"you expect me to believe this?"

vilhelm held strong. "she should have been following us soon, but i got the impression before i left to get laila that something had happened. i swear i'm telling you the truth. caia just wanted you to keep us here hidden until she gets back."

"to hide you from the rest of the pack?" jae asked askance.

vilhelm nodded. "for now."

ryder growled. they all seemed to have forgotten one thing. "and what about marita? surely she would just follow your trace to here?"

however, the magik just shook his head. "she will not know it was me until they scour the center. it would take enough time for caia to get back."

"but marita would still find you here."

"caia intended to protect us from her."

what!

he felt a rush of inexplicable fear, fear that something beyond his belief and capabilities was occurring.

"does this mean... "jae whispered, "is caia... is she turning against marita?"

that's exactly what i want to know.

"caia is good." vilhelm shook his head vehemently. "i'm a daylight, and i believe what marita did was wrong."

"but she's a midnight!" jae spat out, glaring at the girl, despite how weak she appeared.

the boy twisted his face in disgust at her outburst. "and that gives you all the right to condemn her?"

"but, but... " jae spluttered, mirroring ryder's own feelings of turmoil. it was like they were on the high seas, being rocked violently from side to side, waiting for the boat to completely overturn.

"how do we know it was really caia that sent you here?" ryder threw out in desperation.

vilhelm nodded, as if expecting that question. "she said to remind you of a conversation only you and she know you had. she had just started working for your alpha in his store, and you sat with her in the showroom. you told her about your friend, david, who mated with a faerie. she hadn't known some supernaturals could mate out-with their own race, and you told her all about it; you told her all these other stories about hunting, about a faerie who tricked you three times."

dread settled throughout every inch of his body. it seemed the boy might be telling the truth.

goddess, he hoped lucien knew what caia was up to; that caia knew what kind of fire she was playing with.

wearily, he nodded. "i believe you."

"i could hide them," reuben suddenly offered.

"what do you mean?" more than ever he didn't trust this guy.

"i can hide them so that marita doesn't follow them to the pack."

before he could jump on this, jaeden stiffened and turned to regard her friend in annoyance. "and how can you do that? she would come after you."

reuben merely smiled arrogantly. "i'll be fine. i've been around, i have my ways."

"no. you're being an idiot," she snapped.

as much as ryder was glad to see jaeden jump aboard the anti-reuben bandwagon (even if it was out of some misplaced sense of concern), he had to settle with the boy and girl. "we'll discuss that later. for now, they stay here. caia entrusted them to me and to me alone."

visibly trembling, jae approached him, her hand reaching for his. "ryder, what's going on? what is caia doing?"

he shook his head. "i don't know."

she sighed and looked at the girl, a mixture of sympathy and fear in her gaze. "she saved me, too."

"what?"

"caia," jae groaned. "she saved me, too."

"still trust her?"

"do you?"

he chuckled humorlessly, looking back at the magiks who were listening intently. "call me crazy but... yes, i still trust her."

"ok," she agreed.

"i guess i'm not needed then," reuben muttered sardonically from behind them.

"hey." ryder stopped his departure. "you have to keep your trap shut about this."

the vampyre sneered. "i'm not the gossiping kind." and with his usual stealthy regality, he left.

ryder looked down at his soon-to-be mate. "that means you, too."

jaeden shook her head. "this is going to be virtually impossible. my dad isn't a wolf, he's a freaking bloodhound."

"just channel pre-me jaeden."

"oh har-de-har-har."

