4. The Fiato Twins

Brynn

This was the final stretch of this competition.

It was going to determine which pack in the kingdom was the best and I knew that my pack always won and that was why we had been the supreme rulers for the past a hundred or so years.

Frynn and I had to win because I also wanted to be the supreme ruler of Fiato kingdom after my dad.

I knew that many envied the Fiato family because it was like we were born to be emperors but who could blame us?

It all came in a package.

We were all handsome, alphas and strikingly talk.

We stood above everyone.

For example, Frynn and I just turned nineteen and look at us, we were seven feet two and we were even taller than after who was seven feet zero.

“Brynn? Stop daydreaming and row! I will kill you if they catch up with us,” my twin, Frynn called and I started rowing even harder.

This competition was held all over the kingdom.

This kingdom had a total of eleven packs and each pack had an alpha but a peace treaty was signed more than two hundred years ago where they were all to be united as one into a kingdom.

The kingdom bore the name of the ruling family.

My great grandfather won the competition a hundred or so years ago and it became the Fiato Kingdom.

Since then, we, the Fiato’s have been in power.

The competitions are held every twenty years and it is our turn now: my twin and I. 

There were five phases to the competition and so far, we have won three and that means that we are the new rulers but rules dictate that we do all five of them because we may have cheated.

Beats me how one could cheat in a competition that had eyes all over and oracles who spell everything.

For example, if we tried to use a cheat to make this boat love faster, it would stop moving and everyone would know that we have cheated.

That would be the shame of the century. 

The first part is the endurance part.

We compete to see who can carry a certain amount of weight the longest without putting it down.

This year, we were asked to carry boulders and each was two hundred kilograms.

Both my brother and I carried our boulders for a hundred and three hours without flinching and we put them down a day after the last one did.

In those four days and seven hours, we hadn't eaten or slept.

We have practised for this competition since the day we were born. 

After that, the second phase was the speed competition.

We were to run a certain distance in both our human and wolf forms and see who came first.

This year's distance was a hundred and ten kilometres which we aced in flying colours. 

The third part was the rescue part.

People were put in dangerous situations and it was upon the leaders to save them and we saved ours within no time only to discover that they were dummies but if we hadn't, the Edmund Pack would have lost two alphas in a fire, the Grinson Pack would have lost ten children in a landslide and such. 

We saved ours from the fire, the landslide, the floods and from a wolfsbane poisoning.

This is the fourth one.

We are rowing the boat to the deep season and catch the biggest fish we can and bring it back to the stadium. 

We have been taught swimming and fishing but this is the furthest we have ever come to the waters alone. 

“You are men now and I believe that you can bring us a shark or even a whale," dad said and I snorted.

“Da, have you forgotten that it is a boat and not a yacht?" I asked him.

"I know Frynn, it's a boat but you two are alphas and Fiatos.

Be a Fiato,” he said and Frynn and I looked at each other.

We are used to dad confusing us.

He doesn't know which one is Brynn and which one is Frynn but he occasionally gets it right.

The only one we can never fool is mama and our nanny.

I don't know how they are able to tell us apart but they do.

There, let's dock there and go underwater,” I tell Frynn when we see a huge boulder.

We anchor the boat and we swim underwater looking for the biggest fish we can catch.

We aren't allowed to carry any weapon and we are supposed to hunt underwater with just our bare hands or fangs.

I really don't know what we are looking for and we swim around for a while and we catch a mantra.

We slice it and we hope that the blood will lure something big and it doesn't take long.

A shark swims towards us and I hope that it's alone.

We change into our wolves and although water isn't our forte in this form, it is the quickest way to kill a shark.

A fight ensues between us and the shark and we win after a bloody battle.

It is so huge that if we put it in the boat, we won't have anywhere to sit.

“Let's tie it with a rope behind the boat and then we will take turns rowing and pushing," Frynn says and I like the idea.

We do just that and I am the first to row.

It's hard but the pushing at the back makes it bearable.

“What's that?" I noticed something floating in the water.

“Where?" Frynn asks and he sees it.

Let me check,” he says and I tell him to be careful.

We are in the middle of the sea and it could be anything but it looks shiny so you never know.

We could have discovered a treasure.

“It's a girl," Frynn shouts and I think I have heard wrong.

“What?" I shout back.

“It's a girl," he says as he swims back with strong one handed strokes holding the girl with the other.

“Is she dead?" I ask.

“Maybe, I don't know. She looks so pale," he says as he hauls her into the boat.

I notice two other boats in the distance and I know we have to hurry.

We put the girl on the floor of the boat and we start rowing.

It takes longer with all the added wright and we are the second to arrive in the stadium.

I am not worried though after I see what the others have caught.

They can't measure up to the shark we have and on top of that, we have a girl.

She isn't dead after an elder checks and orders she be taken to the hospital.

She looked so beautiful but had a lot of scars as if she had been beaten and then thrown into the lake for sharks to feast.

Anyway, it's time to prepare for the final test: who can kill the largest number of prey in the no man zone forest within thirty minutes. 

“You okay?" I ask Frynn who looks lost as we walk to the hostel to take a bath and rest our sore muscles.

We rowed that boat for hundreds of kilometres.

“That girl, I can't get her out of my mind. There is just something about her," Frynn answers me and I start.

I thought it was only me.