Chapter 218

218 Chapter Two Hundred Eighteen

The two challengers stepped into the fight. The wind grew completely still. “Without wasting any more time, under the moonlight, witnessed by the moon goddess herself and the Sirius pack, the duel between alpha Liam and royal alpha Lina shall now begin.”

Lina’s heart went into overdrive once more, tension leaking into her every pore and fibre of her being. She searched her mind for the first sign of a strategy and came up blank. The alpha before her smirked, noticing how scared she was. “Just like it’s always been. You don’t deserve to bear the respect of your family,” Liam spoke up, as he began to walk straight for her.

Lina’s wolf surged forward in anger, clearing the fogginess in the girl’s mind. Just as the man reached her, the girl breathed out the last of her fear toward the man before her. She felt something unravel inside her right before Liam’s fist made a connection with her jaw as though she’d only been waiting for a moment like this. ‘Huh, this is quite familiar...’ she thought to herself as she remembered the many times the same person had used a move very similar against her.

Gasps filled the crowd as they watched an alpha take an offensive move against a royal in an official duel. They had made fun of her and made her life hell for as long as they could remember, but never enough to raise the attention of the royals themselves. Now that it was under the moonlight, the werewolves weren’t sure if they’d just skipped a rank and shamed the royal before the very goddess that blessed their family. It seemed as though the priorities had been flipped.

Silence took over the audience... a look of annoyance spread across Liam’s face when he saw the girl before him still standing right where she had been. Lina wiped a drop of blood from her bottom lip, “I didn’t know your punches were the same even when you were asked to punch someone. I’d say you hit like a girl...”

The next attack came without warning or preparation. ‘Predictable,’ the girl thought to herself as everything seemed to slow down, ‘All these years and this is the bully I couldn’t stand up to.’ Lina had regained her composure and saw Liam’s fist moving as slow as everything else that didn’t possess the Prometheus gift of agility. Instincts kicked in from the numerous training sessions Lina had been through with the junior hunter, Sandra.

She took the misguided fist and pulled his arm in the direction it was originally going, performing the now-natural motions as fast as she could and as fluidly as she could manage, flipping the alpha almost effortlessly over her shoulder, adding a little more energy to the movements and slamming his back into the ground. ‘Your speed is your weapon, Lina. Would you want to know something about hunters, Katie?’ a memory rang through the girl’s mind while the fight proceeded.

Sandra had been taking her through different ways of using someone’s force against them along with ways of turning speed into strength. ‘No, and I think you have enough stories about the hunters to put me to sleep every night for three months...’ Lina had replied right before failing to restrain the beta alpha, Jason yet again, ‘Come on. Could you turn off your powers just once so I can fight someone normal?’

‘Well, hunters like to play a lot of arm wrestling when they have nothing to do,’ the girl proceeded, ‘Be freer when using your arms and let the movements come naturally and quickly as well... Your initial momentum tells your brain the speed at which your reflexes should kick in and when.’

.....

‘And they call us the brutes,’ Lina replied, taking another try at the alpha following Sandra’s instructions to the best of her abilities.

‘Well, did you know that any hunter that has a Prometheus gift takes part in this arm-wrestling?’ Sandra said to her.

‘No kidding... Wait, what would someone without any real strength be doing in an arm-wrestling match with someone armed with a Strength Prometheus gift,’ Lina asked the girl, losing focus in the middle of an aerial manoeuvre. Jason used the chance to grab the girl by her torso and bring her crashing to the ground with a grunt of pain. It hadn’t been the first time but given her fast healing, Jason had stopped worrying about her hard he hit her.

‘You’re getting better...’ Sandra’s voice rang in her mind.

‘I definitely am...’ she replied to the memory right before slamming the alpha into the ground as hard as the force she’d gathered could allow. Gasps rang through the night when this happened. Lina’s eyes shone a bright blue as her wolf forged forward in an awakening. “I’m not the same person you used to make fun of Liam...” she told the coughing alpha.

Liam got up and dusted himself off, “You get one lucky hit in and you get ahead of yourself.”

Lina smirked, “It seems you are in need of more education.” Liam lunged for her and into a flurry of attacks that the girl dodged with so much ease it made him look like he was aimlessly flailing about. Lina could tell from the amount of calculation he put into his attacks that he wasn’t just flailing about. Each attack made it seem as though he was trying to discern a pattern to her movements, a strategy that would have worked if he wasn’t moving this slow to Lina.

When the girl finally grew tired of dodging his attacks, she allowed her palm to meet with the side of his fist and followed through with another technique similar to what she had done to him the previous time. However, this time, she kept his arm in her grip and made sure he landed with his face on the ground. She then twisted his arm so that his palm nearly touched his shoulder blade. It was a painful position that had the alpha frozen for fear of dislocating his arm.

