The Shadow Twin

Chapter 24 - The attackers

----Kayden POV----

It had been almost a year since we last saw or heard anything from Leigh. She disappeared the second she walked out the door, that day. My people had intensified their search for her but came up empty and when I went to the Council, which was a reckless decision, I was told she wasn’t there. The Council had never heard of Leigh, the only exception being my marriage to her. So, showing up on their doorstep asking to see her or one of the four brothers, had now drawn unwanted attention to Leigh. Hopefully it wouldn’t get her killed. I didn’t for one second believe that the Council didn’t know where the brothers were, given the fact that they worked for them, so maybe they had hidden Leigh away somewhere? I could only hope that she was safe and out of harm’s way. I shook my head and pushed the same thoughts, that I had, had a million times by now out of my head again. Now was not the time to distract myself. Ryder and I was zeroing in on the perpetrators, that had been dropping bodies in my territory for the past two months. They had been exceptionally hard to track, but we had finally come up with a possible location and I was going to hit it now, with a couple of Pack members and Ryder. Normally I would take Rylee with me on missions like these, but he wasn’t talking to me again. He hadn’t been since we found out Leigh’s affair with the Darkmoon Walkers was a lie. I wanted to fix the broken bound with Rylee, but I didn’t know how. Even I hated myself for what I had done, so I understood his reason to give me the cold shoulder. Leigh had become like a second sister to Rylee despite the short time they had spent together, and I had broken that bond with my decision to send her away. So now Ryder was my go-to guy for these missions despite the fact that Ryder was more of a ‘pacifist’, but he was one hell of a fighter when he needed to be, which was why he was now helping me. I Mind-linked my entourage and half of them broke up from me and followed Ryder in the opposite direction. This plan had been underway for some time, and I just hoped that I wasn’t going to lose anybody. My team and I stopped and hid between a small group of bushes and waited. Not to long after we had hidden, we were able to pinpoint four figures and we attacked. They didn’t stand much of a chance and before long we had them on the ground. The fight was rather anticlimactic actually as they didn’t really fight back. I changed the hold of the guy under me, got up and then threw him into a tree. And follow closely behind. Holding him in place against the tree trunk I tore the hood of his face and then my eyes expanded in disbelieve. I knew this man or knew of him. It was one of the brothers that had been with Leigh when she disappeared. The lowest of the brothers with the scar going from the right corner of his mouth and down the side of his lower face. I knew the scar went further down and it stopped on the right side of his neck, but that part was hidden by his clothes. I stared at him for a second and then he smirked, which made me growl at him.

“Let go of my brother or you are going to lose one.” A cold voice said, before I got a change to say anything, and I turned to look at the person. The person, whose face and body were hidden underneath a cloak, dragged Ryder with them, with a grip on his shoulder. A shoulder that looked dislocated, and the persons nails was digging into it, drawing blood. I growled and the brother in my grip laughed.

“You might want to think twice before acting.” He said between his laughter, but I didn’t care because nobody treated my brother like that and especially not these bastards. I tighten my grip on the guy and then flung him towards his brothers, to my right and then ran full speed at the person holding my brother. The person sidestepped around Ryder so fast that they were mostly blurred, pushing him down in the process and then holding him down with a boot-clad foot on his neck. I missed them by a hair.

“Try that again and I will break his neck.” I had been gearing up for another attack, but I then stopped in my tracks at the familiarity in the cold voice. Almost like the person noticed it, they grabbed hold of the hood on the cloak and janked it off and I looked at the person underneath in shock. Leigh was standing there, with her boot pressed against Ryder’s neck and looked at me with a cold and otherwise emotionless glare. The most noticeable ting, beside the fact she wasn’t wearing a dress, but instead pants, was the Onyx scales covering her left arm, from wrist to shoulder. The scales were fastening around the wrist with a small belt and around her torso too, with two belts going across the torso and dark buckles fastening the different belts on the front, with the ones coming around from the back, on the ribs underneath her right arm. It was a harness of sorts, holding the onyx scales, that created a sleeve, at place on her arm.

“Leigh.” My voices sounded breathless as I said it and she bit down hard at that. God, I had missed her, and my wolf howled in agreement in my head.

“Let my brothers go or you will lose yours.” She said and then clenched her mouth harder together as I stared at her.

“Brothers?” I asked with my brows frowned at what she had just said and then someone chuckled.

“Looks like you broke the prince, sis.” I looked in the voice’s direction to see the Darkmoon Walkers brothers smiling amused. No way. I looked back at her, but she just gave me that cold glare.

“Yeah… Turns out you married your enemies long lost daughter.” She said and decreased the pressure on Ryder’s neck a bit.

“Now tell your pack members to let go of my brothers. I won’t ask again.” She continued without waiting for my respond to the previous statement. I looked at my pack members, then her supposed brothers, then my brother, that looked just as shocked as I felt, and then her. Not wanting to gamble with Ryder’s life despite the fact that I didn’t think that she would kill him, I signaled the pack members to let go. The brothers rose to their feet and Leigh removed her boot from Ryder’s neck.

“Now was that so hard?” She said sarcastically, while giving me another cold stare and then walked towards her brothers. I still couldn’t believe that they were indeed siblings, but seeing them together, I realized it was the truth. Some of the facial feature was, alike, especially their eyes. And then there was the fact that they all had brown eyes, even if it was different shades of brown and dark brown hair. But the most noticeable thing, was how they acted towards each other. The bound between family members was hard to hide and they weren’t even trying to do that.

“What happened to you?” I asked her, after locking eyes with her again. She stiffened at my question and then grimaced.

“You kicked me out or had you forgotten about that already?” Her eyes were slowly filling with hatred as she spoke.

“Guess I should thank you though. Because without your rude treatment of me this, would never have happened. I wouldn’t have found my brothers or my place in the world. I wouldn’t have learned to fend for myself.” Despite the words, her voice was still cold.

“I’m so sorry about it all Leigh.” Ryder said, as he got to his feet, but her cold glare didn’t waver when she looked at him.

“It’s way too late for that.” She answered him and then she turned to leave. They all did. Without thinking I rushed after her and was then tackled to the ground. Her wolf, the one that had followed her around at our castle, was holding me down with its front paws and growling at me. The wolf then stepped away slowly and looking up, I saw Leighs eyes glow the exact same way ours did, when the wolf was seconds away from tacking over our human form or when we drew on our wolfs powers. Leigh then took the wolfs place and kneeled beside me.

“Guess you were never officially introduced to my wolf, but now you are and guess what…” She whispered the last part and then she leaned in so close that her breath fanned my neck. It was an odd sensation despite the fact that it wasn’t something new, because Sheila had done it plenty of times, but this felt… Stronger?

“Mate.” She growled low and then she surprised me by licking me from the crook of my neck and up to my ear. In addition to feeling her canines against my skin, I also felt sparks erupt throughout my body. My wolf howled excited, confirming what she had just said and feeling me with intense lust for her and then dreed as she rose to her feet. She then grabbed hold of the wolfs fur and swung herself up. Sitting on the back of the wolf they all ran towards the tight cluster of trees. And I just laid there.

“I’m after that side chick of yours, given she tried to kill me and if you try to come between me and her, I will have your head.” Leigh growled, before disappearing completely.