Guardians of the Opal Moon

Chapter 29

Alina and Phoenix shift and start climbing trees. Wolves are usually ground dwellers and heights are not a usual love, but Alina and Phoenix used to spend a lot of time in trees in their youth, trying hard to escape Alina’s brother. They are extremely proficient at climbing and still manage to have the skills to this day, the action actually bringing in some nostalgia, if it wasn't for the serious situation they would actually be enjoying it.

The team of Hunter and Ava on the ground with the team of Alina and Phoenix naked climbing trees is quite a sight to behold. Jade and Axel have joined Alexis and Lucas in their search. There is nothing to find in the alpha house or the path that Brodie took.

After what happened to Alexis, they are more convinced than ever that there is safety in numbers. Alexis is busy studying the bloody letters.

Phoenix stands at the most direct route from the scene of the crime to the edge of the pack lands, the route with the least possible distance. The largest tree is along this path. Climbing trees like this is so much easier now than in his youth, the added advantage of immeasurable strength coupled with the use of claws as traction makes scaling trees a breeze. When Alina and he were climbing trees in their past, he never thought it would be an actual skill that they would use. Back then it was more of just a rebellion against norms, wolves are ground dwellers? Who said, we can do whatever we want.

Phoenix scales the large trunk with ease, his rippling biceps propelling him up the tree with no resistance. The only downside now is his significant weight. The tree creaks and groans as he moves swiftly up into the thinner branches. He looks over at Alina who is watching him from a lower tree with an amused expression.

‘Do I need to put you on a diet?’

Alina looks on happily, the always serious Phoenix looks utterly comical, his large body, muscled to perfection without an ounce of fat, looks like he is going to take down the entire tree with him, the thick trunk swaying with the weight. He shakes his head at her but a small smile quirks on the edge of his lips, there is nothing that he loves more than seeing Alina smile. Phoenix jumps up, releasing the tree as it bounces back into position. He jumps high enough to clear the canopy as he sucks in a large breath.

It is faint and there is something that he has smelled before. Since Alina was taken before and they used masking spray, Phoenix has been training his nose very thoroughly and is able to detect the slightest hint of scent through the spray. The spray also has its own faint odor. It is just a lot harder to smell.

It is strange because there wasn’t the faintest scent of anyone else on the ground, like it was all suppressed or somehow swept away, but up here there is finally something.

It makes sense, most would not think of checking at this height and even if they did, most could not smell through the masking spray, a slight smile appears on Phoenix’s face as his green eyes flash with excitement.

He lands wrong on the tree and smashes through the limbs until he is able to catch himself. He jumps the rest of the way to the ground.

‘Got it’

Hunter and Ava double back and Alina makes her way down the tree, shifting when she reaches the ground. Three wolves stand around Phoenix looking at him expectantly.

‘I got a scent, it is through masking spray. It is up so high that we wouldn’t have thought it was possible before. Now everything has become possible’

Phoenix doesn’t explain further, just takes off at a run. Finding the tallest tree along the path and making sure they are still heading in the right direction. The three others following along closely in a V formation with their noses to the ground.

A kilometre past the blood moon border, the scents finally return to the ground. Phoenix nearly cheers. While he can smell it from up the trees, it is only very limited and a very specific location, so to be on the ground again is a lot faster moving.

The others all look at each other, they can’t smell anything but are happy to take Phoenix’s word for it and try a bit of nose tuning while they are at it. The pace increases over ten times

Back in the blood moon pack lands Alexis finally spots something, cursing herself for not seeing it sooner. Each letter is large and she has been looking so closely that she somehow missed something so obvious on the second last letter.

A single paw print is in the bloodied area, obviously put there after the letters were written.

‘Found something’

Lucas, Jade and Axel move to her side cautiously. They don’t want to trample anything that may be a clue but none of the others have found anything, so the excitement grows at the thought of something being found, the thought that they might be a step closer to finding out the culprit. The four stand around looking down at the single paw print. There is no scent and it was made after the blood was spilled, so it isn’t one of the pack. There are no others, just a single one, but at this moment it seems particularly glaring.

A wolf?

A wolf did this?

A wolf teamed up with a witch to attack their own kind?

It was expected with the amount of damage and hurt inflicted that there might be more than one person, maybe a small team, maybe a magical team, a dark magic team, but no one expected that there are wolves involved. Are they part of a pack? For what purpose would they team up with a witch?

Phoenix pulls up the high speed run in record time as they reach a patch of sticky mud. The others nearly don’t react in time and nearly crash into him. Phoenix puts his nose to the ground again and then looks at the mud patch.

Jade links through.

‘Wolves are involved’

Phoenix looks out at the mud patch which has close to six wolves paw prints. Jade took the words right out of his mouth.

Alexis looks up at the sky with a slight grim smile on her face.

‘At least wolves are easier to fight than magic’

All eight nod at the same time. While it is a blow, the feeling of being betrayed by your own kind is real. That is the positive. There are few wolves that are able to defeat the team of guardians, so the odds seem to stack slightly more in their favor.

Alexis can’t help but look at the sky. The moon goddess assembled her wolves to defeat other wolves that have turned against their own kind. Would it be a blow to her?

While deaths of wolves are part of life, it is done in battle, in even circumstances, not in such an underhanded way. While all is fair in love and war, teaming up with dark magic to take out people in such a ruthless way is not even slightly fair.

Phoenix looks at the paw prints and a ruthlessness flashes over his wolfs green eyes.

‘We have the trail’

While he has been following the trail for a while, it feels more like he has been following a hunch, as the others are just following blindly. Now this is proof, this is the concrete evidence that he has been waiting for.