Chapter 529 - 529 A Hard Conversation

529 A Hard Conversation

Wyatt stared at his friend, his gaze and resolve unwavering. It felt like his last words still echoed through the trashed room.

There were dark circles around the man’s eyes and it was evident that he was fighting sleep. He looked like he could pass out any moment and yet… he didn’t, drawing on every ounce of energy he could to keep himself awake.

“Why would I do such a thing?” Liam hissed.

“Two reasons, Liam…” Wyatt shook his head, “To wake me up… I can’t sleep… No, he’ll take over if I do. The second one… To weaken me even more… if I happen to lose myself.”

Liam stared at the man’s leg and thought for a moment about actually doing it. It was harder said than done. Breaking someone’s leg wasn’t hard for any werewolf really.

Bones were strong and hard but without any resistance, it was only a matter of how strong the werewolf was. And Liam was strong enough to snap someone’s bone albeit with a little bit of effort…

But breaking Wyatt’s leg. That was a whole different issue all on its own.

“I… I can’t.”

“Would you rather watch the hunters put me down?” Wyatt tried to yell. His dull crimson eyes flashed at his friend for a brief moment, rage filling them before softening.

.....

Liam went back to tending to Wyatt’s wounds and tried to put the odd request out of his mind.

Wyatt was weak but even worse, he wasn’t healing… what’s more, he was asking to get injured even further as though that would help him. Liam quickly came to the conclusion that all these injuries were self-inflicted.

Even though Wyatt had mentioned it earlier, believing it was hard. What wolf, in their right mind would mutilate themselves just to stay awake? Was his condition really that dire?

Liam had his doubts… Wyatt wasn’t the type to go down without a fight… Then again, wasn’t he already fighting?

And fast approaching his limit.

This was the first time he was in such a situation. “Hey, Liam. Why…? Why you’ve been avoiding me this whole time? We could have figured things out.”

Liam froze at the question, “Why are you asking me that now of all times?”

“Because… Because I’ve realised that this might be the last time we talk to each other,” Wyatt admitted, “Two years, Liam. Did I really betray you that badly? Just how weak was our friendship?”

“I’m right here, aren’t I?” Liam snapped at the weakened alpha, his breath going up as it did. A pang of guilt ran through him…

Why had he been avoiding Wyatt? What kept him away all this time?

The questions were just as difficult as they were painful to think about.

Wyatt stayed silent and stared at his friend.

The two appeared like mirrors of each other in the sense of health.

In contrast to Wyatt’s bruised, clawed, wounded and weakened state, Liam was clean and without a blemish on his skin.

What had Liam been doing all that time?

“What was your real reason for going with Lina on the Trials?” Liam asked Wyatt instead.

“Huh, isn’t she the reason we both lost our rights to succeed our fathers? If I could get her through the Trials without a scratch on her, that could be a step in the right direction. We have to get Luna Katie’s approval, don’t we?” Wyatt replied.

“So you weren’t going to stop there, were you?” Liam mumbled half to himself, still trying to wrap his head around his normally malicious friend’s decisions.

“No, I wasn’t. What are you getting at, Liam? I did what I had to do to get my power back,” Wyatt replied, “You should also start working on it. I won’t be around to help you with—”

A loud high-pitched noise echoed across the room.

Wyatt’s cheek turned red instantly as a recollection of the past seconds flashed through his mind.

Suddenly, his cheek was burning and he was very much awake without an ounce of sleep in his eyes. He’d been slapped.

“Ouch, what was that for?” Wyatt yelled.

“Stop talking like you’re about to die,” Liam yelled back.

“Look at me, Liam. What do you see? The rogues have returned and I’m being summoned to join them. I’ve already weakened myself enough during my fight against that Rogue king’s mind. He’ll take over soon enough and when he does, I won’t have much strength left. I’ll die before too long and I suggest you run before he decides on hunting you for sport,” Wyatt yelled back.

