connect with. "Don't speak of her now, Ren munered in my head. "We need to focus on getting out of here."

1 was thrown against the wall of the van's interior as we jolted over another rocky bump in the road. "Think, Ren. J

Johan was the guy she was with, wasn't he? Maybe this has something to do with him."

Ren pulled us back onto our feet, irked by the silver collar around our neck. "Revenge maybe. He had seemed pretty unhinged when he arrived at her doorstep"

"That's insane. I had nothing to do with any of the drama between the two of them. I just happened to find my mate and she serined perfectly normal at first,

"It doesn't matter now. The van came to an abrupt stop and I froze as the engine cut out "Prepare to fight. The second they open those doors, we're out of here.

1 could hear a commotion outside. Dozens of gruff voices and heavy footsteps. The van rocked as whoever was driving climbed our and slammed the door shut. I braced myself for whatever was waiting outside, crouching low and preparing to

pounce

I should have known that we didn't stand a chance.