The Supreme Alpha - Chapter 130

Author’s note: this is from Seraphina’s point of view

—

It was late afternoon when I got a call from Lazarus.

“Serina? Why are you answering this phone?”, Lazarus asked impatiently.

Well, it was my phone, but calls for my father were being redirected here.

“Aldus is busy. How can I help you, Laz?”

“I need you to contact Aldus.”

His solemn tone told me it was serious, and that probably meant only one thing.

“Do you have issues with rogues?”, I guessed.

“Yes. How soon can Aldus come to my place?”

I sighed. I feared this will happen. This was one of the tasks that my father would take care of.

Aldus Mezzanotte is a vampire with a royal bloodline and other than being feared and respected and knowing everyone who is someone, my father also holds several positions. One is that he is responsible for a vast area in Europe where he is ensuring that humans don’t find out about the existence of creatures.

If humans find out that witches, werewolves, vampires, and many others live among them, humans will panic, and bloodshed will be inevitable.

In order to preserve resemblance of peace, creatures decided to keep a low profile, rendering them nearly invisible to the ones who don’t know about their existence. However, not everyone is following those rules and my father is responsible for cleanup when the rules are broken.

Now that my father was not available, I needed to step in so that his absence was not noticed.

“He is busy, but I can come.”

“No.”, Lazarus rejected right away.

“Laz”, I said sternly. “You need help, and I can help you. You know that I accompanied my father for cleanup tasks many times. I can do it. Instead of arguing with me, send me the coordinates. Let’s meet at the site, it will be faster…”

…

“You are not going.”, Duke said with all the seriousness in the world when I told him why I was dressing up in pants, plaid shirt, and hiking boots.

“It will be fine.”, I assured him. “I did this many times.”

“Did, what, exactly?”, Duke asked stiffly. “Are you expecting me to be fine with you going into some forest in the night to fight who-knows-how-many lawless werewolves?”

I really didn’t have time for this. “I don’t expect you to be fine with it. But this is a job that my father performed, and now that he is not available, I need to do it. I did this many times. I know what to expect.”

Duke jabbed his hand into his hair angrily.

“You can’t be serious.”, he said.

“Do I look like I’m joking?” I walked to my sulking Alpha and hugged his waist. “I will be back by morning, and you won’t even know I was gone.”

“The hell I won’t.”, he growled. “And there is no way I’m letting you go there.”

“What will you do? Tie me up?”, I challenged him.

“That doesn’t sound like a bad idea.”, Duke said with an evil grin. “But I have a better one.”

I was afraid to ask, but I had to… “What is it?”

“I’m coming with you.”

“What? No!”, I objected firmly.

Duke gripped my shoulders and his endlessly blue eyes locked onto mine. “You are not going without me. There are rogues. Werewolves and maybe something else. And then there is Lazarus. I am not letting you go among them without protection.”

I knew he was serious, but… “You are still not in tune with Nox. What if you get hurt?”

“Didn’t you say that my strength and speed are mine and not Nox’s?”, Duke reminded me. “Besides, I have my healing and if things come to worse, I will let Nox come in front. He can subdue any werewolf with his aura and he definitely agrees that we are not letting you out of our sight.”

I wanted to remind him that he can’t subdue Lazarus, but I decided to keep those for myself.

“Let me grab my boots and we can go”, Duke said and I let him have it.

I didn’t have time to argue.

I decided to take this in the same way how my father allowed me to accompany him the first time. I was following him obediently and when the trouble got close, he told me to hide and wait and I did that… almost.

I clearly remembered the blood and messed-up camp that was ravaged by rogues who came to Lazarus’s territory to hunt humans. And it was not just hunting; they collected human hearts and livers as trophies, and I think they were planning to eat them. Disgusting.

But it was not all bad because on that night I met Zoe, Luca, and Ash.

…

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…

Mitch dropped us with a helicopter to the location that Lazarus specified. It was a small clearing, surrounded by dense forest, and considering that the sun was setting, we were working with limited daylight.

It’s not that Lazarus or Duke had issues seeing in the dark, and my night vision was better than human’s, but when tracking hostile units, it’s better to have a clear view instead of dealing with shadows.

During our flight, I told Duke several times that he needs to stay in the back and not cause trouble with rogues, or with Lazarus. Duke agreed with everything I said, but I had a feeling that he agreed only to pacify me.

“Why is he here?”, Lazarus asked with disapproval when he saw Duke with me.

“Mateo can help and he will not be in the way.”, I responded. Before Lazarus could complain more, I waved my hand, indicating that we should hurry. “Do you have a trail we can follow? If yes, let’s start. You can tell me what you know on the way.”

Lazarus was not happy, but he didn’t reject my suggestion either.

He gestured in the direction we should go, “If you are ready, we can start.”

“Lead the way.”, I said.

Lazarus was explaining the situation as we walked. “Two kilometers West from here was a camp. Four humans were killed in the same way. Their throats were ripped out in patterns that resemble a werewolf bite or clawing out, and their hearts were missing. The rest of the bodies were intact.”

This was strange. Werewolves kill in frenzy and usually mutilate bodies beyond recognition. “Bodies were intact?”

Lazarus confirmed. “My men packed the bodies. You can examine them later if you wish but my guess is that rogues attacked to collect hearts.”

“I will examine them.”, I told Lazarus.

I was glad that he collected the bodies. After autopsies, I will use them for experiments.

“The scent is going further to the North from here. I expect at least four rogues, possibly more.”

My father told me that when there are only one or two troublemakers, Lazarus takes care of them himself, but when there are three or more, he calls for backup. No matter how strong Lazarus is, two arms and two legs can’t fight off six arms and six legs. And sometimes they might mix up with humans or witches, so Lazarus’s aura won’t suppress them. Over the years, we encountered all kinds of situations.

The most disappointing was when humans were among perpetrators. Most of the time, the humans involved were actually hunters. Of course, Bolek, the head of the Hunters Association, is denying that he has anything to do with this, but we highly doubt that.

It’s a public secret that Hunters Association is the largest supplier of organs, magical items, and slaves on the underground market.

I asked my father how can this be tolerated. Hunters Association was supposed to be the protector of the weak ones (aka humans), to ensure the balance of all creatures in cooperation with the Council, and my father told me how corruption runs deep.

I never understood how someone can take a life in the name of profit. It’s one thing if you kill out of necessity, to eat or in self-defense, but this… they were already unimaginably rich. Why did they need more?

Greed is an incurable disease, my father would say. He taught me a lot over the years, and I missed him immensely.

It was nice to remember my father. Lately, things were hectic, and I didn’t have time for random thoughts.

This walk through the forest in silence allowed me to reminiscence about Aldus and my heart warmed. The fact that the day of me going with Vesper to buy a dragon egg and revive Aldus was making me impatient. I really wanted to wake him up as soon as possible.

“Why would they collect hearts?”, Duke broke the silence. “Organ trading?”

Since Lazarus was silent, I responded. “That’s one of the possibilities. Some creatures consume the hearts in the belief that it will make them braver or stronger. Witches use human hearts to make potions, and then there are those who need organ transplants. It could be any of those.”

Lazarus didn’t approve our chatter. “Let’s quiet down.”, he said. “And can we hurry up?”

“Lead the way, Laz.”, I said. “The sooner we find them, the sooner we will finish.”

Laz started with a jog and then he broke into a run.

Duke and I were right behind him.