Chapter 82


    -Ignatius-


    “We’re not going to make it there in time, Carly protested and 1 bashed my knuckle against my head.


    “We have to try. We need to move now.”


    Everyone was ready to leave, but Carly was right.


    My team was worn down and exhausted from the fight in the woods. We had lost two young members


    to the Tally that to had led into the camp and their deaths would be on my conscience forever. There


    was no time for sentiment yet though. Johan was moving into Bielke territory as we spoke and we were


    running out of time.


    The forest behind us was still aze and the smoke curled up into the darkeing sky, blocking out the


    stars and looming over us like a bad omen. My b*dy was still healing from the wound my mother had


    gifted me before her death.


    Every rough movement I made tore it open again. I was in no shape to run the distance back to Bjelke


    territory. But by G d I was ready to try. Dorothy was alone out there and Johan was on the prowl. I had


    to get back to my mate, no question.


    “There might be an easier way.”


    Imed to look at to who had his brow furrowed and he chewed on his knuckles in thought.


    He looked up at me with a spark in his eye. “The van. The one they brought me here with. It might still


    be there”


    you dinner


    I grabbed his shoulders and bashed my forehead against his, “If we survive this, I owe y


    I pushed him back again and pulled on the jacket that had been handed to me. I wore nothing but a


    tattered pair of jeans swiped from the mes and the cold air soothed my hot bare skin.


    “Let’s go.”


    I set off in the direction of where we hadst seen the van and my team followed along behind me,


    to blushing as we


    well


    At first I thought that it must have been taken already, swiped by some Tally shifters escaping the fires,


    but we jogged a little further and suddenly there it was to who oped in delight and we ran for the


    dingy rusted van that stood a little way from the smoking trees.


    The fire hadn’t reached that part of the woods yet, but it was spreading fast and it would be directly


    upon us and the van both if we didn’t act quickly. And it was hot, so very hot. Heat licked across my


    skin as it radiated from the forest, soothed only by the asional breeze that blew through and


    quickened the mes ent across the trees.


    I ripped open the drivers door and was surprised to find it unlocked. Peering inside I was even more


    All rights ? N?velDrama.Org.


    suprised to find that the keys were still in the ignition.


    “Alright, everyb*dy get in


    Carly threw open the back doors and everyone gagged at the putrid stench of dried blood and other


    fluids that wafted from the bark. No one was happy with the gruesome ride hut at least there were no


    bodies in the back this time. The van was haunting, but it was also our one way ticket home.


    I turned to Will who was the only our who seemed to be coping with the rancid scent well enough. “Will,


    you drive. I need to let my b*dy heal in time to fight”


    He nodded and climbed into the drivers seat, probably eager to avoid sitting amongst the muck that


    lined the back of the van. We were all paling into theck when a single figure stumbled out of the


    smokey woods. I pauses my helping of another team member into the back of the an and squinted at


    the figure


    11:01 Fri, Jan 26 G.


    He stumbled closer, shaking his head and coughing as he walked, until I could get a beter look at him.


    “Of course, you made it out”


    4


    up at me


    me from where he stood. I stood my ground and folded my arms as


    I had said it under my breath but the man looked up Elliot approached.


    “Ignatius!” he called and lifted a hand to wave. He glimpsed the blood, my mother’s blood, that stained


    his fingers and immediately shoved his hands back into the pockets of his burned jeans.


    He sauntered all the way up to the van and I stepped out to meet him, blocking him from getting any


    closer. “What do you think you’re doing?”


    “Come now,” he growled at my hostility. “We’re both on the same side. We want to protect our people.


    Surely I’ve just proven that to you?”


    “All you have proven to me is your insatiable need for violence and bloodshed.” I spoke coldly. “Moirah


    didn’t need to die.”


    His expression darkened and he straightened his back. For most of my life, Elliot had been taller than


    me, towering over me like a cruel g od. Only 1 had grown some in the past year or two and now our


    eyes were aligned perfectly as I held my ground against my father.


    I kept my arms folded loosely at my chest while Elliot flexed his blo ody knuckles.


    “Someone had to take care of her,” he said darkly, and I noticed the gray hairs in the overgrown stubble


    on his jaw for the first time. “She was a loose end. She was a threat to my people, you can’t deny that.”


    “Your people?” I raised an eyebrow. I didn’t have time to argue with my father. I had a pack to protect, I


    had a mate waiting for me. Elliot himself was the loose end who absolutely refused to stay tied. “The


    Bielke are not your people anymore.”


    I turned to follow the others into the van, motioning for Will to get the engine running as the fire crept


    closer and closer. That turned out to be a mistake, however, as Elliot gripped my shoulder.


    Enraged, he threw me to the floor, inches away from where a burning log had fallen and peals of fire


    were creeping along the sta ggered patches of grass.