“Surrender now... as you should have noticed, if I wanted, I could dislocate your bones in a number of ways and in any that I want. You’re completely outmatched and ridiculously slow. You can’t land a single hit on me and I can do what I want to you,” she said to him.

The alpha laughed darkly, “You don’t really think I believe that for a second.”

“Alpha Liam...” the girl spoke up filling her voice with all the authority she could. Within her mind, she screamed at herself, wondering where her dominant attitude had come from, “You have constantly disrespected someone who ranks above you and you have been tolerated for a while. Even after being denied the right to take your father’s place as alpha, you remain ignorant of the crimes you commit time and time again. I will give you five seconds to forfeit or else...”

'

“Or else what...” the alpha asked before a pop was heard echoing across their beach. Liam gritted his teeth to keep a scream from escaping him. Lina had dislocated his shoulder and kept the arm in that position. She released him and allowed the man to observe the consequences of his compliance.

“You have thirty seconds to forfeit... Something else will be breaking once your time is up,” Lina declared.

Liam sat up and painfully pushed his shoulder bone back into its socket. He turned to the girl that had just disrespected him... “You’re going to regret that...”

Lina raised her eyebrows at him in surprise, “You know... Crysta was right about something. There is a lot that’s going to change here. Look at my eyes Liam. What colour stares right back at you,” the royal ordered him and walked up to him so that he could take a better look. The eyes pulsed a bright blue... “Don’t forget your place, alpha Liam.”

The next attack was much slower and more predictable than the rest. The girl sighed in disappointment. She moved about him, keeping her speed faster than he could visually follow and twisted his dormant arm behind his back, tripping him at the same time. Knocked off balance and completely unaware of what was going on... the alpha was surprised to find himself in the same position he’d only been in a moment ago and a popping sound followed soon after.

This time he didn’t have the time to prepare himself for the attack and he yelled in pain, “Fine, I forfeit...” he said to her.

“Never compare yourself to a royal, Liam. You aren’t even close to the power of a beta alpha. I would know... That idiot gave me one hell of a hard time,” Lina said to him letting go of him and turning her back to her friend. The circle that had been drawn in the ground vanished immediately, a light wind blowing the sand, signalling the confirmation from the moon goddess. The duel was already over...

A growl filled the air... Everyone went quiet... Lina turned just in time to see a black red-eyed wolf rushing towards her with its fangs bared. The wolf was slow, however, she hadn’t expected the alpha to resort to something that was clearly illegal. Before the royal could react, a grey wolf rammed into the alpha that attacked her, sending the two of them rolling to the side. The two wolves fought for the upper hand, their senses disoriented, before backing away from each other.

The grey wolf shielded Lina and snarled at the alpha menacingly, its teeth bared and claws extended in a stance that only displayed hostility to its enemy, “That will be enough, Liam. You lost,” the voice struck a chord in Lina. ‘Just how far are you willing to go to redeem yourself, Crysta.’

Liam snarled at the defiant wolf before him, anger filling him even more. The hypocrisy of it all was unforgivable, “Hey, Liam, now might not be the time to let your anger get the best of you,” Wyatt tried, levelling his head.

“You lost the right to advise me a while ago, Wyatt. Just get out of my way,” the boy barked at the alpha. Looking at the royal surrounded by the very wolves he’d been surrounded by only a few weeks ago, he couldn’t help but feel detest for the girl. Going against her when she’d only watched the duel would only cause him more trouble than he would have liked. And so, he dashed off into the woods, trying his best to put as much distance between the pack and himself. At the same time, he shut himself off from the pack’s mental link.

Lina sighed in relief when it was all done, “I thought for a moment there that I was a goner.”

“Really, how would you think that when he barely had the chance to touch you?” Honour exclaimed, looking her friend up and down, “Are you the same person I’ve always known?”

“Well, yeah, I am. Sandra made it look so easy to turn my speed into a weapon and it...”

“That was a brilliant display,” an eerie voice interrupted the girl. Along with it came a cold breeze that brought everyone to a halt. Their senses didn’t lie to them either... the scents that were carried in the breeze belonged to none other than their natural enemies, rogues. Lina turned to look at the source of the voice. Leaning against a tree, a relaxed look on his face was a huge man of similar muscular build to Alpha Jackson.

“Who are you?” Lina asked him, keeping her voice defiant. A couple of growls came from the woods behind the man revealing two more wolves. The three all bore red eyes...

“Oh, you shouldn’t be asking me such a question when you’re so close to your end,” the man replied.

“There are only three of you. What makes you think you can take on a whole pack?” Lina asked him.

“I honestly don’t think we need more than the three of us to lay waste to this sorry excuse for a pack, but since you insisted I’ll just show you that we came in more than just strength, but numbers as well,” the man smirked. Emerging from beyond the treeline, rogues began to walk into the moonlight cutting off every possible escape route in an instant. They were cornered between the rogues and the ocean. “I love the looks on all your faces... That fear... It’s what we live for when carrying out the goddess’ wishes...”