A Quest To Reclaim

CHAPTER TWO

“She did not do it,” someone declared. Everyone halted and stared in his direction.

“What did you say?” Dylan fumed, appearing ready to pounce.

“I witnessed what happened here tonight.” The young man spoke calmly. “And she did not kill him.”

Anna walked up to Gabrielle. “I see you have this all planned out; a false witness.”

“That’s not true and you know it, Anna,” Gabrielle said. What followed was a stinging sensation spreading across her face. Anna had just slapped her.

“Do not mention my name, liar!” Anna slapped her again, depositing a dull ache in her head. “Witch!” Another slap had her ears ringing.

Anna would have continued with her barrage of slaps if the strange witness did not stop her hand midair.

“You should take no pleasure in hitting someone who is defenseless.”

“Who the hell are you?” Dylan took a menacing step towards the stranger. “I have never seen you in this pack.”

“I do not belong here. I am a sojourner.”

“Well, sojourner, this is the Grey Crescent territory, and you are trespassing,” Declan said. “Your word does not count here.”

“What I say would stand as long as I prove it to be true.”

“I could have your head for challenging me but I will be kind enough to throw you in jail.”

“You lack the power and the jurisdiction for that.”

Dylan couldn’t believe his ears. He growled, baring his fangs. “You shall learn the hard way how much power I wield,” Dylan said between raging breaths as he started to charge.

“That’s enough!”

The voice carried enough command to bring Dylan to a halt. He looked up.

“Uncle?”

Earl Claudius, brother to the Alpha Egerton and member of the high council was staring down at them from the top of the ridge. The moon cast a silhouette of his flowing robe and his face could be barely seen.

“She killed my brother, uncle,” Dylan said, appearing fraught with grief and one would think he had actually loved Declan. “She has to pay with her life.”

“He doesn’t know that,” said the strange young man. Earl Claudius gave him a brief, scrutinizing look.

“She did, and we can prove it,” Anna retorted.

“Then you shall do so in court,” Earl Claudius said. “The Grey Crescent pack has suffered a great deal of tragedy tonight. I shall not have you add to it.” Earl Claudius was a kind and diligent man. He had nominated Declan as the next alpha of the pack. He had convinced the council members that Declan’s integrity should be picked over Dylan’s brashness and also stood up for Gabrielle when they insisted, based on a suspicion that she was a witch, that she was unworthy to become the next Luna.

“We are just going to let the witch go?” The frustration in Dylan’s voice was palpable. “That would result in even greater tragedy for us.”

“No,” said Earl Claudius. This time, his voice was calmer, but the authority it carried never diminished a notch. “We shall take her in and investigate what has happened here tonight. Only after a conclusion has been reached shall we make a decision. Her life is not yours to take, nephew." He began to walk towards Gabrielle. “Now, let her go.”

Earl Claudius led Gabrielle away and walked with her to the Lair.

“I know you did not do it, Gabrielle.”

“Thank you,” she said, her head bowed. “But no one would believe me after all that has happened.”

“I do. And hopefully, the council shall heed to reason.”

“I felt paralyzed like I was under an evil spell. And I couldn’t fight when he was attacked. They believed me the other times. I fear for what it shall be this time.” Tears streaked down the sides of her face as she spoke.

“Dylan is so rash he just fails to see that you are also aggrieved by the death of your mate, whom you had absolutely no reason to harm.”

“I fear for what he might say in court. There were no other witnesses.”

“Just say the truth as it happened and let the Moon Goddess guide you.” Earl Claudius patted Gabrielle’s shoulders. “I have known you since you were an infant. You have a good heart and I shall make sure you get justice.” The older man gave her a soft smile which was only slightly comforting. “You shall be placed in a guarded room, not a cell, until the court holds tomorrow.”

“Where do you think you are going?” Dylan stood in her path.

“I have to get to my room,” Gabrielle said defiantly, despite her thumping heart. She was now alone with him in a hallway and she dreaded what he might attempt.

“Your room?” Dylan scoffed. “My dead brother doesn’t get a warm and cozy bed tonight, and neither do you.

“The Earl had said-”

Dylan cut her with a smack across the face. Next his hand was around her neck, squeezing and making breathing a herculean task for her.

