Chapter 83: Paralysed By Fear
"Do you guys really have to? I mean you have introduced yourselves and for the looks of it, you will be working together, so why don\'t we break this up and let Hawi get some rest before she falls on her back?" Luna Amara said and Hawi pouted at her.
Granted, she could feel her stomach clawing for food, but she was certain she could go another round with Mbali, and win. It was a given on her end, because she had never lost the battle, ever, but would it really feel the same?
"I can still go on. Besides, how else will he know that I am good at my work when he fights like a woman I once shared the battlefield with?" Hawi whined and Mbali looked at her curiously. Was this woman by any chance assuming that Mbali was a female warrior?
"Female warrior? That\'s quite the assumption, alpha Awuor," Alpha Clarkson asked.
Hawi looked at the alpha, and then at the whole team almost like she was trying to tell them that she may have been dumb, but not that kind of dumb not to know the one warrior that had promised to fight her to the death if ever their sides crossed once again.
Granted the Clarkson pack wasn\'t it for them, but maybe they would create a new pact, right?
"It\'s nice to see you can still hold your first as usual, Warrior Jabali Lihle. If you wanted not to be known by me, you should have changed a few tactics, and yet you did everything that you always do.
"Such a predictable warrior," Hawi said and Lihle figured that it was pointless hiding behind her mask again.
She had been waiting for the day she would see Hawi again and frankly, this pack had never crossed both of their minds then again, as it was, fate played different cards for them and now they would have to either side with each other, or part ways.
"Of course, only you can remember the tiniest detail about anyone. Nice seeing you here, Alpha Awuor. Mind sharing your blood to heal me fast?" Lihle asked and Hawi gladly slit her wrist and let Lihle drink from it.
It was the fastest way for them to heal, especially since Hawi had learned a lot about her healing powers over the years. Maybe she was a gifted werewolf, but then things were slowly making sense to her.
She still had questions though, and wanted to know why the hell the strongest female warrior to ever exist was here at the weakest pack.
Sure, Hawi knew that this pack wasn\'t as weak as everyone imagined, but that didn\'t answer the question of why Alpha Clarkson needed Warrior Lihle of all the warriors in the realm. What was the alpha planning or rather, who was he hiding from?
The only way someone would get such a force was if there was a threat, but what was the threat this time?
"Tell me, Lihle. What are you doing on this side of the realm? Why are you with the Clarksons?
"No offense but the reputation of this pack isn\'t exactly something that people would brag about in the royal councils and hallways," Hawi said, her bluntness once again making Luna Amara facepalm.
However at least this time they were slowly learning that the woman was chaos after chaos. But would that make it easier for them to even understand when she sometimes couldn\'t even understand herself?
"They\'re my parents, Alpha Awuor," Lihle said and Hawi let out a laugh.
No one ever knew that the Clarksons had children, and yet at the same time no one had ever actually questioned how the Clarksons were going to let their lineage live on when they had no one to continue their lineage.
"Them? Your parents? What a beautiful lie. Again, no offense but they don\'t seem like the pack to deal with your brutality, Lihle. Or did they adopt you for your skills? That is more believable than you being their biological child," Hawi insisted, though she had a feeling that this wasn\'t a lie.
She was curious and yet for the first time, she was scared of the answers she would find beneath the layers.
If the Clarksons had born and raised Jabali Lihle, then why the fuck did their daughter not have their last name? What the hell was going on in this goddamn pack and why were there so many secrets lingering around?
Hawi was curious, a little too curious for her own good, but even then she was determined to not bond with anyone though her curiosity was taking a toll on her self-control. Soon enough she would go snooping and she would probably never find the answers she was seeking.
"I knew you wouldn\'t believe me, so I\'ll show you something," Lihle said as she walked with Hawi to the house next to the pack house.
The warriors who had been standing there with their weapons ready to go to war for Hawi just looked at their alpha as if asking what they were to do now.
"Dismissed," Alpha Clarkson said to the warriors who bowed and their weapons disappeared in the air just like they had been summoned.
Hawi saw that and she knew that there would come a day when she would know what was happening here. But first, she needed to know why the warrior had agreed to be on this side of the realm when she could be fighting for Sicario or even the Greyson pack.
Both were the strongest packs, so why choose the weakest in plain sight?
"We\'re here," Lihle said as she opened the door to the house. It was dark inside and seemed dusty, given how harshly the door creaked.
Hawi wondered whether the door had ever been opened in a while and the more she walked into the house, the more answers she got, and yet at the same time, the more fearful she got. She had never seen anything like this and she didn\'t know what to do.
There were paintings on the walls, beautiful paintings, and if it had just been that, Hawi would have been satisfied.
She had fought long and hard to survive all these years and yet when the lights flickered on, Hawi finally confirmed that her werewolf vision hadn\'t fucked up her sight.
She hadn\'t been hallucinating all this while and that left her with even more worries than she could ever voice out.
She was scared, and Awuor Hawi was never scared.
"Come along, we still have more to look at," Lihle said, as she turned to Hawi, only to see a shocked and shaking Awuor Hawi. She was trembling and her white hair was slowly turning a tad darker, something that happened when she was scared shitless.
"Malika, help me," Hawi managed out, before her vision got blurry and her breathing got heavier.
She could feel her heartbeats in her ears, and her throat drying up. Her mind was whirring with so many scenarios as she tried to force herself to breathe, but then all she could see was darkness.
"Malika, please," Hawi called out again and this time there was nothing.
She was met with absolute silence, something that never happened, not with Malika. Maybe the protector was busy, but couldn\'t she even send out a signal to Hawi to tell her that she was coming or explain whatever the fuck was going on?
As her breaths slowed, Hawi could only think of one other person who would come if ever she called for help. And so as a gamble, she sought out the woman she loved but would never admit to, in the hope that she would come.
But even Rukiya Greyson didn\'t make a show.
"Fuck me," Hawi said humorlessly as she watched her world get blurry and everything stopped making sense.
Defeated, Hawi watched as Lihle\'s mouth kept opening and closing, the words from her mouth coming off as grunts more than clear statements. Lihle began fading slowly as the darkness consumed Hawi, and she let it this time.
She had never thought that she would ever have her panic and anxiety attacks at the same time again, and this time, in her terror, Hawi gave in to the darkness, because it was the only other place better than the room she had walked into.
Maybe she would be okay, but would she, really?