Cry Of The Pride

| 5 ₹ the Third |

Imaan Hammam as Nuria of Tashudrel.

Nuria blinked at his words. This man was unpredictable, he didn't jump at the chance of being alpha and now he wanted to die at the hands of a hunter.

"Do you know what you're asking?" she asked.

She knew that if she was the one to kill him that he'd enter the after life with pain and regret. His soul stuck between using his people's paradise and hell and being forgotten as an ancestor. Something strange was running through her, as if she didn't want him to die. To go, because as she mulled over it. He was different.

"Perhaps someone else can help you with that." she said when he didn't answer.

"Please, Nuria. You dont understand what this means," he begged.

Nuria bit her lip, the desperation in his voice. "I'll come... We need a distraction Altan."

She heard him hum, "i can arrange one." Nuria couldn't believe she was agreeing to this.

The line went dead after that, she felt regret overcome her. Killing someone like him seemed to weigh heavily on her. She stood up from her Father's desk.

Swiftly pushed the chair into place and walked around the large desk, she walked to the door and out of the Laird's office, some place she wasn't supposed to be in in the first place.

She walked down the dimlit passageway, taking in the red walls and the images of the the past leaders and their families in them.

She stopped at her own families. It was only a frame and below it a disray of photoshop since they were never together once in their lives.

Her two older brothers stand together, it was the day they got their permanent rank, next to them it was she, within different lightinf she stood next to her father as a third and after was the youngest ones. The triplets a boy and two girls with their mother between them. This was the current main house of Tashudrel, with the highest success rate but in complete disray.  Hardly together but the perfect unit.

"Ria!" she turned immediately. A scowl came about as she looked to the one who'd called her.

"Othin," she said. "Why are you here?"

She saw how he smiled, it was annoying meant to be charming but the act behind it obvious. "I was sent to come look for you."

She looked him up and down, today was her complete day off. Even if she was needed, they would have to wait. "You really need to work on your lies," she said in response and began walking towards the exit.

"You're not allowed in the Legacy wing no matter what," and for him to be this far underground...

He wasn't looking for her, but for something. "I know but i really needed to see you." she turned and smiled at him and carried back up the stairs.

"Are you still mad at me?" Othin asked.

Her remaining silence was an answer to him. She sped up her pace avoiding him being close as she went on. "I can't live with my destined so mad at me!" he said in a fake cry she carried onto the surface and en route to her room.

She stopped when she reached her door, playing along. "My destined isn't allowed to be in the Legacy Wing," she said countering.

"C'mon baby, that ban is going to be lifted pretty soon." he winked. She returned in with one of her own.

"Pretty soon will be later than you thought, you left a giant loosr end in the last test." Othin's eyebrows furrowed.

"What was that?" he asked.

"Me!" she said and began opening her door. "You might be tried for trying to kill and Alpha of such an ancient Pride, especially without your supervisor's consent." she told him.

"But-"

She smiled, "exactly." she shut the door in his face and walked to the center of  her room.

She took in the entire place, it was dusty. Just as she had anticipated, but there were foot prints. Some old and some new, she crouched next the black tile. The person must have stopped there for a long time.

She came to the conclsion that it was the bottom print of a Nike shoe, a dress sneaker.

She stood up and walked over to her wardrobe the feet carried on to there. The inside was a disaster, not exactly but an imitation of how she kept her clothes together. A poor imitation.

She slid the door shut and turned to look at where the intruder went. The set of older prints went to one of her side pedestals. The drawer left slightly open as a sign of rushing, he pulled at the handle with her pinky missing. There was alnost no change except for the fact that her photo album was clean.

She would alway leave in on the window sill and let it gather dust, she wanted to see how much dust it would accumilate until she could blow it off like they did in the movies. Silly, but that resulted in her figuring wherever there was an intruder in her space. Only she would clean up.

Slowly Nuria grabbed the weighted book and began flicking the pages searching looking for something. A misssing photograph if some sort.

She fell short. She put the album back in and shut the drawer.

She wasn't planning on returning given the new development.

Nuria left her room, she shut the door gently went to join the rest of the house.

Some may have called her paranoid for her skepticism, but she called it being aware. Because there was a greater plan to everything she did.

If someone learnt of her patterns, likes and dislikes she would be predictable and predictable means easy to stop.

"Third!" she heard a shout. She stopped at the sound, turned and looked at the boy who was jogging in her direction.

She gave him a lazy smile, he handed her an envelope. Nuria thanked him, opened the letter infront of him and anounces that it was an invitation. She dismissed him after, it seemed Altan worked fast.

As one of the least sloppy people she knew he spent little time planning and seemed to be acting quickly. Perhaps of impulse.

The thing was that she had seen him in action, although that singular encounter was little to go by she had learnt plenty.

Perhaps the pressure had gotten to him.