Xander continues to growl at my rogue but moves closer to me so I can lean on him. It looks more like a lover’s gesture than him holding me upright which my ego appreciates at the moment.
“These two are gone, your highness.” A warrior I don’t recognize says somewhere to my left.
“This one is still breathing, but barely.” Mina’s dad says.
“Oscar and Skylar’s rogues are still alive, take them back to the holding cells. Give them just enough treatment to keep them alive. Have Doc Sylvia force their shift then collar them.” Warrior Osiston comes up from behind us.
All the other warriors have shifted and started with their assignments, Xnader and I remain in wolf form, I refuse to shift without something to change into, I don’t know any of these guys really and I don’t like being naked in front of Sierra on a good day.
As if he can read my mind, Warrior Osiston looks at me. “I have a shirt for you Little One, Xander is blocking you, shift so we can talk.”
I don’t hesitate, I want to tell them what happened so I can get information in return. What the hell just happened? And why are hostile rogues so far into the King’s territory? I shift and grab the shirt pulling it on quickly, then Xander shifts next to me and it’s then that I realize all of the warriors were fully clothed when they shifted back.
“How do you do that? Shift without destroying clothes? That could be useful information.” I look up at Xander then to Osiston expectantly.
“It is something we will teach you how to do in Elite training, don’t worry. Now tell us what happened. How far out did you guys go to train? Mina and Oscar know not to leave the territory with so few people, especially this side.” Osiston looks like he’s trying to hold back anger.
“What are you talking about? We didn’t go anywhere outside the territory…Sir.” I add as an afterthought with my slight attitude. I wasn’t going to let my friends get punished for a perceived lack of following the rules. “We came right here to train and this is where they attacked us.” Xander looked from me to Osiston and back. “That’s not possible, there’s no way they got this far undetected.”
“As you can see it’s completely possible, they did just that.” I gesture around me. “We were here training when three attacked us. Two were waiting over there by the tree line.” I pointed to where the rogue I was fighting waited until he thought I wasn’t paying attention about twenty yards away from where we are standing now. “The two extra seemed to be waiting for some kind of signal to join in. We didn’t hear or smell them until they were attacking. What’s going on and how did they get so close to the castle? Are Mina and Oscar okay?” I can’t see them among the other warriors cleaning up, but some have set out to run quick patrols to make sure there aren’t any other rogues here.