“Take her to the dungeons.” Dylan snapped his fingers, and two guards she hadn’t seen came out the bend and pulled her by her chains while Dylan watched to his satisfaction.

The coarse chains peeled her wrists as she was being dragged and shoved into the dungeon. She stumbled and landed on the cold floor.

“By the time I am done with you, you would wish you had died a long time before you met my brother.” Dylan’s voice was punctuated by the banging of the door to her cell.

Her eyes were swollen from crying already. Gabrielle felt like a withering flower, battered by a storm and abandoned in the wild. Her strewn frame convulsed as she wept. She was alone now and her tears wouldn’t stop flowing. She wept with the grief of losing her mate, for her fate; she was likely going to die gruesomely, the way convicted witches did.

Too weak to lift herself, Gabrielle fell asleep in a pool of her own tears.

Gabrielle shuddered in her sleep, from the biting cold in the room and from her nightmares.

She was being dragged through and angry crowd. Chants of “Die, witch” filled the air.

The noose tightening around her neck felt like Dylan’s hand had felt, stifling.

“You didn’t do it.” A lone voice, deep and unwavering, drowned all the others around her. It was the voice of the strange witness infusing into her an inexplicable calmness. She suddenly felt warm.

Her chains clanked as she stirred awake. She was wrapped in a woolen jacket and someone snuggled close to her. Gabrielle blinked, trying to get used to the faint light around her.

“You were shivering,” he said, noticing her confusion.

“It was you in my dreams.” Gabrielle pushed herself away from him, observing his jacket and wondering why she felt drawn to its scent. “You believe I am innocent.”

“I witnessed what happened last night. I can prove to them that you are innocent.”

“There’s no point. They already decided my fate. Nothing you say or do is going to change that.”

“They cannot treat you in that manner, not after all you went through last night,” he said and offered her a hand.

Gabrielle ignored his hand as she lifted herself off the cold floor. She cast a suspicious stare at him.

“Why should I trust you when I do not know who you are? Your name for starters.”

“I’m Ray,” He said “I can’t ask you to trust me. I only ask that you do what you can to get justice and not let the uncouth young man from last night decide your fate.”

“Dylan lost his brother last night.”

“And you lost your mate. Your loss is as great as his, if not greater.”

“Why do you think I don’t want justice.”

“You do, but not for yourself.” His voice was as smooth as it had been last night. It bounced neatly off the four walls of the cell room as he spoke.

Gabrielle looked at him, not knowing where he was driving at.

“You want justice for your slain mate while I sensed that you resigned yourself to whatever fate they decide for you.”

“She abandoned me.” Gabrielle turned, blinking away the tears in her eyes.

“What?”

“The Moon Goddess has brought so much suffering my way.”

“I think this is beyond that.”

“I don’t understand why she would bless with a mate, only to lose him to a mysterious and brutal death just when I found peace. The entire pack would, no doubt, be convinced by now that she was simply cursed.”

“It wasn’t a curse. Someone set you up to make it look like you killed him,” Ray said.

“Did they set me up when I lost my parents at a young age and two mates before him?”

“Someone so powerful wants you dead so much that they sent a dark assassin to do the job. Someone on the inside helped it track and find you.”

“How can you tell?”

“The eastside guard posts were left unguarded, and that was how the territory was infiltrated. That was how I got in.”

“Who are you?”

Before he could answer, there was a bang on the metal door followed by the clinking of keys . The door swung open, and the sun ray lit up the room. Two guards poured into the cell and one pointed at Gabrielle. “It is dawn and the court shall now decide your fate.” The other guard seized Gabrielle’s chain and started to drag her away.

Suddenly, she was pulled back. Ray was standing right beside her, holding onto her chain and preventing the guard from dragging her along.

“I wouldn’t let you drag an innocent lady out in chains,” he said.

“Who are you to tell us what to do?”

“Right now, you only need to know me as Ray. And no one should go before a court in chains. Especially not this lady. If anything, she is the victim here.”

“I won’t stop watching over you,” Ray said softly to Gabrielle.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

The guards led her through the hallway reflected. Sunlight, bounced off the marble floors onto the walls and patterned ceilings which were held up by large pillars.

Her knees grew weak the moment her eyes met Dylan’s. He appeared as determined as ever to make sure she had the wore the noose like a necklace.

Her heart sank when she saw Alpha Egerton having the same expression on his face.