The Wannabe Warrior
Chapter 138

Madison POV

It was dark and it made it harder to gather all the bodies, so I called it a night, saying to get a shower when we returned to the camp and we hopefully could eat, though many g*****d at the thought of eating after what we had been doing. I doubt they would have trouble downing a bowl of stew or two.

The camp was quieter than I would have expected. When we returned, the fires were burning bright and the stew smelt great after what we had been through, and some warriors were seated around the fires, chatting lowly, they nodded a greeting as we arrived and I mind linked the guys that something was off and to be careful.

I left the men to get washed and changed before we ate.

I entered my own tent and dressed and placed a knife in my boot, and sprayed myself freshly with neutraliser, and left the tent.

Being as quiet as I could, I carefully went to the tent that should have Graham in it and I approached from the non-fire side, so my shadow would not cast across the tent.

I laid down on my belly and slowly lifted the back of the tent, and peeked in. Mitch was bound and gagged close to me and Graham was a little further in, bound and gagged too, but he had b***d on his face. That I was not happy about. How did this guy get the jump on Mitch?

I sent out a warning to the others, that we had traitors here and what was happening in Graham’s tent, and to watch out for trouble. They offered to come and assist me if needed. I asked them to wait, didn’t want to alert them, that we knew something was wrong.

Lifting the tent base a little higher, I rolled into the tent, and nestled behind Mitch. He twitched a little when he felt my weight on his back, but stayed as still as he could.

Looking around at Peter, he was waiting patiently at the door, every now and then moved his head out of the tent and looked around, then backed back in, he knew eventually I would come here, and it made me smile, that he knew nothing of war fare, or he would have had someone in here helping guard Mitch and Graham.

Mitch shuffled his wrists at me and grabbing my knife slowly from my boot, I began to cut Mitch’s ropes from his wrists, trying to be as quiet as possible, when the ropes gave way, I handed the knife to Mitch, he leaned forward and slowly cut through the ropes at his ankles. I watched Peter, as he was sitting just inside the tent, poised with a knife ready to jump at me, when I entered that way. His focus was totally on the tent flap and he did not once look over at Mitch or Graham the whole time I was there, he was a stupid man, not used to having to fight like this, which made me wonder if he had even been to Alpha training or even decent warrior training. For that matter. Surely he would have been taught to watch his back.

Mitch nudged me, to let me know he was free and was ready for the fight, and I nodded to him. Mitch crept around the tent, to the right and I crept to the left.

Mitch gave out a count in my head and at three, we jumped together at Peter .

Peter fell forward onto the ground and the knife he had in his hand went straight into his own chest, killing him quickly. We did not mean to kill him, but by the time I realised what could happen, the momentum forward and falling was too far gone to stop it.

Mitch rolled him over and looked at the knife sticking out of his chest and sighed softly.

‘He was a great kid, just given bad directions, it is a pity it has ended like this.’ Mitch said with a heavy heart.

‘We can place him on the fire tomorrow with the rest of the decaying bodies.’ I said, as I rushed over to Graham and felt that he was breathing. With a happy sigh, I untied him.

While I was checking out his injuries, something unexpected happened. My hands started to glow a bright white light which slowly covered his body, and filling the tent with light, Graham’s body jerked up and then the light winked out and Graham sat up with a start, looking around the room and his eyes settled on Mitch and then on me.

I glanced over at Mitch and saw his eyes wide and jaw dropped, as he gapped at me and then my hands and then at Graham.

‘What happened?’ Graham asked, rubbing the back of his head, and hissed.

‘Peter was a traitor and somehow had some of the royal pack help him.’ And I pointed over to his body.

‘We had a little struggle and he ended up with his own knife in his chest.’ Mitch clarified as Graham looked over at Peter.

‘He made me feel uneasy, my gut said don’t trust him, as we were to be working together. I tried. I can give you the names of the ones that were with him, just before my lights went out.’ Graham said softly.

‘Come on out to the fire and let’s have some stew and warm you up, I think you are still in shock.’ I suggested and we left Peter where he lay and headed out to the others.

‘Mitch, I will inform Alpha, can you let our guys know all is well now? I warned them of what I saw in the tent. We don’t know if any of the royal warriors are part of it or not. We need to weed them out as we burn the dead. I have some of the truth potion, we can put it in the coffee pot for breakfast and work on finding out who was at Peter’s side and who wasn’t. Something is going on here.’ Mitch nodded as he helped Graham to the fire and sat down with him.

‘Alpha.’ I called.

‘Madison, report.’ Ezekiel commanded, all polite greetings gone, only anxiousness about the unknown and not having heard from Mitch, his long-time friend and head warrior.

‘Peter had Mitch bound and gagged, same with Graham. Although Graham seemed to have a head wound, I have not asked Mitch yet as to what happened, but I need to let you know that Peter is now dead. We jumped him and he fell on his own knife.’ I gave what I could, not yet ready to address the issue of others, maybe in on this.

‘To have Mitch jumped, something more is going on, and what about the men that went with him?’ Ezekiel must have known I was holding something back.

‘I don’t know, you can ask Mitch, I am going to have a look around, sorry I have no good news to give you.’ time to hunt down some more traitors.

Ezekiel included me in the link to Mitch and I learned that some of the royal pack warriors had assisted Peter to subdue our guys and to get the jump on Mitch. He did not expect our own royal warriors to do that and that was why he was easy to take down. Had he not trusted his own men, he would never have been taken down.

Mitch will handle the ones that attacked him, and to find out why the others did nothing to stop them and just sat and watched, there are three that will not make it back to the packhouse. Mitch and Graham have a reason to kill them. It seemed only the Blue River warriors were trustworthy at the moment. We had to watch our backs, with our own men, and that was a hard, bitter pill to swallow.

The others will have to prove themselves, and they have lost any chance of promotion if Ezekiel lets them live after that.

I walked around the tents in the dark, and found bound and gagged the six men that went with Mitch.

As I unbound them, they told the story of being jumped by some of the royal warriors and Peter was behind it all, and they promised to point out who was with Peter.

‘Come, we are having some stew for dinner, get by the fire and fill those bellies, we will worry about the warriors tomorrow.’ I led the six back to Mitch and Graham and pleasant greetings were made, our Blue River group sat together away from the Royal pack, and it seemed the segregation had started. Trust has yet to be earned, loyalty has to be shown. And I had to work it all out somehow, and not have more needless deaths. My sleep was going to be restless tonight, it seems.