"You want us to let you go?" Lulu asked the rogue incredulously. "What's to say you won't come tomorrow in another attempt to kidnap my Luna?"
He smirked. "You are right. We will probably return. In order to prevent that, Luna Talia should join us now." He spoke to Talia. "Our task is only to bring you back, to talk. This is not kidnapping; it's a friendly invitation."
Lulu crossed her arms over her chest, giving her two peaks a push up. She was not bothered by her nakedness.
"Do you think my Luna is stupid to go with you?" Lulu asked.
He shrugged. "What do you suggest? Should we sit here until breakfast? What will that achieve? You know we won't talk. We can't. If you hand us over to Alpha Maddox, he will interrogate us and that will end up with him letting us go, assuming we survive. And we know that Luna Talia won't kill us."
Talia didn't hear what the guy said. She was visually inspecting the bodies and four rogues that were still breathing.
"Why is your leader not here? Did he send you on a suicide mission? Or are you another diversion so that he can do something else?"
Talia shook her head at this last question. She heard that Luna Talia was the target. However, that didn't mean it was the full truth. That was only what these guys received as instructions. There was a possibility that the leader had a different plan, one that he didn't disclose to others.
Talia really wished for Damon to be here. She tried mind-linking him again but to no avail.
"What are you guys using to prevent mind-link from working?" Talia asked. "There is no way that rogues would know such a thing. With whom are you working? There must be something you can tell us otherwise you can only dream about leaving this place."
The guy just shook his head.
"How can you be so calm after your leader set you up like this to be cannon fodder?"
He shrugged. "It is what it is. What's the point of being angry now?"
Talia was surprised by this rational response. But then... they were rogues, always scheming, and Talia was confident that under that calm demeanor the guy was plotting revenge.
But he was right. She couldn't kill them, but she had no intention of letting them go either.
Talia puffed her cheeks while thinking about what to do. If Damon was here, he would know how to handle this mess.
Talia remembered that her mind-link with Damon worked while she was in the packhouse. Mila was at the edge of the forest, mind-linking Tatiana, and Talia wondered if the rogues turned on the interference when Talia stepped into the forest, or maybe Talia entered the zone where mind-linking was jammed. In any case, she needed to fix it.
For rogues, this was not a big deal.
Rogues didn't belong to a pack, so they didn't communicate via mind-link. They had other ways to exchange information, like phones or they would carefully plan their missions, accounting for various outcomes so each could move independently without exposing others.
Unfortunately, werewolves that were part of the pack relied on their mind-link too much, and now this was a problem. How can she inform Damon, Meg, or anyone else of their location? And the bad thing was that there could be more rogues nearby, approaching them, and Talia wouldn't know unless they stand right in front of her.
'If they are interfering with mind-link, we could be able to sense the energies and see from where it's originating,' Liseli said.
There was not much confidence behind Liseli's words, but it was the only thing they could do.
'How come you didn't discover anything before?' Talia asked.
'At that time, I didn't know that such a thing could exist.'
'Let's try this together,' Talia said and turned to Lulu. "Keep an eye on them. I need to focus on this."
Lulu nodded, unsure what Talia was up to, but Talia closed her eyes and took a deep breath, and Lulu understood that Talia shouldn't be disturbed.
Talia's body was glowing again. Pulses of silver exited her feet and spread in every direction as circles of light. Each circle reached further than the previous one, covering the foliage and trees and even the forest critters that were hiding in their burrows, making every detail visible for Talia, like it was right in front of her.
Talia's eyes snapped open when she found something. She was not sure what it was, but the energies were acting strange there, and it needed investigation.
The problem was that it was about fifty feet away. Talia was the only one who could get it because she didn't know how to explain it to Lulu, other than shouting. Leaving Lulu on her own to watch over four rogues was not a wise idea. There was only one way to deal with this situation.
"We need to move. All of us." Talia said.
Lulu glanced at rogues and then at Talia. "Go, where?"
Talia gestured. "That way. There is something and I need to check it out."
Talia led the way with four rogues behind her and Lulu at the back.
Talia was maintaining her aura on the rogues, so they walked slowly.
It didn't take long for Talia to reach the source of the disturbance. She moved the leaves with her hands carefully, unsure what to expect. There was a metallic cube-shaped device lodged between the roots of a massive oak tree.
A few tugs later, a cube-shaped thing was in Talia's hand.
There were buttons and a small display with lights flickering, and Talia found a groove at the back. Upon pressing there, the cube opened and revealed a switch and two small knobs.
"What are you doing?", Lulu asked in an urgent whisper when she saw that Talia was about to press that switch. "What if it's a bomb?"
"I don't think it's a bomb. It's a device that's preventing the mind-link from working." Talia explained.
Lulu was not so confident. "Are you sure?"
"No," Talia admitted. "But if this will blow into our faces, those rogues would be running for their lives." Or at least try to.
"What if they don't know that this is a bomb? We just saw them spontaneously combust. What's to say that this won't blow?"
Talia had to admit that Lulu had a point, but what were their options? "If you are afraid, you are welcome to step back. If this kills me, tell Damon I'm sorry. I did my best."
Lulu made a face. "If you blow up and I survive, Damon will find me and kill me five times over. I will rather stay here and have an honorable death."
"Is it honorable to die in an explosion?"
Lulu thought for a moment. "For a warrior, honorable is to die in a battle. But right now, I'm not a warrior. I'm a guard." Lulu snatched the device from Talia's hand. "Now, Luna, please step back so I can flip this switch."
Before Lulu could react, the cube was back in Talia's hand. "I'm not going anywhere. If you don't want to go, you are welcome to stay."
Lulu opened her mouth to protest, but Talia already flipped the switch.
"You can open your eyes now," Talia said to Lulu teasingly.
