After our little encounter Matteo and I steered clear of each other and continued on with Fran and Amias into the new land without another word.

It seemed like we were always traveling like this, either in complete silence or outright brawling. There was never an in-between.

By the time we reached the central city of Freeman's Land, I understood how the unclaimed territory earned it's name. It was chaos personified.

People ran wildly through the streets in various states of undress, fires burned in the trashcans lining the streets, there was screaming and music everywhere I turned. It looked like the modern day equivalent of the raucous port of Tortuga from Pirates of the Caribbean, complete lunacy.

I flinched when a bottle fell from the sky and crashed onto the ground right beside me, shattering into a million different fragments. I glowered up at the second story apartment window where the bottle hailed from, a clearly intoxicated man sat in the sill singing a song about cheese.

"Which cheese is the saddest?" He crooned sloppily above us, "Bleuuuu cheese because it will forever be provoloneeee!" The man drunkenly lost his balance during his big finale and slipped from the step of the window. He sunk to the ground landing remarkably almost in the exact same spot as the bottle he sent down moments earlier.

He wasn't moving or singing anymore for the matter.

Fran stooped down to check his pulse, her grim expression was the only explanation she needed. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough for Amias. He too crouched by the man's body to confirm Fran's judgment call and after a moment he seemed satisfied with her findings as well.

We turned away from him, looking around at the packed streets hoping someone would speak up and claim him but no one spared the scene a second glance.

"We can't just leave him here." Amias fretted.

Matteo frowned immediately, "Sure we can and we will be leaving him here. He and his unfortunate alcoholism is none of our concern."

Amias sputtered wordlessly as he looked to Fran or I to back him up, "The man is lying dead in the street after serenading us with a cheese song, it would be wrong to leave someone like that!" He turned with his arm outstretched to emphasize the condition of the poor man's lifeless body but when we faced the building again, there was no longer a body.

The Cheese Man had disappeared.

Amias knelt by the glass where the body had just been seconds ago, searching for some indicator or sign that he had been there but there was nothing. No blood, no body, nothing.

Matteo suddenly grabbed my arm and continued down the street with a renewed vigor as he dragged me along. "Keep moving." He didn't seem terribly worried but there was definitely something he knew that encouraged him to leave behind the Cheese Man mystery. He seemed to know something was not right with the situation.

I had to jog every few steps to keep up with Matteo's quickened pace, I was so lost in my thoughts that it was difficult to keep one foot going after the other. Finally, they overflowed into a cathartic release of confused inquiries as he guided us through a series of quick turns and blocks, "What is this place? What just happened to that man? Who are these people? Where is Lysander? Why--"

Matteo clamped his hand over my mouth and pulled me down an alleyway with Amias and Fran in close tow. Only once we reached the end did he remove his hand, I scowled at him and made a dramatic show of wiping my mouth from his touch. "Are you going to answer my f:cking questions now?"

"What happened to the Cheese Man out there, Alpha?" Amias asked, his voice despite the humorous name he too was using for the man, was filled with concern and maybe even sadness?

Matteo nodded to the other end of the alley, back towards the rowdy streets. "This is the in-between for our kind, a purgatory of sorts." He started, "When a wolf is a rogue or kicked out of a pack they can either sell themselves to an ancient vampire, Lysander and join his service or they can come to me and continue to live a normal pack life."

Normal? Hardly. I snorted and it earned a dirty glare from Matteo. "Some are not too keen about either option so they come here, Freeman's Land. No packs, no rules, just living." He ran a hand through his hair, "You can see how well that is working out of them." Matteo remarked sarcastically as he began to run his fingertips across the bricks of the alley as if he was searching for something.

This time it was Fran that asked for clarification, that was a first. "I thought you said that Lysander is in Freeman's Land?"

He nodded but didn't take his attention away from the brick wall, still searching. "He is, but that doesn't mean he owns the place. People still flock here regardless if they choose to join him or not, it is free land after all."

"And Cheese Man?" Amias reminded again.

"Ever since Lysander took up a residence in Freeman's Land more and more of his kind have decided to relocate here as well. Crime runs rampant here, bodies go missing all of the time. Chees--The man," Matteo quickly corrected himself, "Was no doubt taken by a juvenile vampire as an easy meal, this sort of thing happens often I wouldn't think too much about it." He shrugged casually but it seemed forced, his rush to get us away from the scene also suggested otherwise.

I had a million more questions as usual and in the same Matteo was unwilling to answe them all. He shook his head the moment he saw me open my mouth again, "I promise you all, everything will be explained to you in due time." Matteo faced the wall again and pushed against the small brick underneath his hand, suddenly the entire brick wall began to creak and shift. Slowly the brick magically slid to the side and revealed a wooden door, Matteo took hold of the handle and waived us over.

He tugged the seemingly ancient looking door open and we were immediately face to face with a room full of people murderously glaring at us. Matteo didn't seem phased in the slightest he stepped inside of the room, strangely enough, grinning as a particularly pale man walked towards him in a similar fashion.

The place was a dump just like the rest of the town, it was exceptionally small upon first glance and it reeked of mildew and wet concrete. The only lights in the room were from a few strategically hung lanterns throughout the space.

I frowned lightly as I followed Matteo inside, the more I looked around I began to notice that everyone here was exceptionally pale like the first man. Glancing over my shoulder, Amias and Fran's visible unease was enough to confirm my growing suspicions.

We were in a room of vampires.

Aside from positively terrifying, it was rather strange to see them holed up in an annex like this. If this was Freeman's Land, I wondered why a group of vampires would go to such lengths so hide themselves from the rest of the community.

"Devin," Matteo greeted warmly, extending his hand to which the vampire, Devin, batted it away and resolved to embrace Matteo instead.

Immediately, the entire room went back to what they were doing, no longer paying us any attention. Weirdly enough, no one was rushing to rip out my throat and drain me of my blood either. It was suddenly a very normal room of people, except for the fact that I knew they weren't normal and that they could at any given moment kill me in a blink of an eye.

"It is good to see you, old friend." From the other side of Matteo while they embraced, Devin's red eyes landed on me. "And I see that you've brought me a snack."

I involuntarily and rather embarrassingly squeaked hearing the creature's words and Matteo merely chuckled, "What, the girl?" He shook his head and let go of Devin, "She is one of us."

Devin arched an eyebrow and examined me skeptically before turning his attention back to Matteo, "Right, I was just playing around with her. Poor thing looked scared to death when she walked in, I thought I would have some fun." He cleared his throat awkwardly after that mess, his eyes darting back over to me every so often, "Lets sit, I am sure you wouldn't have come all this way just to visit."

He guided us out of the room, my heart was thundering against my ribcage and I swear I could hear hissing from somewhere in the back of the room as I slipped out. Devin lead us into a private room that was separate from the first one we barged in to, there was a fireplace roaring and chairs set up around it.

Matteo sat down across from Devin, he leaned his elbows on the tops of his knees, "We are going to kill Lysander and I am going to need your help to get us inside."

This was news to me.

👀👀

♥️♥️♥️♥️