The Alpha: Claiming His Enemy's Daughter-Chapter 24: BLOODY FOX

Iris couldn’t hide her curiosity at the palm size rock in her hand, she felt that nagging feeling again, the same feeling that enveloped her when she found her first magic stone.

Would this rock contain a magic stone as well?

Iris had never been to the mine site before this, therefore, she was shocked and overwhelmed by the knowledge that she could find it quite easily. She felt that intuition everywhere around this area.

Some were easy to find and they had a weak pull and the others were so hard, being buried deep down in the ground, or inside the mountain rock, you needed to dig deeper into the mountain to find them.

She was amazed by this new knowledge and was thrilled to know why she had this tingling feeling whenever she touched the magic stone.

Therefore, when she found a magic stone without anyone seeing, she hid it inside her rag-like dress. Her heart was thumping wildly. She could feel the cold stone against her stomach.

Magic stones had no use for a shifter like her, but then she was born as a runt, probably there was finally something useful that she could do with this useless body.

Iris looked around to make sure that no one saw her hiding such a precious stone and then started to dig around for another stone to exchange it for some warm soup and a piece of meat.

It would be so nice to have a warm meal after so long.

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Cane was accompanying his uncle, King Aeon, who had arrived just a few hours ago. They had a pleasant lunch together, but the Queen, Della, didn’t want to have Aria at the same table as her, knowing she was a lowborn and not from a privileged family.

Therefore, Cane had to dismiss her.

Aria’s face fell, but she did her best to keep her temper in check, after all this was the royalty that they were talking about and they couldn’t act rashly, it wouldn’t bring any benefit to this pack and Cane if she started throwing a tantrum at things like that.

That was something that she couldn’t afford.

Thus, with the fakest possible smile on her lips, she resigned herself and returned to her bedroom, her heart was so heavy, she was enraged.

From one look, Cane knew what she was feeling, but he would deal with her later.

"You have done a great job, my nephew, taking back what belongs to you," King Aeon said on their way hunting near the Goffa mountain. They were on the horses, while the queen stayed behind and had Aliana, the beta’s sister, accompany her.

"Yes, I am glad, I managed to free my people." If Cane was mad at the king’s statement, he didn’t show it on his face, as he kept his expression impassive.

How dare this man talk that way to him when he didn’t do anything at all to help him in time of need? The way he called him ’my nephew’ repulsed him, but then, there were a lot of things that repulsed Cane recently and now this only got added to the never ending list.

"I see you have a beautiful mistress, I am glad that you can finally let go of your mate," King Aeon spoke without batting an eye. He missed the way Cane gripped the reins of his horse until his knuckles turned white when he mentioned his mate. "Is there something that you want to tell me?"

King Aeon stopped the horse and then looked at Cane. His dark eyes met his, but even so, the king was frustrated to know what was going on inside his head.

"It is you, my uncle, who came to see me. I want to know what brought you here." Cane had to bite his tongue when he addressed King Aeon as his ’uncle’, but holding onto something so trivial such as that wouldn’t bring him anywhere.

On the other hand, King Aeon seemed pleased with the way Cane addressed him, the same way he did. He smiled at him indulgently, as if he was staring at his own little brother.

"You have done so well and proved to all the people in this continent that bad experiences couldn’t break the spirit of a true leader."

Bad experiences? All of that whipping, rape, torture and hellish life for more than ten years, he classified it as a bad experience?

The guards from the Howling Wolf pack, who heard that, tried their best not to scoff in front of this senile King, for he could have their heads at a snap of his fingers.

But, the way the King belittled what they had gone through made them seethe in anger inside. They felt no respect for this King whatsoever.

Yet, their alpha said nothing, he didn’t show any indication that he was angry, as if he didn’t hear those words to begin with.

Cane was staring at the King with his impassive eyes, his gaze on him was steady, he looked almost as regal as the royalty.

"However, to merge two biggest packs in my kingdom will be too much, you will disrupt the power balance amongthe packs." King Aeon sighed. "They started sending me petition after petition to stop this."

Cane had expected such a conversation, but it didn’t make him feel any less irritated. After all, the king came all the way here just to complain about the inconvenience of receiving the petitions that the other alphas had sent.

Yet, the alpha’s expression still remained the same, as if he didn’t think much about it.

"I don’t understand, Uncle," Cane spoke again, he feigned ignorance when he talked casually to King Aeon, since he was the one, who wanted to be addressed that way. "For ten years, Alpha Gerald kept the two packs merged, but as long as I can remember, you didn’t interfere with that."

"Alpha Gerald didn’t merge the two packs, Cane. He made your uncle the acting alpha of the Howling Wolf pack." It was an uncle from Cane’s mother’s side, which meant he was one of the king’s people.

"And he turned the pack house into a brothel, drowned himself in alcohol and between women’s legs, actively creating new life and filled the brothel with his bastards."

The guards, who heard that, wanted to laugh when they saw the king’s expression, not expecting such vulgar words from Cane.

King Aeon cleared his throat, he wanted to regain control of the situation. "It is unfortunate that Alpha Gerald didn’t have a good eye for selecting his people."

"Uncle Randy is not his man, Uncle, he belongs to the royal family and it was you, who pointed him out. Alpha Gerald generously showed me the message from you about the repositioning of the alpha in the Howling Wolf pack."

On the other hand, Cane wanted to say that it was King Aeon, who didn’t have good eyes to select his people.

"Ah, if only I had known about it sooner, I would have removed him from that position myself." King Aeon urged his horse to move forward, as Cane and the rest of the guards followed.

"You don’t need to worry, I have removed him for you. I hung his head on the spike, just a day after I ripped apart Alpha Gerald’s heart from his chest." The detailed explanation was not needed, but Cane spoke about it so calmly, one could mistake it as if he was talking about the weather. "Since it took you a decade to realize it, I did you a favor."

King Aeon turned his head, his eyes were ablaze with anger, but he was smiling. "Thank you for doing that for me."

"You don’t need to mention it, Uncle."

But now, Kiang Aeon was irritated to hear the way Cane addressed him, it felt like he was mocking him instead.

"In that case, you can’t merge the two packs."

"If that’s your problem, I will find another way to solve it." Cane stopped the horse and the rest followed, which made the king do the same, which upset him because he did it purely out of instinct. "You have shown me how to handle it, so I will follow your good example."

If King Aeon had to correct him, he needed to admit what he had done before was a mistake and a king admitting to a mistake was something unheard of. At the very least, in his reign, only his words rang true.

Silence descended between them, until Cane reached for his bow and arrow. He positioned the arrow, but he aimed it at the King, which made him widen his eyes. It was too close and he wouldn’t be able to get away from this without being injured.

"Wh- what are you doing?! Where are you aiming?!" But, before he could think straight or his guards could do something about it, Cane had released the arrow, and it whizzed past his cheek.

"I was aiming for a fox, Uncle," Cane said calmly, not even affected by the tension that he created. "You didn’t think I was aiming at you just now, did you?"

King Aeon gulped down so hard, he turned his head and true to his word, a fox was dead with an arrow stabbed in one of its eyes. It was perfect marksmanship, since it wouldn’t ruin its fur.

"No, of course not." If King Aeon wanted to hide his trembling self, he failed to do that, because he stumbled with his words.

"I am glad that you don’t think that way. You are my uncle, you don’t think I will harm you, do you?" Cane jumped from his horse and then approached the guard, who was holding his game.

It was a white fox.

"This is a rare animal around this pack, I know because I have been here for ten years. You can have it." Cane handed the bloody fox to the king.