Chapter 190: Unexpected Encounter

Azura’s POV

A full, exhausting day had officially passed since we packed up our things and left the safety of the Dragon King’s massive stone castle.

The journey was long and tiring, forcing us to pull the carriages over every few hours just so we could eat some dried food, stretch our stiff legs, and let the heavy horses rest their hooves in the shade.

The moment the animals finished drinking water, we climbed right back into the dark wooden interiors and kept moving forward toward home.

Right now, we were standing in the middle of a loud, incredibly crowded local market.

This place was completely different from the Crescent Moon territory or any other official werewolf pack lands. It was just a regular human village tucked away in a neutral valley, hosting a busy market where all kinds of different creatures could mingle around completely freely.

The only rule here was that the supernatural beings had to be entirely harmless, or at least smart enough to pass themselves off as ordinary humans by keeping their heads down and hiding their scent from the villagers.

Torin was leaning casually against the side of our lead carriage, keeping a sharp, watchful eye on our remaining food supplies and bags like he always did.

Liona stood right beside me on the packed dirt path, her arms crossed tightly over her chest as her eyes scanned back and forth through the sea of passing strangers.

Genevieve had taken Rhydor with her a few minutes ago, dragging him into the deeper rows of fabric stalls to find some specific herbs she claimed they desperately needed for the final stretch of the trip.

I didn’t bother to ask what the herbs were actually for, preferring just to stay behind where it was quiet.

I stood there by the carriage wheel, looking around at the bright colors of the stalls and watching the regular people pass by with heavy baskets of vegetables.

Then, something completely unexpected caught my eye through a small gap in the crowd.

It was a flash of bright red hair.

The color was incredibly vibrant, completely unmistakable, and painfully familiar.

My heart instantly stopped dead in my chest, a cold wave of pure disbelief rushing straight down to my toes.

Without a single word of warning to Liona, I began walking toward the red hair. I moved slowly at first, my boots stumbling slightly over the rough gravel as my brain tried to process what I was seeing.

Then, as the panic started to set in, my footsteps grew faster and more urgent.

"Azura?" Liona called out loudly from somewhere behind me, her voice filled with sudden confusion.

"Where on earth are you going in such a hurry?"

I did not answer her. I didn’t even turn my head back to look at her, keeping my eyes locked entirely on that bright patch of red hair.

Behind me, the quick, rhythmic sound of Liona’s boots crunching against the dirt told me she was following right at my heels.

As I got closer to the edge of a wooden fruit stall, I realized my eyes weren’t playing tricks on me.

It was really her. It was Isadora.

She was standing near a pile of woven baskets, deep in conversation with another woman who had long blonde hair.

I could not see a single feature of the blonde woman’s face because Isadora’s slender body was blocking her completely from my line of sight.

The two of them were talking in incredibly low, serious voices, their shoulders tense.

Before I could even take another step forward to see who the stranger was, the blonde woman suddenly turned around and walked rapidly into a dark alleyway, vanishing completely into the crowd before I could get a good look at her.

"Isadora," I said loudly, finally reaching the spot where she stood.

Isadora did not turn around immediately. She remained completely still, her eyes fixed firmly on the space where the blonde woman had just been standing a second ago.

I reached out my hand, dropping my palm onto her shoulder and gripping her skin firmly.

"Isadora."

This time, she spun around on her heel to face me.

The moment she saw my face, her green eyes went incredibly wide with total shock.

"Azura?" she gasped out, her mouth dropping open.

"What exactly are you doing here?" I asked, my voice equally shocked as I stared at her perfectly styled clothes.

Liona finally caught up to us, stopping abruptly right at my side. Her mouth fell completely open as she stared back and forth between the two of us in disbelief.

"Isadora?" Liona whispered, her eyes blinking rapidly as if she thought she was dreaming.

Instead of glaring at me or snapping an insult like she usually did, a massive, bright smile suddenly broke across Isadora’s face.