17 - soldier

the last meeting had dispersed and caia stood in the main reception hall waiting for the others to join her. the center was buzzing with anticipation. even though the students didn't know exactly what was going down, they knew it was something big and the hype level was helping to agitate an already nervous caia. she was thankful for marion, who stood close by her side, watching as the others arrived. she was barely aware of mordecai and the five magiks he had chosen from his unit to help take out the spies watching the maclachlans. her mind unfortunately was all over the place. one, she was terrified their carefully strategized plan would fall apart in action, and two, she was worrying how vilhelm and laila were faring with ryder. caia was supposed to have returned home almost immediately where she would put her now fully formed plan into action. when it became apparent that the battle was back on with du bois, she forced herself to remain confident that it would still take marita at least the length of the battle to figure out it was vilhelm. for a start they were focusing their investigation on the idea that a midnight had somehow infiltrated their facilities to break laila out (that was sending them into a massive panic). because of this assumption, vilhelm wouldn't even be a suspect as of yet, not to mention he was a traveller, a magik without the kind of power needed to do the glamour she had done to disguise him as vanne. she wasn't stupid, eventually someone would report vil gone, but by then she was hoping she would be back with the pack and there to take the heat off of him.

she sighed heavily, watching as michael appeared around the corner, his tall figure strapped with guns and knives. behind him were the four other vampyres he had selected, who were to be partnered up with a lykan to take out the four midnight guards who du bois was placing in a sort of rhombus formation around the edges of the forest. moments later, anders stepped out of one of the elevators with nine other lykans from his unit. four of them would take out the guards. the five others would be attacking the spies sitting outside the maclachlans. the plan was the maclachlan pack would pretend to depart for their pack run. all of them would leave their houses and get into their cars and drive away from their streets. in truth, they would be heading towards magic fitness where a magik would be waiting to transport them through the portal to the center for protection. the spies watching the houses were to contact du bois as soon as the maclachlans were off the street. caia would be listening in on du bois, and once the spies had done this she would send in the paired lykan and magik to take out the spy. she had given each team the description of the car the spy would be in and a description of the spy themselves and the element they used. the magik was to open the door to the car for the transformed lykan and cloak the vehicle while the lykan turned the midnight into a chew toy. this way there would be no human witnesses wandering around. once this was done, four teams of two consisting of one vampyre and one lykan, would take out each guard around the forest perimeter quickly and silently. caia, lucien, rose, phoebe and anders would head in, in wolf form, along with michael, marita and mordecai. each had been given a magik to take out. there were situated towards the north end of the forest where the pack met in a clearing and changed before the run. du bois had decided to outflank the maclachlans by encircling the clearing, ensuring his magiks could attack from all sides. caia knew exactly what position each would take. to caia's chagrin, marita had ordered that mordecai take out du bois. she had wanted pierre for herself, mostly because he was an extremely powerful water magik and she was afraid for the person who would be attempting to attack him.

even if that person was a treacherous man-whore.

speaking of which...

she was sure she had caught a glimpse of familiar jet black hair on top of brawny shoulders. squinting, she pressed gently against marion to get the magik to budge a bit so she could see around one of the reception's steel pillars.

her heart literally stopped.

rose was pressed flush against lucien, who had his arms around her waist, and they were kissing... quite passionately.

she felt sick to her stomach.

trembling, she pulled back so she didn't have to look anymore. gaia, how had her life gotten here? she flexed her hands, trying to force the trembling to subsist.

"caia, you have to forget what you just saw and focus. you have a long night ahead of you," marion whispered sympathetically in her ear.

"i'm ok," she assured her mentor.

"no, you're not. but you will be."

surprised at her cryptic comment, she turned to gaze at the witch only to see her glaring at lucien and rose as they came into view. it almost made her smile. it was nice having friends who cared. blowing out a troubling breath between her lips, caia focused beyond 'the couple' and watched as phoebe appeared behind them.

that was everyone then.

"we're all here." marion nodded around the tactical team. "we're all aware of our parts in this?"

a lot of murmuring and head nodding confirmed this.

"we all have a set of comms?"

caia nodded with the rest, hardly noticing the small ear-piece in her inner ear that would allow her to communicate with the others.

"now remember, the portals that have been opened transport us out very close to the midnights, so stealth is of the utmost importance. unit one." marion turned to the magiks and lykans who were teamed up together. "you'll each be taking a portal to the street your midnight is on. it will open in a secure location where you are hidden from midnight view. you all remember which team you are? caia, do you?"