The Mate That Wasn't Mine novel Chapter 102

Chapter 102

Chapter 102

TESS POV

Sprinting back down the spiral staircase I had every intention of finding help. This was not a chance for personal glory and redemption. It’s blatantly a

suicide mission.

Three dead bodies and a missing princess were no match for one person. Except, a few steps away from the outside world, a faint scream sounded,

It was the kind of cry I had only heard once before in my life. As distinctive and desperate as when Irene plunged from the cliff Coming from the same underground route that Warden Marshall took me, the night Maxim almost died from the Cliff

Even so, I paused. I have only a bow and arrows. Briggs has some kind of insane spine ripping device.

But Hazel screamed again. Gritting my teeth, I accepted my fate.

What if by the time I scream and shout, praying someone comes to help, she is already dead?

The majority of the Beta Guards are with Remy. The rest of the Wardens will be overseeing the Blades tournament or participating in it. The men assigned to guard Princess Hazel are dead.

Stabbing one of my arrows directly into the wooden door leading to the tunnel I start my descent. At least if someone walks past looking for Hazel they might find that sight odd and explore further.

I’ve left her suite door open too, so the bodies won’t be concealed.

There is nothing left to do but run further down the eerie, stone walkway.

Within seconds I wish I had thought to kick my boots off. My feet are unhelpfully loud upon the flagstones. Someone has lit a few lanterns to help Remy and his team today but not all of them. All I can do is follow the sound of scuffling. The lingering scent of Hazels perfume.

It already looks different to when Warden Marshall guided me down here only a few weeks ago, crammed with junk, mattresses, piles of old bedding, and dismantled metal cells.

Hazel screams again but it is deafeningly loud. Enough for me to almost drop my bow., I’m right behind them. A deep, furious roar deafens the space.“Stop snivelling. I promised you would see your brother again didn’t I?”

It’s Briggs. Only his voice is filled with anger and twisted malice.

“What are you doing! They’ll kill you for this!”

“I’m already dead, Princess. Completely dead inside. My wolf has gone. I’ve a limp that hurts me every single second of the day, a wasted face and not a chance in the world of ever being accepted by my peers again. And do you know whose fault it is?”

“Is…Is all this because you loved Tessa?” Hazel guesses only for a slap and a shriek to ring out.

“No I didn’t fucking love her!” as the sound of a dismantled bed frame crashed down to the floor.

Briggs raged. “You think this has anything to do with love! This is me saying Ravenbow can fuck off and burn. I hope, by completing my task today, that I let hordes of rebels in. That they swallow up and destroy everything your father and the fools before him built.”

Pressed into the shadows, I silently draw my bow, ready to fire in under a second. Waiting for when the moment feels right. Only for the sound of metallic tapping, perhaps someone slapping a barrel echoes around the dingy space.

“I hate Ravenbow too!” Hazel adds meekly. “Look at what my father did to me.”

“Your hair? That’s nothing,” Briggs dismisses with a scoff.

Chapter 102

“It was my fucking dignity! No different to you!“.

“So what, are you suggesting we team up?” his voice laced with sarcasm. “You get to be the new Luna and I’ll be your monster in the shateng bakara choking sound leaves me grimacing. I think he’s just picked her up by the throat.

“I didn’t think so.” Briggs grunts, before Hazel clatters into some more metallic junk, deafening the space around us.

Hazel is sputtering but persistent. “I don’t know. I need to know what you intend to do. Tell me what’s going on. Either the Princess is stalling for time of she’s lost her mind too. Right now I’m not sure which. If she’s truly turned against her pack, I’ll have to kill her too.

Briggs must have been alone a long time because he seems to be relishing talking. “We’ve got a few minutes I guess.”

“Until?”

“Until all these barrels. The ones filled with lantern oit, dragged down from the exiles camp get sparked up. By me. And you know what they do don’t you? Fucking BOOM!” before laughing wildly. “Get up you stupid bitch. So now you know. Whether you’re on my team or not, is irrelevant now. You’re dead. I’m not trying to survive this. I’m just determined to make sure it happens.”

Footsteps patter, then a shriek and slapping sound, as presumably Hazel tried and failed to make a run for it. “REMY! REMY!” she screamed, only for her voice to be roughly muffled. A sickening choking sound left my own throat closing up. “It didn’t have to be this way, Briggs murmurs. “But if you want to die, tied up and choking that’s your choice.”

It’s time.

I break out from around the corner. Mentally picturing his height and stance I have the arrow firing towards his chest area before I’m even visible.

Only Brigg’s is wearing a shitload of black armor. Every inch of him is layered with shields and plates. Even his face is covered by a traditional helmet, with a metal gauze guard. My arrow flies off his chest. A second effort flies off his face shield.

“Oh dear,” he grins. “Come join the party Tess,” pointing to Hazel whose wrists are bound, trying to crawl towards me on the floor. Her long white dress covered in dust and fillth. Every surface has a gloomy orange tint from the lanterns.

Not moving, my voice is terse. “I can still kill you.”

“But you can’t. Not with that shitty little bow and arrow. You know the elves have crossbows? Just point and fire. Powerful fuckers. That’s what you need right now Tessa. But instead…” shrugging his shoulders before taking a vicious swipe my way with the long metal stick.

It whizzes past my face, close enough to pick up the scent of flesh still embedded into the long, flaying claws at the end.

He’s right. I need something else. Goddess I’d love an axe right now to smash through that helmet. Anything. But Briggs, through the thin gauze, is smirking with triumph, his green eyes dancing around the dark space.

“I counted you know. One Alpha, forty–three Beta’s and twelve Wardens. They even lit the place up for me. Just a shame Maxim is out adventuring, but you know what, finding out you died in this too, it’s just made it…fucking perfect.”

“How did you know they’d be doing this? How did you even put this shit together!”

“Because I’m not the only one who hates your fucking/guts Tessa. Not at all.”

I blink, trying to digest who else might possibly despise me so much they’d take down an Alpha. “Malva? She helped you?”

“You lead to her family being killed Tessa. She had every right to want you dead. Not even a fair trade. One dead Tessa as justice for her huge family? Goddess I had to listen to her talk about them for hours. But looks like it was worth it.”

He is so sickeningly smug yet I don’t have a comeback for him. There’s no magic trick of a weapon I can produce. Hazel is just a lump trapped on her

knees.

“So, how long have you been in Ravenbow?”

Chapter 102

Briggs‘ grin is adoring the attention. Bragging about his cleverness. He never really hit the top spots in the skills test, maybe now he finally feels like a

winner.

“A couple of weeks ago actually. I snuck in, planning to slit Remy’s throat. I saw you practicing. Like always. You’ve no idea how lucky you are bereka a was on my way to slit your throat first that she found me.”

“Malva knew you wanted to hurt me?”