Without a single second of hesitation, she lunged forward and threw her arms tightly around my neck, pulling me into a fierce hug.

I froze entirely to stone.

My arms hung completely straight down at my sides, my mind spinning in circles.

She was hugging me. Isadora was actively hugging me in the middle of a public market like we were long-lost best friends.

"You are actually here," Isadora said happily, finally pulling her body back from the hug but keeping her manicured hands clamped tightly onto my upper arms.

"Why on earth would you hug me?" I asked, looking down at her hands on my clothes with a deep frown of pure confusion.

Isadora completely ignored my question, her eyes darting over my shoulder to look at the carriages.

"You left the pack house for such a horribly long time. I was just wandering around these neutral villages, checking to see if I could somehow find a trace of you guys. I desperately needed to see Rhydor."

The sound of footsteps approached us, and Torin suddenly appeared right beside our small group.

He looked down at Isadora, his dark brown eyes narrowing into dangerous, suspicious slits.

"Why is she here?" Torin asked slowly, his voice dropping into a careful register. He stopped talking right after that, leaving the rest of his sentence completely unfinished as he studied her posture.

Isadora shifted her gaze over to Torin, tossing her red hair over her shoulder.

"Oh. It is you. Have you seen Rhydor yet? If you are standing out here in the open, then he must be somewhere nearby too."

Torin just stared at her, his facial expression turning incredibly strange. It was a dark, unreadable look that made me feel slightly uncomfortable.

"Rhydor went to get some supplies with his mother," Torin explained, his voice entirely cautious as he watched her movements.

"Why are you physically here, Isadora? You are not supposed to be this far away from the pack boundaries."

Isadora shrugged casually, letting out a small, dramatic sigh.

"I was just completely bored out of my mind at home. My favorite enemy was not around anymore, so I had absolutely no one to fight with or complain to every day."

"And since Rhydor was not there either, the pack house felt empty."

My eyebrows pulled together into a deep, frustrated frown.

"I thought you completely gave up on your claims to Rhydor," I stated, my voice filled with confusion as I stepped closer to her.

"I thought you two legally and emotionally broke up before we left. Why are you still actively traveling around looking for him?"

Isadora tilted her head slightly to the side, her expression softening into something else.

"Just because I technically gave up on trying to force him to be with me does not mean I am never going to try my luck again. Real love is simply not that simple to erase. It is incredibly hard to just forget a man like him."

She smiled at me, a tiny, fragile expression that looked almost sad.

"Even though I am truly trying my best to give up on the idea of us," she added softly, her voice dropping into a gentle tone, "a woman who truly loves someone with all her heart will always check on him. Just to see if he is doing okay out in the world."

I slowly turned my head to look over at Liona, keeping my voice incredibly quiet so Isadora wouldn’t hear me.

"I kind of regret saying that I missed her back in the carriage," I whispered to my friend.

Liona’s lips instantly moved into a knowing, amused smirk, but she kept her mouth shut, refusing to say a word out loud.

I turned back to Isadora, raising my voice so it carried over the noise of the market.

"She is truly the worst."

"Where exactly are they?" Isadora asked, ignoring my comment entirely as she stood on her tiptoes to look over the crowd.

"Where is Rhydor? I want to see his face right now. It feels like it has been ages since we last spoke."

At that exact moment, Genevieve and Rhydor appeared at the very edge of the busy market, walking side by side with a small brown paper bag in their hands.

Isadora saw them instantly.

Before either Liona or I could reach out to grab her, she took off running across the dirt path, her skirt billowing out behind her.

"Rhydor!" she screamed at the top of her lungs, drawing the attention of several human merchants nearby.

She reached him in a matter of seconds and threw her arms violently around his broad chest, hugging him with everything she had left.

Rhydor stood completely frozen under her touch, his large, muscular arms hanging limply at his sides. He did not lift his hands to hug her back even an inch.

He just looked down at the top of her red head with a completely confused expression, his sharp amber eyes widening in pure shock.

