My Most Precious Human

Blood trail

I took my phone from the soldier who held it in his hand and called Draven again. This time, I even lost

the signal and any possibility to connect. I glanced meaningfully at Patrick. He immediately pulled out

his phone and tried calling Draven himself. Like mine, his phone was out of range.

"Neal." Patrick jerked his chin up at the soldier standing next to me.

He grabbed his phone, looked at the screen, and shook his head.

"Damn it!" Patrick clenched his fist, then slowly scanned the area, processing our situation.

He ordered everyone to retreat deeper into the forest, hoping that whatever was jamming our signal

was coming from the mansion. Half an hour later, we knew that it wasn't the case. The signal came and

went in brief waves, but once any of us broke through with the connection, the other end of the line

went dead. Nonetheless, no one but me experienced this odd strike of disturbing sound while trying to

make the call. When I brought up that subject, Neal, who turned out to be an IT specialist, took my

phone to take a closer look at it.

We were left with only one option after losing all communication options: we had to wait. Draven and

others were about to get here soon anyway. Our plan was to meet in the area where we were currently

staying in an hour and attack the mansion with all our force. We used that time to regenerate, staying in

smaller groups around the forest. Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org exclusive © material.

I was with Patrick, Neal, and six other soldiers. The waiting was nerve-wracking and devastating. I sat

on the ground, giving my feet a rest, but my mind was running at full speed.

"Do you think that the same happened to Sariel and Leo?" I asked, restlessly gazing at Patrick.

He confirmed, "I'm afraid they might have entered a similar jamming zone."

"Then… they might be around here somewhere, somewhere in the woods around the mountain," I said,

feeling my heart hammering, hopeful and filled with fear at the same time.

"As much as I want to hear from the General and the King, finding them here would mean that the

degenerates are close, and our armies are doomed to collide." Patrick gritted his teeth.

I instantly remembered Draven's concerns about his warriors facing the degenerates. The pack

warriors might have been trained to fight against other wolves, but I bet that most of them had never

fought against bloodthirsty vampire zombies, not to mention a whole army of them. The Royal Army

struggled to defeat them, but they just kept reappearing in great numbers. If Sariel truly lost to them,

then I doubted that Draven would not share his fate. Yet, no matter how dark the thoughts invading my

mind were, I tried holding onto the hope that the vampire king had to be more powerful than thousands

of degenerated creatures.

While I was busy worrying about the possibility of JD's army getting closer, Neal crouched down beside

me, opened the palm of my hand, and handed me a small black object the size of a bean.

"What's this?" I asked, confused.

"Spying device," he replied.

"Why would you give me that?" I chuckled nervously.

"I took it out of your phone."

His words made me flinch. "What?"

He showed me the back of my phone and pointed at the CPU. "Someone planted a bug on you. It must

have malfunctioned from the start, and, finally, caused a short circuit when you were trying to call Alpha

Draven," Neal explained.

I swallowed and took a deep breath. "What can this device do?" I squeezed through my teeth,

wondering how deeply someone might have invaded my privacy.

"All of your calls and texts might have been intercepted, blocked, or manipulated…" he paused,

checking if I could handle the details. "A stranger might have called you, and your screen would have

shown you someone from your contact list. The same goes with text messages."

I laughed hysterically, feeling violated and assumingly deceived. Someone out there could have

listened to all of my conversations with Martha, Kanan… or even with Sariel. If it had been JD or

someone working for him, then he would have known everything we had ever found out about him, and

he would have known a lot of intimate details about me. Thinking about it made me sick.

The more I started to wonder whether the messages about Sariel being the father of Elora's child were

fake. How much would it change if they were… Those texts were my final push towards Draven. The

accumulation of what-ifs made my head spin.

"How long has this device been on my phone?" I asked, forcefully pushing the words out of my throat.

"I don't have my full equipment with me, but I guess that the chip wasn't there for long. I would say a

few days tops," Neal answered, expressing professional composure.

