Chapter 4 The Blood Games Begin

Damon's safehouse no longer offered security.

Everything was within reach within mere hours. Security systems lay splintered. Cameras malfunctioned. Movement was detected all around the location-silent phantoms drawing nearer. The situation sonar capably detected was far more complicated than Damon.

If anything, the system was only tracking Lyra.

Lyra walked back and forth on the wooden floor, lost in her own thoughts. The silence he noticed was almost surreal. Body language along with her intuition could ascertain what someone was feeling.

The smell of dominion grazed its way towards her. Lyra was deeply instinctual. As a reflex she could pick up parts of someone's rage and merge it with her peripheral mannerisms.

The order that Damon gave removed a clip from the drawer. Starting to place clips in the slot aimed towards his right side rifle horizontally placed on edge. Gunning down the rifle seemed like the most straightforward approach. "I assume you were packed with gear for your newest task," he quietly claimed.

"Soldiers already crossed long before you were notified," Damon declared.

"To an extent, yes," Lyra mumbled.

"Did I forget to pack something?" Damon continued.

"Use the injured set bound to blood wires approach," she retorted.

"You never claimed to have been computer entitled focused approach," Damon sighed.

Close up the drawers. Cross arms. "My rules are just a tad different from aides," she gloated.

"They could potentially range somewhere in the region of mid fifty," he countered. Lyra didn't miss a beat, "Relying greatly on a full sensor to skeletal structure to limbs estimate. Sure," Damon chuckled, "Keep telling yourself that."

Trying not to draw attention, she subtly nodded towards the screen with greater reach. Pulling her guard down already exposed.

Damon continued right where they left off knowing they were heading towards their target with forty too much delay.

All of drove distractions were distracting staring out in open space staring back. Deep down inside, calm within the storm, Damon paid lesser than a second of attention to dull floating curtains repeatedly aiming to reel him in.

If anything he felt numb like dying neon lights dimmed to black, light free.

He drew Lyra behind him while simultaneously readying his weapon, as the door of reinforced steel gave way.

A silver-bladed cleaver only faintly gleaming with crimson hung from one of her gloved hands. She stood poised and statuesque in a fitted body suit and a red trench coat paired with stiletto boots. An equally suffocating air came from the crimson gloss on her lips and hair the color of ravens.

"Hello, little cub," her gaze fell on Lyra as she languidly purred. "Miss me?"

"Seraphina...", Lyra whispered. But her words fell short.

Seraphina Valente.

Her father's sister, an aunt whose love had rid her of her sanity. The woman exiled for overstepping her boundaries attempting to claim a throne with dabblings in the forbidden art of anime rituals.

"You don't belong here," Damon warned and aimed his gun towards her.

"With joy. Do you believe a gun would do anything to stop me, Kade? I taught you half the tricks you know." She chuckled.

Fingers itched with anticipatory eagerness to clasp the trigger. Before he could pull it, Lyra cut him off. "What is it you want?"

"To help," Seraphina stated bluntly. "Reconsider the motives of every pack, clan, and cartel that stretches from here to Eastern Europe. Cassian wants your blood. Moretti wants your hand, and your father? An already settled alliance intends to trade you."

With everything pulling string after string taut in her jaw, Lyra managed to utter: "Let them come."

Darling, brave words Seraphina retorted but daring without schematics was suicide, 'we're going to need a lot more than words.'

Rogues. Exiles. Forgotten Alphas swarming in blood debts owing to me. I now possess a group of my own. "We can protect you."

Damon stared at her with icy eyes. "And what exactly do you want in return?"

"I want what was always mine, a seat at the table, and a queen to crown," Seraphina grinned too sharp.

"You're not just a runaway bride or reborn wolf, my dear. You're a prophecy." She said towards Lyra. "And it's time the world recognizes you for what you truly are."

For merely a second, lightning illuminated in the sky and Lyra caught a glimpse of herself, but not as a prey, or a victim; something far greater.

A ruler.

A predator.

A queen, reborn in flames.