Liam stood up and walked to the other side of the room before dropping to the ground with his back to the wall. The two males sat in silence for a few moments before Liam spoke up.

“It’s chaos out there. Humans shifting into werewolves all over the place and ripping the hell out of their fellow humans and werewolves alike.”

“What?!” Wyatt gasped.

Liam scoffed, “Yeah, it’s hell. I ran here as soon as I could to make sure you’re alright… and I find… this,” Liam pointed to the trashed hospital room, “Then I realise you have a death wish.”

“I’d rather die than kill my best friend with my own claws and fangs,” Wyatt sighed.

Liam stared at his friend, furrowing his brows into a curious expression, “Why don’t you… you know, ask for help?”

The idea sounded so… alien to the weakened, bruised and battered alpha’s mind. He’d never once thought of asking anyone to help him.

Him… Alpha Wyatt… asking for help. Wasn’t this supposed to be the other way around? The whole idea was an outrage.

Still…

“Perhaps it’s because I owe everyone around so much more than I could ever repay them. Felt like I should be giving back… or maybe it was just the little pride I have left as an alpha. How much lower must I fall?”

Liam couldn’t answer the last question. As an alpha, he knew how much their pride meant to them, “Well… Dying won’t help you repay them.”

“We can’t just talk about me. What about you? What have you been up to?” Wyatt asked.

“Meh! Nothing much really. I apologized to my father for everything. He wasn’t amused with what happened that day. He was… fuming.

He told me to stop hanging out with you. That you were… a bad influence on me.

I, on the other hand, was mad at you for my own reasons. I was even more of a coward not to confront you about them. Did you… quit smoking?” Liam asked.

“I’ve been trying to do that… not easy. My old man wouldn’t look at me after that incident. I wasn’t able to reconcile with him. I thought perhaps if I could fix the rift between us first, I could fix the one between me and my old man.

Well… you know how that has been going. ‘Should have been easier,’ I told myself,” Wyatt sighed.

Just as the alpha was about to say something more, he gritted his teeth and shut his eyes, clutching his head in pain, “Damn it!”

Liam was by his side in a flash, “Wyatt!”

Wyatt couldn’t hear a word, though.

The alpha was in a whole other world of pain unknown to Liam. His mind crumbled and shuddered against an external pressure threatening to take control of his body.

Liam hurriedly looked around in search of something. A sedative… painkiller… something to cure his best friend of the suffering that ailed him.

He fumbled through the cabinet he’d found earlier, checking the labels of the different drugs that were inside, trying to find the right one.

His knowledge of drugs was limited… and their effects on werewolves were even less.

He continued his frantic search, inevitably growing unaware of the state of his friend. Standing behind him was a large black wolf, its pelt tainted with patches of dirty grey.

The wolf’s crimson eyes told a conclusive story of a great mental battle as two consciousnesses fought to gain control of the creature’s body.

“Just a little longer,” Liam said through gritted teeth, more to himself. Somewhere along the way, he began to hope for a miracle. He knew next to nothing of the drugs he was checking through…

Just a few that the wolves had grown addicted to… Chloroform, paracetamol, ibuprofen… a plethora of medicinal drugs flooded his mind, neither of them coming with their uses…

‘Damn it!’

A ferocious growl brought him out of his frantic search, allowing him to turn around. The massive black wolf stood in place of his friend’s body, staring him down. The wolf bared its fangs and blocked the exit.

“Wyatt?” Liam asked in a high-pitched voice… “When did you get… bigger?”

Something was different about Wyatt’s wolf. The two of them had never managed to decide who was stronger between them but right now, there seemed to be a larger gap than the one Liam was used to.

The wolf before him was larger than it should have been.

Liam quickly shifted into his ashen wolf as well and faced the cold murderous eyes of what should have been his best friend.

Unfortunately for him, Wyatt’s wolf seemed to take this as a threat and lunged forward, claws and fangs extended.

......…..