    “You will never be Alpha so long as I am breathing!” he roared and I pulled myself to my feet. I didn’t


    have time for a fight. and in my condition I wouldn’t win one if I tried.


    “Look at yourself,” I yelled to my father over the roar of the fire. People’s lives are at stake. Johan is


    marching on our territory as we speak and you want to waste time with a needless brawl. You don’t


    care about your people.” I stormed towards him and gripped his ckened shirt, leering into his face as


    I hissed, “You don’t deserve to be the Alpha.”


    Elliot’s look of fury mirrored my own. “You’re nothing without me,” he spat


    “There is nothing you can teach me about being a good leader, 1 spoke loudly, my voice building to a


    roar as I confronted my father. “There is nothing you can teach me about being a good mate. And there


    is absolutly nothing you can teach me about being a good father.”


    Moirah’s blood on his hands had me seeing red, but I would not stoop to his level,


    “Because I


    I know what a good father is meant to be. And I know that that’s not what you are. Fathers raise their


    children with kindness, not brute force. Fathers protect their families, not tear them apart from the


    inside. I was raised by my closest friends. I was saved by my mate. They are my family, the Bielke fire


    my people. And you are not wee there.”


    With all of my strength, I pushed him backward and Elliot sta ggered a few steps, staring at me with an


    incredulous look. My words were wasted on him. He would not hear what he didn’t want to.


    I turned once again to leave and climb into the van which was now shuddering to a start. Behind me.


    Elliot released a loud cry of fury andunched himself at me. I had been ready for his attack


    I hadn’t wanted it toe to this, but I had been ready all the same. I turned on the spot and lifted the


    III


    Fri, Jan 26


    of wood that I had spotted in the dirt earlier and drove it into Elliot’s heart.


    59%


    My father’s eyes widened in disbelief and he stood frozen in ce, choking slightly as he clutched at


    the long piece of timber that was buried in his chest. My grip on the end of the hunk of wood was tight


    and I was breathing heavily, staring my father in the eye as he regarded me in a new light.


    Elliot smiled, and a trickle of blood started from his hips as he caughed. Blood stained his teeth red and


    flecks of the crimson liquid spattered onto my face. I stood, unflinching as my fatherughed out loud.


    “Now you’re the Alpha, Ignatius, You’ve killed me”


    “I didn’t kill you,” 1 hissed. “You did that all on your own. I merely helped you along. I take no credit for


    bringing down the voracious Elliot Amount”


    His smile faded. Ellot looked at me as if he was finally seeing his son for who he really was


    His expression softened slightly as he gazed at me, blood trickling from his lips. He clutched at the


    spear that was buried in his chest. His hand came back blo ody and he looked at it incredulously like he


    couldn’t understand where the red hade


    1 telt in useless to tell him that it had been there all his life. Elliot had chosen a path of violence.


    Countless individuals had yed a part in staining that hand red. Including my own mother. With that


    same hand, he gripped my shoulder, leaving a red brand of blood on my skin


    Elliot’s eyes searched my face as it desperately seeking the son he used to know, Or, more urately,


    the son he didn’t know at all until that very moment. A small thicker of understanding shed in Elliot’s


    wide eyes. It hade far toote, however.


    sote, in fact, that I wished I hadn’t seen it at all. I wished I hadn’t seen the tiniest inkling of humanity,


    of love in my father’s eyes, so that I could be able toy him to rest with absolutely no regrets. It was


    like a final punishment. Elliot’s final weapon to wield against me was his own love. Withheld until there


    was no other option left. It made me sick to my stomach


    watched his pupils dte as my father died in my arms.


    Elliot breathed one final breath, hisst words were a question that would haunt me for the rest of my


    life.


    “When did you grow up?” His hand slipped from my shoulder and drew a line of red across my chest.


    “When did you grow up: 1 mussed it.T


    The life left his eyes and Elliot by cold and dead in the dirt beneath me.


    I stared down at Elliot for one final moment and then turned and took to’s hand. He hoisted me up


    into the back of the van and rapped a knuckle on the metal framework to let Will know it was time to get


    moving.


    The van rattled away and 1 watched the dancing mes inch towards my father’s b*dy, enveloping him


    in a fiery red cocoon One final glimpse as the smoke billowed up into the heavens, carrying Elliot to


    some ce where maybe he might finally be


    prace. And then the doors of the van swung closed and we were shrouded in darkness.


    I closed the lid on that final memory of my father, filed it away as the final chapter in that particr


    book.


    Carly tended to the burns across my shoulders as well as the wound left by my mother as the van


    jostled and bounced over the dirt road.


    I turned my mind to the thing that mattered most


    “Dorothy. I’m on my way Just hold on a little longer”