The Wolves and the Vipers

Chapter 46 - Lion Like

We've reached 1k votes so thank you, everyone!! It's much appreciated <3 who's going to be brave and guess who our prisoner is? (there's no prize except my undying love)

It was maddening to spend hours with Zoe and yet be unable to talk to her. Tyler had made sure we weren't alone until Jace had come home, and now I was descending into the pack's prison with her beside me, knowing full well that it would be hours longer before we could finish our little chat. I could kick Alek out of the house whenever I liked ... but Jace and Tyler were another story.

"You two can wait here," Jace told Zoe and Alek as we passed the guard's room.

"He's a feral, Alpha," Alek muttered. He had never been shy to question orders. "I'd feel better if we were in the room with you."

Jace sighed long and loud. "I'd feel better if Emma wasn't in the room at all, but it's her decision. And he won't open his mouth if there's an audience. Three is pushing it. Five would be ridiculous."

Alek made a face, but he didn't raise another protest. So we left my guards behind and continued into the prison alone. One of the wardens came to meet us halfway down the corridor, a big ring of keys in his hands.

"Good morning," I greeted him, since I recognised him from my previous visits. It sounded overly cheerful to me, but that was my job, wasn't it? To be the cheerful, glowing life of the pack even when I was standing in the darkest, most miserable corner of the pack house.

"Good morning," he replied. "Who are you looking for?"

"The feral prisoner," Jace told him.

The warden blinked at us. He looked over both shoulders, scanning the rows of cells, and then he turned back to us with a new, decisive set to his shoulders. "Uh, I'm sorry, Alpha, but we don't have one. He was returned to Riverside, remember?"

Jace shook his head curtly. "Not him. The one who was brought in last night."

"I don't know who you mean," the warden said, looking anxious now. My heart seemed to skip a beat or two. Because if he wasn't in this prison, then where was he? "We did admit someone last night, but he's in the communal cell with the rogues."

"That'll be the feral," Jace told him incredulously. "You put him in the communal cell? If I wanted to execute the bastards, I'd send instructions, thank you very much."

The warden threw his hands up. "Look. No one told me he was a feral, and he sure doesn't act like one. If he had black eyes or picked a fight, then sure — I'd have given him his own cell. But they seem to get along fine. He hasn't hurt any of them."

I didn't really care if the feral had been put with the rogues. I was just glad to hear he was actually behind bars. The events of last night were very clear in my mind. Two children dead. Both of their parents missing. Another six men vanished into thin air. So the feral had a lot to answer for, in my opinion. He was not in the murderous haze of a newly-made feral — he seemed to be capable of clear, cohesive thought. Feral or not, surely he had to take some responsibility for his own actions.

Jace scrubbed at his face, unusually wide-eyed. "Goddess above. Okay. No harm done, I suppose. Let's just get him out of there."

Footsteps behind us. I turned my head to see Bradley, whose hair was tousled as if he had just shifted. He would be joining us for the interrogation — why, I didn't know, but perhaps it was Jace's way of keeping him too busy to disrupt our truce with Riverside. They both nodded a greeting to each other as if yesterday's argument hadn't happened.

"Do you notice anything strange about this cell?" Jace asked him in an undertone. I didn't know what he meant exactly. There were eight men inside, and I recognised the feral amongst them, but nothing else seemed amiss.