"How could you possibly leave me behind for so long?" Isadora cried out, pulling her head back slightly but keeping her hands clamped onto his thick forearms.

"How could you stay away from the pack house for this long without sending a single word?"

"Isadora," Rhydor said slowly, his deep voice thick with total bewilderment.

"What on earth are you doing all the way out here?"

I stayed exactly where I was standing near the fruit stall, refusing to take a single step closer to them.

I kept my arms crossed, watching the entire dramatic scene unfold in front of the whole village.

"Why is everyone acting so completely shocked to see me?" Isadora asked, looking around at Torin, Genevieve, and the guards with a hurt expression.

"Am I not allowed to move around freely anymore? I told you, I was specifically looking for you."

"Why would you be actively looking for us?" Rhydor asked, his voice entirely careful as he tried to gently detach her fingers from his jacket.

Isadora’s voice suddenly broke, a tearful, emotional edge taking over her words.

"Is that really how fast you fall out of love with someone, Rhydor? A woman that you loved and cherished for years? Do you really... do you really not love me even a little bit anymore?"

Rhydor did not answer her question.

Instead of speaking to the crying girl holding onto his clothes, he lifted his gaze, looking past her shoulder to lock his amber eyes directly onto me.

I did not look away from him. I held his intense gaze completely, my expression hard and steady as I waited to see exactly how he was going to handle his ex-fiancée in front of me.

"Isadora," Rhydor said quietly, finally breaking his silence as he looked back down at her.

"Let us not do this right here in the middle of a human market. Let us just get everyone back to the pack territory first. We will discuss everything you want to talk about the moment we get home."

Isadora nodded her head quickly, wiping at her eyes as she agreed to his terms.

"Okay. That sounds fine. Which specific way are we going? Am I going to be riding on top of your wolf today?"

My jaw instantly tightened so hard my teeth clicked together, a sudden, hot flash of pure territorial anger flaring up deep within my gut.

She wanted to ride on Logan. She actually wanted to climb onto my destined mate’s giant wolf form.

No.

Absolutely not under any circumstance.

"You are going to ride inside the carriage with me," I said loudly, walking closer to the group with long, deliberate strides.

Isadora pulled her brows together, frowning deeply at me as I approached.

"No. I do not want to ride in a cramped carriage. I want to ride out in the open on top of him."

I stepped directly into her personal space, my gray eyes turning ice-cold as I looked down at her face.

"You really do not want to know what I will physically do to you if you end up riding on top of my Logan."

Rhydor’s mouth suddenly twitched at the corners, a small, amused smile threatening to break through his serious expression as he listened to me claim his wolf.

I quickly snapped my gaze over to Rhydor, pointing a finger at his chest.

"When I say the name Logan, I do not mean you as a human person. I mean him. Individually. The wolf."

Isadora took a hasty step backward away from me, clearly sensing the raw, dangerous edge in my tone.

She tossed her vibrant red hair over her shoulder, trying to look unbothered by my threat.

"Fine."

She shifted her green eyes over to where Liona was standing quietly by the wooden wheel, her expression turning strangely curious.

"But what about your little best friend over there? Where exactly is she supposed to ride if I take her seat?"

I did not even bother to look back at Liona to check her reaction.

"She is going to ride inside the second carriage with Genevieve," I stated flatly, my voice completely devoid of any emotion.

I held Isadora’s gaze firmly, refusing to let her look away from my face as the wind picked up across the dirt courtyard.

"You ride with me," I added, my tone dropping into a cold, final register.

Isadora stared back at me for a long, silent moment, crossing her arms tightly over her chest as she stood her ground against me.

I stared right back into her green eyes, refusing to back down even a single inch.

But as the seconds ticked by in complete silence, a strange, cold shiver suddenly ran straight down my spine.

There was something entirely off about the way she was smiling at me now, something dark hiding behind her wide eyes.

For some strange reason, she was giving me the creeps.