What The Fox? (Completely Free!)

Chapter 31

Chapter 31

We slipped into the Imperial Camp uneventfully. Alix knew the lay of the land better than I could have imagined. He let it slip during our descent from the mountain that during his travels as a human to recover his werewolf powers, he had, at one point, infiltrated the Imperial Army. A couple of years ago, the army captured a trio of war elephants from the southern fractions. There was a legendary shaman who the emperor had employed to enchant the elephants to carry towers of crossbow-wielding soldiers against their former trainers.

Although the shaman was ultimately trampled by his charges, Alix told me he befriended the army blacksmiths and was able to rise in the ranks and forge weapons for General Nanxin himself.

"It was all in pursuit of that charlatan shaman who turned out to be nothing more than a bag of snakes."

"Did you find out anything useful from serving the high general?" I didn't keep track of Imperial City going abouts. After all, I had been foolish enough to have fallen in with Julong without figuring out he was a prince. But I did know during my preparations for taking on Cixi's identity that General Nanxin was killed during one of the southern campaigns. At that time, General Teng (Cixi's father) was promoted from his position as TongJung to JiangJun.

"Only that once the emperor had a taste of using the supernatural to subjugate the southern nations, he would never relent until he has conquered us all."

"Wolves live in packs," I noted, "unlike the rest of us animal spirits who live in the forest with brief forays with the humans. That makes you an easy target."

"Hardly easy," Alix replied with a devilish smirk. Even without the light of the moon in his eyes, he was still beautiful in an out worldly way. Even without the preternatural sparkle, he still oozed danger from his every pore. "Imagine if they enslaved the pack for their purposes. A werewolf plowing through an advancing line of soldiers would be far more fearsome than a bumbling elephant. Our fur is almost impenetrable by their arrows. Elephants aren't intelligent animals in the heat of battle. They can easily topple over and crush their entire garrison."

"Unless the enemy realizes that silver is your weakness."

"Yes," Alix admitted with a shrug of his broad shoulders. "But you would have to pierce a creature like me with enough arrows to cloth a porcupine to win."

"You are mighty sure of yourself," I retorted. "And yet you were taken down by a single shaman."

"No, not by a shaman, by a woman," Alix winked at me as we crept into the borders of the Imperial camp. "I'm here crawling about like an insect for you so that you can be reunited with your Prince. No shaman ever could make me do such a thing."

I rolled my eyes at him, but I didn't push the conversation further. The more we spoke, the more I wondered if I wanted to help Julong fulfill his father's dreams of using magical creatures to conquer all his neighboring kingdoms. Was the love of a Prince worth such a price?

We entered the makeshift forge used by the resident blacksmith. The man was so hard working he slept on a pile of hay beside the forge. A jeweled dagger had been newly repaired and left out on a silk tray to be delivered to its high-ranking recipient in the morning. Alix descended on the sleeping man and slit his throat with it.

Before I could fully comprehend his plan, Alix had already disposed of the body into a nearby stream flowing from a tributary of the sacred mountains.

Alix stripped the man of his clothes and dressed in it. The man had an iron face mask that he likely used for hammering the blades after they had been treated with fire. Happily, by wearing it, it concealed Alix's much younger features. I wondered if I needed to hide myself during the day if Alix had taken on the identity of the blacksmith, but soon, Alix also found a spare set of clothing that appeared to be made for a woman.

"You can pretend to be my daughter, who I brought along to help me light the forges."

"Do you think they will buy it?"

"Of course, and if they don't, we can always just kill them all, as I originally intended."

"The entire army? All ten thousand?"

"Perhaps that will motive you to play a convincing blacksmith's daughter," Alix joked and handed me the ragged, moldy clothing and straw shoes.