* [T/W: Mentions of Suicide]
[GREYSON]
Greyson was a little too quiet when the two Savasci Knights reached it. They hadn't been expecting much really but the silent stares from the people, and the defeated sighs from the wolves just weren't it.
These wolves were currently cleaning up the pack, clearing the messes from their hell they had been in for the past two weeks. They had been broken when their people had died and their grief had put their lives on a standstill.
Sure, the grief was always going to be there and they would always miss their friends and family, but the fact that eleven people had taken their pain like it was nothing scared them.
Perhaps the rumors about the protectors being of the strongest minds were true, right?
"Enforcer, we're here. I apologize for the mess... I didn't think you would want to portal in directly to her," Zane said and Mbali just nodded. She was still taking in the sight and frankly, this was insane.
Then again it reminded her of the one time that Clarkson pack had been thrown into mourning when their daughter, Luna Eniola was murdered. It reminded her of the pain the wolves had felt, and how the Lycans had tried their best and still failed.
Everything had been going sideways one moment and the next, they were waking up healed and healthy, with sad faces and acceptance of the pain they had endured, not to mention acceptance of the loss of one of their own.
It was strange to everyone, but none of them dared to question how an entire battalion of warriors had managed to overcome their grief in one day.
Now that Mbali was here and seeing the same, she couldn't help but hear Rukiya's voice about how her sister had to have been looking out for her. Perhaps it was Malika who helped them out four years ago when Luna Eniola was murdered.
This was all too familiar and Mbali wasn't sure how to express her gratitude to the sister she was supposed to be mad at. The more she learned about Malika and her selflessness, the more Mbali wished she could have reached out.
Surely, there had to be other ways other than them separating for those many years, right? Over six hundred years was a long time and it broke Mbali's heart to know that her sister was out there alone, and taking on people's pain with no one to take care of her.
"Are you okay, Kane?" Mbali asked as she looked at the woman her sister had chosen.
It was a ridiculous idea given that protectors were never allowed to mate, seeing as they had the cruelest of jobs in the realm. And while Malika hadn't marked Elodie, even the blind could see that Malika was hopelessly falling for Elodie.
It wasn't just sex for them and it was a good thing they had come with Elodie because Mbali didn't know if she could let herself break down before her warriors.
Emotions were complex and they were things that people needed to have clarity about. But in Mbali's case, she was allowed to be angry and disappointed. Love was never supposed to hurt and yet love had broken them apart.
"Like I said, I'm here for Hawi. There's nothing emotional about that, unless someone hurt Hawi," Mbali said and Elodie smiled softly at her as Zane opened the door to the infirmary where Malika and the other warriors were laid on one huge bed, their hands tangled as if to keep the link complete.
It was a sad sight, seeing the most powerful warriors of the realm so weak and unconscious. This was a sight that not even Mbali could have imagined, after all the time she had land of the nature of the different factions in the realm.
She had never imagined she would ever see more than a protector at a time, and yet here they were, eleven protectors in the same room, under the same roof, and that too in a pack where the white wolf wasn't even in at the moment.
This was history... but Mbali hated this kind of history.
The way they were sprawled in the bed reminded her of the last time she had seen her parents. It reminded her of her parents holding hands on the bed, as they breathed their last.
Her parents had ingested poison intentionally because they couldn't handle the pressure that came with being a Jabali. At the time, their family name was a little too complex and their histories were not something people would talk about.
But young Mbali didn't know that. All she knew was that her parents were dying slowly and none of them were moving. She was too young to know what death was like and they had forced her into that state.
She had tried to wake them up, but all she got were sleeping forms with their fading heartbeats. In their letter to her, they had mentioned that they hoped she would understand them someday.
But what about her?
She was just a five-year-old kid then.
What of the fact that she was left all alone in a world where people never liked her family name? What about the fact that she wouldn't have family or even anyone to take care of her for that matter?
Their entire Lycan pack had disbanded and most of them didn't want anything to do with the child of the house Jabali.
She had been left by her parents, abandoned by her pack and now that she had grown up, she was learning that her sister had long abandoned them before her parents abandoned her.
Her entire life seemed like a circus, and yet again, the universe was playing games with her. She didn't deserve all of this pain.
"Mama... Papa, please wake up... I'm scared, Mama," Mbali whispered defeatedly, her tears free falling down her face.