Chapter 6: Vantage Point

For a werewolf, Adira was horrible in nature.

“I can handle adventure.”

Braxton scoffed at the woman’s attempt at defending herself, amused by her insistence, but Adira simply rolled her eyes and pretended like his scepticism didn’t bother her. She wasn’t sure how successful she was being but she would assume not very if Braxton’s chuckling under his breath was any indication.

“I’m just tired.”

“And clumsy,” Braxton added with a cheeky smile.

“I am not clumsy!”

“You are too,” he teased, “I’ve seen you trip at least ten times and that’s only counting the past five minutes.”

“Wow, more than once a minute? Some would call me an overachiever for that,” she countered in a dramatically amazed tone.

Braxton simply raised an eyebrow at her and she huffed.

“Fine, maybe I’m a little clumsy.”

“A little?”

“Don’t push it.”

It wasn’t long before they reached the end of the path and returned to the depth of the woods. The trees provided plenty of opportunities to hide if they needed to and Adira calmed at the cover, grateful that they weren’t as exposed as they were before. Jumping was their only option at the time but she doubted that either of them had considered what they would do after that. They never had the time. Not if they wanted to live.

“Now what?” Adira asked.

She wasn’t exactly sure when Braxton started to hold power over her. When he got her to jump off the cliff? When she realised he was her key to finding Camden? Whenever it was, she now found herself looking to him for guidance and she found the change in dynamic uncomfortable. She had never been good at handing control over to someone else and she was only worse at it given the current circumstances.

“Now, we need to find the way out.”

“And how do we-”

Adira cut herself off out of pure confusion when she noticed Braxton was climbing up a tree. On instinct, she tilted her head slightly, trying to figure out what his plan was. There was no one coming so no need to hide but they didn’t have time to waste and stick around in one area either.

“Stay there.”

Adira raised an eyebrow and watched the man climb as she called up to him.

“What are you doing?”

“Finding our way out,” Braxton called back, a hint of amusement in his tone.

That didn’t clarify much. Adira was still confused and didn’t understand how climbing a tree was going to help them out of the woods in any way but she feared that the answer would be something simple - something she should know. She’d already humiliated herself enough with the constant tripping over and the footprint incident that she decided to just stay quiet and hope that Braxton could sort things himself, however he intended to do that. It wasn’t a comfortable option but it kept her from making herself look even more stupid than she already had.

She watched Braxton climb higher and higher and glanced around anxiously. There wasn’t much she could do apart from keeping a lookout and she hated the feeling of usefulness as she stood around waiting. 

Next time I get an explanation first, she thought.

Her anxiety only got worse when Braxton got high enough in the trees that she couldn’t see him anymore. He could leave if he wanted to. He could climb between the branches from that height and Adira would hardly be able to tell. Or, he could stay up there, hidden and safe, and wait for the guards to find her while he was out of harm's way.

After all that I’ve done for him-

“Okay,” Braxton called out, cutting off Adira’s trail of thought.

The leaves rustled as the man started to climb back down again and Adira found that she was breathing with an increased sense of ease.

“I know where we are going.”

“How?” She asked him.

“Simple,” he shrugged as his feet hit solid ground again, “I climbed up high enough to see across to the village. The church tower is pretty easy to spot and as long as we keep heading towards that, we can’t go too far wrong.”

Adira just nodded.

She barely knew Aethelgarde so she was at least comforted by the fact that she wasn’t being stupid by not understanding Braxton’s plan, but, on the other side of that, it meant that she didn’t know if Braxton was telling the truth. He could lie, he could lead her to her death, and she would be none the wiser. 

As if sensing her internal conflict, Braxton spoke up, “What’s wrong?”

Silence.

What was she supposed to say? She couldn’t exactly tell Braxton that she didn’t trust him. Especially not when he hadn’t wanted to help her in the first place. She also didn’t think she could lie, at least not convincingly, and that was probably worse.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure. Why aren’t you?”

She hesitated. Braxton’s question was a good one. Why was she having such an issue trusting him? This wasn’t the warehouse anymore, she wasn’t being poked and prodded or experimented on. Braxton’s pack mark was enough to prove that he had known Camden, at least at some point even if they didn’t talk anymore. They had even been teasing each other a short while ago. 

Why was he suddenly not trustworthy enough?

Braxton groaned and ran a hand through his hair as he spoke again, “I’m such an idiot. You clearly don’t trust me. Well, if you think I’m such a bad guy, let me get out of your hair. Wouldn’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“Wait!”

Braxton didn’t listen. He just turned and started to walk away, shaking his head softly as he went. 

Shit, Adira thought, now what am I supposed to do?

She watched Braxton, her mind racing to try and come up with a solution but, as much as she wanted to ignore the fact, she needed him.

“Braxton, please!” She called out, silently cursing the way her voice broke as she did so.