Chapter 129

Chapter 129: Chapter 129

Deyani’s Point of View

I didn’t care about the lethal, thousand-foot drop. My eyes were locked entirely onto the limp, bleeding body of my brother falling just a few meters below me, his clothes soaked through with blood.

“I will not let you die here, Vikron,” I vowed inwardly. My wolf screamed against the suffocating pressure of the descent.

Fortunately, the heavens offered a single thread of mercy—a deep, dark glacial lake rested directly at the bottom of the rocky cliff. Because I am highly proficient in water maneuvers and possess advanced martial arts skills honed by the royal tutors of our homeland, I managed to adjust my body’s alignment in mid-air just a fraction of a second before impact.

I sliced through the surface perfectly, the impact knocking the remaining breath from my lungs as I dove deeper into the black depths.

Through the dark, bubbling water, I spotted his sinking form. I lunged forward, my arms wrapping securely around my unconscious brother—who was none other than the prince of our great kingdom. My true identity was the princess of the Kingdom of Howling Ashes, and we had traveled across massive sovereign borders together with trained warriors for the explicit, top-secret purpose of capturing the iron box.

The ambush on the peak had shattered our unit, but I refused to let anybody destroy our plans.

I aggressively kicked toward the surface, dragging his heavy, armored body onto the rocky, snow-covered bank. Vikron’s eyelids fluttered open for a split second, a sudden cough racking his chest as he spit up a mixture of water and dark blood.

"Deyani..." he rasped out hoarsely, his fingers weakly pushing against my shoulder. "Leave me... save yourself. You must run before the tracking scouts close us in."

"Shut your mouth, Vikron!" I commanded, my voice shaking with an intense defiance as I dragged his arm over my neck. "I am not leaving you behind to freeze on this bank. Just keep your legs moving!"

After a long, agonizing hour of trudging through the blinding blizzard, my muscles screaming from the weight of his body, I finally spotted a dilapidated, empty hunting shed nestled deep within the mountain crags. I kicked the rotting wooden door open and hauled him onto a bed of dry straw, aggressively securing the iron latch behind us to block the freezing wind.

The moment the lamp was lit, the horrific reality collapsed upon me. I checked my brother’s body thoroughly, tearing away the leather of his clothes, and my breath hitched in fear.

Vikron was brutally injured all over his torso, gouges oozing a dark, infected fluid that smelled of rust, and a fever was already beginning to boil on his skin. I clutched his shivering hands, my chest heaving as I sobbed—not from tears of weakness, but from a consuming anger at what that nameless, silver-furred commander had done to my brother on that mountaintop. We did not know his identity or who he truly was, but his strength had placed my brother’s life directly on the thin verge of death.

"Deyani... listen to me," Vikron panted weakly, his eyes rolling back as the fever spiked. "Take the maps... return to safety inside the Howling Ashes lines. If I die here, father will still need you to launch the war."

"I told you to save your strength, Vikron!" I barked fiercely, pressing a handful of clean snow against his burning neck. "You are completely weak right now, and if you talk too much, the internal bleeding will worsen and I might lose you! The exact second your fever reduces, we will leave this place together—both of us, just as the two of us came here together. I am not returning to our father alone."

"The box..." he muttered deliriously, his hand clawing at the empty straw. "Take the box and go..."

I endured the crushing pain in my heart, keeping a rigid, protective guard by his side through the dark hours. I kept thinking that his fever would eventually break if I kept the ice packs fresh, but as the midnight moon reached its peak, his temperature became too high. Vikron passed out completely, his body shivering uncontrollably as his lungs began to rattle.

Realizing my brother was in imminent danger of fading before dawn, I locked the shed doors, pulled my cloak over my head, and went down the mountain at night to desperately seek help

The market town was quiet under the lockdown, but I managed to slip into a back-alley trading post. Using twenty imperial gold coins from my hidden belt pouch, I quickly bought a reinforced wooden trailer cart and a small packet of generic fever-reduction pills from a shady merchant.

I scrambled back up the mountain paths before the night guards could detect my tracks. After aggressively giving him the medicine alongside some stale travel food, the miracle of his wolf physiology responded; my brother finally recovered from the fever, his eyes clearing as he became fully conscious once more.

However, his injuries were still incredibly severe, the torn chest muscles urgently needing high-grade medical treatment that an ordinary camp kit could never provide.

"You are being stubborn, sister," Vikron murmured hoarsely. "I will only slow your retreat. If the army circles back, they will slaughter us both."

"You will bleed out in these frozen crags, Vikron," I hissed, tightening his blood-soaked linen wraps with trembling hands. "We need a real healer right now."

"It’s a trap, Deyani," he rasped. "They know we escaped. The warriors will be actively looking for us everywhere because I am severely injured and dragging our pace. And they’ll check the pharmacy."

I don’t believe they’ll check pharmacies, because the commander who we fought with thinks he won when he snatched that backpack. But he is a fool—the box he took away was nothing but a decoy, a completely fake double we engineered to throw him off us. The real iron box is the one I have now.

So, I don’t think he’ll look for us. And I’ll have enough time to save my brother.

"I don’t care about their warriors. I am not letting you die in this shed. We find a healer first thing tomorrow."

Vikron closed his eyes, sighing heavily. "Fine, have it your way, little sister."

After daybreak, I carefully hid my brother under the cart, covering his body entirely with plants. Disguising myself as a poor peasant merchant, I hauled the wooden trailer straight into the busy center of the Fairy White Pack’s territory.

The moment I entered the primary merchant plaza, I began to strategically inquire about people with excellent medical skills, hitting the local taverns and smithies.

"If your man is sick, you need to head to the central square," a burly blacksmith told me, pointing a caked finger toward a long line of wolves gathering near a newly renovated limestone building. "Everyone is talking about the Physician Lin who has been doing wonders. They say he cured the Beta’s son of a plague in less than forty-eight hours."

Following their directions, I successfully found the grand storefront of the Azure Leafs pharmacy, which was highly recognized and deeply praised by the entire tribe.

I pushed the cart into the secure courtyard, walked through the herbal threshold, and found myself standing face-to-face with the legendary physician Lin, who was famous for his excellent medical skills.

I looked at his calm, sharp eyes, suppressing my aura entirely as I lowered my posture into a submissive, desperate bow.

"Please... I am begging for your help, Physician Lin," I whispered, my voice trembling with a forced panic as I clutched the counter. "My name is Nadia, and my brother Kairo is gravely injured in the cart outside. The high pack doctors have entirely abandoned him, and you are our very last hope. Please save him."

Physician Lin arched a brow, his gaze drifting out toward the weed-covered trailer in the yard where Vikron lay completely silent. I deliberately didn’t use our real names so our true identities wouldn’t be known to anyone.