The Shadow Twin

Chapter 26 - The Council

I was traveling back to the Council. This time with Rylee by my side and members from both of our Packs. I was going to need a lot of help to get Leigh back. I didn’t want to actually ‘take’ her back, but there where no way in hell I was going to convince her to come back. But maybe Rylee could. Which was why he was here. That, and the fact that he wasn’t going to let me screw this up even more. So, knowing for sure that Leigh was with the members of the Council’s Cobalt Order, I had made an official request to have a sit-down with the Council. Something they had granted me. I was going to request, that the Council made the brothers hand her over. I knew she wasn’t going to just go back home with us, but if the Council could just get us in the same room… Then maybe we, as in Rylee, had a fair shot at getting her to come back with us. What I was doing was risky as hell, but I had to give it a shoot. The only people with the power to order Leighs brothers around was the Council and I kind of needed them to find her for me. The first time had been pure luck. And I knew that Leigh knew that I wasn’t going to stop looking for her, so she would now cover her tracks even better. So right now, Rylee and I was walking through the halls of the Councils main building, on our way to the sit-down I had requested. Rylee hadn’t said a single thing to me the whole way here and I didn’t know how to fix our bond. I f****d up big time, I knew that, but admitting to it and owning my s**t, wasn’t enough. Which I knew. I just didn’t know what else I could do. Right now, I just wished, that he would talk to me or even yell at me. Anything was better than this deafening silence between us. Our guide opened a set of doors for us and then bowed. Rylee and I walked through the doors and were greeted by a couple of people sitting at a huge table. The whole Council wasn’t’ here. I didn’t know if that was a good thing or not, but my claims were legit, so convincing the Council to order the brothers back with Leigh shouldn’t be that hard.

----Leigh POV----

I hated this. I f****d up by telling Kayden that I was after Sheila, but I wanted him to hurt as much as I had when he banished me. Now, I was never going to get close enough to take her out. Kayden and his Pack was going to protect her at all costs, and I didn’t wish to hurt them. And by them I meant his Pack. I didn’t care about Kayden all that much, even if he was my Mate. I just wanted Sheila’s heard for taking out a hit on me back then. She was the reason my left arm was a mess. But due to the fact that she was a member of Kayden’s Pack, going after her now would declare war with the Graycrest Pack and possible the Thenem Kingdom. Which meant Kayden’s family and there was no way in hell I could really hurt them. Just the thought of what I did to Ryder, made me sick. I made sure it wasn’t going to leave permanent damage, but I still hated that I had to hurt him. Kayden wouldn’t have let us go otherwise. God, I hated all this. I just wanted Sheila dead for what she did to me, but since I was still new to Pack politics and rules, I had to rely on what my brothers told me. And right now, it was to back off. They wanted her almost as much as me, but they were the Councils enforcers and couldn’t just kill her. Especially not, if they had to go through an entire Pack to do so. Besides we haven’t been able to find her so far and now, that the Pack knew I was after her… We weren’t going to find her at all. The knowledge to her whereabouts where somewhere in Kayden’s territory and with them on the lookout for us, finding it was a lost cause. So, we headed to the Council. I had never been there before. This entire year, that I had spent with my brothers, we never once went there. It was for my safety, they said, but now, with the possible threat of Kayden’s Pack, we needed a safe place to crash. And if we didn’t mention the family connection, I should be fine. Or so they told me. We stopped at the out scourge of a bunch of trees and my brothers shifted back. I tossed them the bag of clothes I had on my back, and they got changed out of my view.

“Reel your wolf back in sis…” Videric said as he popped back up next to me. I sled down my wolfs side and pulled her back in. None of us completely understood what I was. All we knew was that I could separate myself from my Wolf, so it became its own ‘person’. I could still telepathically communicate with it when it wasn’t inside me and control if of sorts. But it also had a will on its own. For the most part it aligned with my own, so I didn’t really care, and she always had my back. Like with Kayden. She had spawned and tackled him, without me thinking about it. Almost like she could sense I was in danger, although I doubted that Kayden was going to hurt me back there. But knowing he didn’t even get the change to touch me… It kind of made me smile. When this Shelia business was over, I was going to have a little ‘chat’ with my husband, and it wasn’t going to be pretty.

“As long as we are with the Council, you probably shouldn’t manifest your Wolf. It would be pretty hard to explain, but also just not a good idea to let people, who aren’t family know of your extra power. Being stronger or special is not a good thing, when it comes to the Council.” Aspar said, as he joined me and Videric. I just nodded at his words because he was probably right. The second Vetranio and Alaviv joined us, we walked out from our hiding spot, and I came face to face with the Council… Or the physical structure at least. The Council resided on an island and the only visible way to it, was to cross the stone bridge that connected the island to the land we stood on. Videric and Vetranio took up the front, then me and Alaviv and Aspar behind me. The formation was clearly to protect me, and I appreciated it. I didn’t need bodyguards, we all knew that, but they were still trying to protect from a threat none of us would be able to take down. The Council itself. As we got closer to the island, it was like a fog cleared and I truly saw the building. The small patch of land between the bridge and the entrance was gray-ish, like the place itself sucked up color. A huge stone statue was standing there, looking down at us with a hard glare and a grim smile. Mostly colorless flowers and grass was at the base at the statue and of to both sides of the statue were a couple of benches, coupled with more colorless flowers and grass. And some bushes and small tress. A huge stonewall was the last ‘accessory’ to the small patch of land and the only way forward, the huge ass doors behind the statue. Doors we went through, and the other side wasn’t much better. This place reminded me of an old-fashioned stone castle, build in a way to intimidate people. With high dark spires and grim gargoyles mounted on rooftops and walls. This place gave me goosebumps and not in a good way. Seeing the place of the Council, I now understood way my brothers didn’t want me anywhere near it. And I didn't want to be near the building nor its people. I was here because I had to, but the second it was safe to leave, I would.