"A few days tops…" I repeated under my breath.

Was it that she-wolf that broke into my room, the one who planted it? Was she working for JD? I initially

thought she wasn't, but what if JD had more than one spy operating nearby? It was only reasonable to

assume that. That time, he had sent a girl to break into my room because her task required technical

knowledge. This theory began to make sense, but I didn't have time to give it more thought.

"They're here," Patrick informed everyone, focusing his sight far on the east side of the forest.

"It's Alpha Draven and two other teams," I said, distinguishing their scents.

Ten minutes later, all the warriors gathered in the forest at a hundred-meter distance from the mansion.

Draven rushed straight my way, scanning me from head to toe. Once he was assured that I was fine,

he heaved an audible sigh of relief. Then he turned to Patrick.

"I'm guessing the signal is jammed here as well?" Draven smiled wryly.

"The communication is cut in the deeper parts of the woods as well," Patrick wrapped up.

Draven cursed under his breath and ran his fingers through his black hair. He seemed restless, and I

couldn't blame him. Patrick and everyone else seemed to be in a state of alert. Something was off. I

knew that I was about to face my bastard of a father in less than half an hour, yet I was anxious about

something else. There was an intimidating aura around Randall D'Apolito's residence, and I was almost

certain it wasn't coming from my father. Nonetheless, we had to carry on with our plan.

The groups from the Royal Army and Moon Hill Pack, supported by a few warriors from my mother's

old pack, move to besiege the whole residence. Communication was down, so we had to rely on

perfect timing.

The attack was supposed to begin at 6:45. With our watches synchronized, the wolves and vamps

started jumping through the fence of the mansion from every side. Only then did we notice something

was very wrong…

The area seemed quiet, too quiet. All the warriors were moving slowly, carefully stepping toward the

main building, and then it hit me: the smell. It was so disgusting that I had to cover my nose and mouth.

It was the smell of death.

Patrick gestured to spread out and secure the area. Teams of six to ten went to check the left and right

sides of the building. Patrick kept me beside him as we headed straight towards the main entrance of

the residence. To get there, we had to pass through the garden and a large fountain located at its

center. As we passed another high row of hedges, we saw the bodies of a few guards. They were all

ripped to pieces, massacred. One's head had been decapitated and was floating in the fountain. The

blood painted the water, the grass, and every hedge in the area. The view was horrifying.

"Who could have done this?" asked a female soldier walking beside me.

I looked at her and saw her pale. Her hands were slightly shaking, yet she fisted them, locking fear

beneath her fingers.

Another soldier crouched down to take a closer look at one of the corpses. "There were no teeth

marks," he said, "so those guards couldn't have been killed by degenerates."

"Then what the hell can kill this way? Wolves with rabies?!" A frustrated grunt escaped the female

soldier's throat.

I shared her restlessness. My heart was pounding wildly, as I anticipated grave danger meeting us

every second. I tried to read Patrick's face, searching for answers, but he could barely hide how

puzzled he was. His tense jaw betrayed anger, as he struggled to figure out what had happened in this

place.

While moving closer to the entrance, we discovered more dead bodies. They all looked the same:

slaughtered, with their body parts cut off, and blood sprayed all over the place. They weren't just killed;

it seemed like whoever did this enjoyed the whole process. I felt like I would vomit all of my guts out if

my stomach wasn't cramped with overwhelming fear.

When we entered the mansion, we saw each wall covered in dark red, and the bloody river was

flooding every floor. The entire elite squad was dead. It wasn't too long before our team met with

Draven's group, which entered the mansion from the back.

Looking at me and Patrick, Draven said, "My warriors checked every floor except the top one. There

were no survivors."

"My father's throne hall is on the top floor," I muttered, clenching my fist.

"Then… Let's go there, Lilith," Draven smiled coldly and grabbed my hand. "It's time for the family

reunion."