The Lost Female Alpha

I could feel Elijah's distress through our bond before I even made it to my room. I wasn't sure how he knew there was something happening but I could understand his distress. He was completely in the dark about our plan, so as far as he was concerned this was a real attack and we were in serious danger. I wish I could tell him something to set his mind at ease but I couldn't. Until I could be sure that he would be able to hide his thoughts from Arthur I couldn't risk him giving away our whole plan.

I waited for the escorts that Arthur sent to take me to my room and lock the door behind me before fully relaxing. Elijah ran over to me as soon as the door was closed, he wrapped his arms around me and kissed my neck in between gushing about how worried he had been about me.

"The way your mom ran out of here, I was worried that Arthur had done something to you."

"I'm fine but I don't have time to explain. There is something I need to do." The tone of my voice was harsh but I needed to get my point across. I wasn't sure how much time I would have and if I failed in my mission then the rest of our plan was well and truly screwed.

I blocked everything else out around me and tried to focus on reaching out with my mind. I could sense the wolves of the people around me and I could also sense the control that Arthur had over them. I concentrated on each of them, looking for a point at which his control was the weakest.

Most of his energy seemed to be focused on the stronger wolves which made up his warriors. This left his control over a few of the wolves in the kitchens barely hanging on. It wouldn't take much for me to break that control and exert some of my own. Now that I had chosen my target I just had to wait for the right opportunity.

Arthur looked to be hiding in some room under the house while his warriors were heading towards the perimeter of the pack. The vampires that were closing in on the territory were approaching from the opposite side to the one I came in from.

Arthur's concentration focused in that direction as he struggled to use his guards to fight against a foe who he couldn't even sense. His focus temporarily released some of the others closer to the house. I could feel their distress as they suddenly regained their consciousness and recognised that they had lost time.

I focused my attention on one of the women who had just been released from Arthur's control. It felt bad to know that my next actions were only going to add to her distress. But knowing that my actions would hopefully free them forever at least managed to alleviate some of my guilt as I took control of their mind.

As soon as I took over the woman's mind I could see her memories and thoughts but none of them were as clear as the books had led me to believe. That coupled with the niggling in the back of my mind which felt as though something was trying to push against me, made me realise this was going to be harder than I had anticipated.

I could only assume that it was my inexperience. Arthur didn't seem to have these kinds of issues, he was able to simultaneously control a whole pack full of werewolves. I couldn't help wondering how many years he had been exerting control over these people, how many years of their lives had they lost because of him?

Trying to push these thoughts out of my mind, I focused on my task. It was taking almost all of my concentration to get the woman I was controlling to move in anything that resembled a smooth manner. I just had to hope that the distraction we had planned was effective because every time I tried to check I would feel my control over the woman slipping.

This wasn't going to plan and I had only just started my task. I had no other option than to ignore my lack of information and the churning in my stomach, I had to push ahead with my part of the plan. I pushed the woman to move more quickly towards the opposite border of the territory.

I could hear Elijah freaking out in the background, desperate to understand what was happening. He even tried to mindlink me a couple of times but I blocked him out and kept pushing forward. Locating the supplies that I had set aside before leading her back towards the house again.

"Whatever you are doing you have to hurry. I can hear them heading back towards the house now."

My anxiety spiked and I almost lost control again but after taking a couple of deep breaths I managed to recover. It felt like hours later when she opened the door to our room but in reality it couldn't have been more than a couple of minutes. My control over her was wavering and I could hear the sounds of Arthur's guards coming back into the house drifting down the corridor. I managed to hold on long enough to take the bag from her and close the door in her face before my control finally snapped.

Hopefully she wouldn't remember any of what happened, just as my pack members didn't after they were controlled by Arthur. It was a risk, but at least it was a calculated one.

"What was all this about? What did she give you?"

Elijah's voice was strained and I could hear his heart beating rapidly. I had to put my concerns to one side and tell him my plan, otherwise his panic would draw too much attention and give us away. Hopefully Arthur would be too distracted with my presence to bother reading Elijah's mind. I knew that was probably too much to hope for but I was due a bit of luck.

"There is a way to stop Arthur from being able to bind himself to me." I told him, holding out the bag towards him.

"Won't he work out that something is wrong and get annoyed with you?"

"I'm not sure if it works like that. There isn't much information on the process but what there is implies that the only thing that would change is our bond."

I wasn't even sure how long it would take for the spell to start working. I was hoping that it would work pretty quickly, in fact our plan kind of relied on it. One of the other side effects of completing the spell was that it would give Elijah some resistance to Arthur's powers. He would still have to work to keep Arthur out of his mind but at least Arthur wouldn't be able to use him like a puppet.

Elijah watched me suspiciously as I laid out the ingredients on the floor. There was clearly something that was worrying him about the process but I wasn't sure what. I know that we were in a bad place but I wouldn't suggest doing something that would put us at risk of further danger. Did he really think I would be so reckless?

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It would be difficult for me to alleviate his concerns if he wasn't going to talk to me. Besides, we didn't have time to argue about it. Arthur could be back here any moment and I wanted to perform the spell and hide the ingredients. As Elijah suggested, Arthur would not be happy if he worked out what I was trying to do and I didn't want to give him a chance to stop me.

"I'm not sure I like the idea of messing with our bond." Elijah told me, finally opening up about his concerns.

"Is that why you were worried?"

He nodded her head in agreement. Now I felt guilty for dismissing his concerns so quickly. It had to be a side effect of the stress.

"It's only going to strengthen our bond and protect it from interference. I will basically be asking the goddess to bless our bond. It is nothing to worry about."

Most of the concern melted from Elijah's face as I explained to him what we would have to do. I finished laying out all of the ingredients and turned all of my attention towards Elijah.

"Right, let's get this over with." Elijah stated as he sat down opposite me on the floor.