Alpha Nocturne's Contracted Mate

Chapter 273 Return as Heroes

The journey out to the last spot that had been scouted by the Enclave’s Specialist handlers and their

direwolves had been uncomfortable to say the least.

The standard black armored transport with tinted windows was not air conditioned, and the heat in the

back was stifling. The only breeze came from the window in the front passenger seat, where Lord

Brarthroroz was seated next to an obviously tense driver.

The specialists that accompanied them sat in the front two rows, occasionally throwing worried glances

back at the cages, as Lexi grinned unashamedly at them from her seat next to Allen on the back row.

“Do you have to torment everyone that you come into contact with?” Allen murmured in annoyance as

he rolled his eyes.

“What? I’m just being friendly.” Lexi protested with a shrug, her eyes glinting mischievously.

Allen raised an eyebrow at her as Lexi snorted.

“Look, I’m hot, I feel like we’ve been cooped up in this tin can forever and I’m already bored. A girls

gotta do what a girls gotta do to keep herself entertained, beta-boy.” She winked.

“It wouldn’t be so damn hot if you hadn’t brought those…those things with us for a ride along.” Allen

grumbled as he glanced back at the cage, “I don’t know why you couldn’t just teleport them in when we

arrived.”

“Don’t you listen to the grumpy old smelly furball, my poor little babies” Lexi gushed as she crouched

down in front of the metal grill and stuck a few f*ingers through to scratch under the chin of one of the

sinister looking hellhounds, “The big old meanie just doesn’t appreciate your uniqueness, does he?”

The hellhound’s eyes seemed to glaze over as its eyelids lowered in an expression of what seemed to

Allen, to look like ecstasy. He shuddered at the eerie turquoise light that seemed to penetrate the

hounds eyelids with their unnatural light and glanced across in sympathy at the enormous direwolves

that huddled together in the corner of the cage, eyeing the beasts and their clearly insane mistress with

suspicion and a healthy dose of fear.

“I sometimes wonder what goes on inside your head.” Allen murmured with a mixture of awe and

disgust.

“A pretty gooey mix of sass, s****l depravity and an incredible amount of time devoted to thinking about

cake, surprisingly enough,” She answered offhandedly as the hellhound pushed its snout against the

metal grill and she planted a gentle k*iss on it, before standing and taking her seat next to Allen again.

The only sound in the silence of the van otherthan the hum of the motor, was Lexi’s contented sigh and

Lord Brarthroroz’s deep chuckle from the front of the van.

After a few hours of constant motion, they pulled off onto a dirt track that abruptly ended a short way

along and they continued on through the overgrown field towards the edge of the sprawling forest that

lay in front of them.

The closer they got, the more excited the hellhounds became, nudging at the heavy doors of the back

of the van as if eager to be off.

The van pulled to a stop and they exited the vehicle, the team that had traveled with them, hanging

back a short way and making themselves look busy as Lexi sauntered past them with a snort.

“Amateurs.” She muttered with a shake of her head as she flipped the latch on the outside of the van

and flung them wide.

As soon as she did, the hellhounds were out and fussing around her as she giggled like a child, and the

dire wolves that had shared the cage with them slunk past them carefully before bolting to their

handlers.

“Anyone would think you were frolicking in a field with a bunch of cute little puppies.. .not fully grown

hellhounds.” Allen sneered.

Lexi scowled over her shoulder at him at the same time as the unlikely pets focused their full attention

on him and bared their teeth in a viscous snarl, growling lightly. Allen swallowed nervously, suddenly

feeling very vulnerable.

“Just so you know Allen, these three hounds are puppies…and they are as intelligent as you or I,” Lord

Brarthroroz advised as he leaned in by his ear, making him jump slightly, “I would be careful what you

say. They understand every word.”

Allen blinked at him dumbly with wide eyes, at a loss for words as Lord Brarthroroz wandered over to

the so-called puppies and indulged them with the belly scratches that they were begging for.

“No offense Beta, but, aren’t you a little… I don’t know.. .freaked out by all this?” one of the specialists

asked quietly as they joined Allen to watch with complex expressions, the almost unnatural sight of an

oversized Daemon Lord and his daughter playing with the monstrous looking hounds as if they were

harmless and not at all moments away from embarking on a potentially deadly expedition.

“I mean, I suppose at one time, I would have been,” Allen sighed, “But I’m rapidly learning that I’m far

more accepting of things like this, the longer that I spend with my mate.”

The specialists exchanged complicated looks with each other and returned to their dire wolves,

beginning to attach the harnesses that held their equipment to them and Allen looked between the two

groups with a resigned look.

He was part of two worlds that had collided in a spectacular fashion and for all the odd looks and

whispers that went on behind their backs, the sooner the shifters accepted and welcomed different

species among them, the easier it would be to repel threats like Narcissa and Eromaug before they

became an issue.

He knew damn well that these specialists were going to go back to the Enclave with stories to tell about

how terrifying Lexi and her fathers abilities were, and some of those people who would listen would try

to twist it to their own ends, planting the seeds of discord that would further their own goals and divide

communities further.

After all, at one time, Allen would have been among those people who would be all too easily

persuaded about the potential evils of Lexi and her father.

There would be comparisons between this Eromaug and Lord Brarthroroz, then the questions about

what made them so different from one another and what would stop Lord Brarthroroz from turning on

them and working to destroy them, as his brother had done for years in secret.

This mission to destroy the sites would be imperative in shaping the narrative around Lexi and her

father once it was complete, and it was just as important that they completed the tasks with minimal

incident. That part at least, would be relatively easy to control.

What was not so easy to predict, and therefore mitigate, is what they might find when and if they

succeeded in restoring communications. He could only hope that for Lexi’s sake, Greyson and his team

were holed up somewhere and able to defend themselves until help arrived.

Anything else could prove disastrous for them all. Lexi and her father needed to return as heroes, not

as bearers of bad news and cast as the villains of the whole ordeal by those desperate to see not only

them, but Ann and Adam fail too.