I took a deep breath after reaching my decision. I will tell him the truth. He deserves to know.

I show him my phone and he reads Lucy's message. After he's done, he looks at me and questions, "Who is Selena?"

"Gamma Tyler's sister," I answer.

Alarick becomes confused. "How will she be helping you and Lucy? And what's the plan?"

I took a deep breath and exhale slowly. The moment of truth is finally here. I start from the scratch, "Lucy and I want to empower women by training them, we want them to be strong, we want them to be able to defend themselves. And so, Lucy came up with a plan. We will go to every pack in the world and convince the leaders to start training their female pack members."

"What if the leaders don't get convinced?" Alarick asks. It's no secret that we live in a patriarchal world. There are men who believe in equality but also there are men who don't want women to walk shoulder-to-shoulder with them. These male chauvinists want to exert their so called "superiority" on the women. And Lucy and I are exactly planning to break this "superiority".

"Then, we're going to challenge them."

Alarick's eyes go wide in shock. When he returns to a calm state, he asks, "How?"

This time, my eyebrows rise in astonishment. I didn't expect him to react in such a restful manner. "Since Lucy, Selena and I have undergone the same training that the pack leaders do, we will be able to give them a tough fight. It will be their choice who they want to fight with. But there's a condition though, if they choose me then they'll have to send their Beta to fight with me. Same condition will apply to Lucy and Selena as well."

Alarick keeps quiet for a while. But when he speaks, he surprises me, "That's a brilliant plan."

"You think so?"

"Yeah."

I give out a nervous chuckle. "When I started telling you about Lucy's plan, I thought that our conversation would go downhill but I'm really happy that our conversation is going well."

He places his hands on my shoulders as a comforting gesture and tells me, "I trust you and I completely support you."

I hug him. A tear escapes my eyes. "Thank you for believing in me." He rubs my back in a soothing manner.

When we pull apart, he wipes away my tear and he says, "Thanks for telling me the truth."

I smile at him.

"So, how did Matthew and Darius react to Lucy's plan?" He asks.

"Well...I haven't told them yet."

"Why haven't you told them?"

"I know that they won't take the news well so I'm not planning on telling them," I say.

"But they will eventually come to know when you carry out Lucy's plan. And getting to know from someone else would be worse than getting to know from you."

I think over his words. He's right. If Matt comes to know about Lucy's plan from someone else, then he'll be hurt that I hid things from him. This will make a dent in our already strained friendship. I want to save our friendship. I want our friendship to return to its previous state. And for that to happen, I will have to tell Matt about Lucy's plan.

I look at Alarick and nod.

*

This is a bad idea.

Alarick and I are presently in the sitting room of my pack house with Matt and Darius. Everyone can feel the tense atmosphere in the room. I'm nervous, Matt and Darius are confused and Alarick is calm.

"What's going on?" Matt questions when he looks at the serious faces of me and Alarick.

I start, "I need to tell you something."

"What?"

"I know Lucy's plan," I say and exhale all the anxiety out of my system. There, I said it! I feel a little burden off my chest.

"What's her plan?" He asks cautiously.

And I tell him. The fire in his eyes continue to increase as I reveal each and every detail to him. When I'm done, Matt takes a deep breath to calm down his anger while Darius remains expressionless.

When Matt is composed, he questions, "Do you know what you're getting yourself into?"

"I know."

He shakes his head. "No, you don't. Do you realize that you are happily and willingly walking into Lucy's trap?" He asks slowly and dangerously.

"It's not a trap," I tell him with full confidence.

"I still don't understand, how can you trust her?!" He asks as he explodes in anger.

"You already know my reasons for trusting her," I tell him.

"I don't want you to be a part of her plan."

"I know that but I'm still going to be by her side."

"You are going to be by her side by leaving my side? You're going to leave your childhood friend for your new friend?" He questions with utter disbelief.

"I'm not leaving anyone!" I shout to get my words into Matt's thick skull.

"Yes, you are!" He exclaims in the same loud voice that I had used just a few seconds ago. "Your actions are enough to convey what your lips won't. Your decision is clear to everyone present here."

I shake my head at him. "You're not thinking straight."

"Oh really?" He asks in a challenging tone. "If I ask you to choose between me and Lucy, who would you choose?"

"I would choose the person who is taking the right stand. And Lucy is doing just that," I say cautiously.

"And I'm not? I'm trying to protect you from her!"

"I can protect myself! Don't you have even a little faith in me?"

"I do!" He exclaims.

"No, you don't. If you did then we wouldn't be having this conversation right now."

"Alarick, are you okay with Chriselda being a part of Lucy's plan?" Matt asks.

"Yes," Alarick says without missing a beat.

Alarick immediate response leaves Matt speechless for a minute or two.

"So, you too trust Lucy?" Matt questions Alarick.

I turn to Alarick and wait for his response.

"I don't trust Lucy but I trust Chriselda. She can take care of herself."

"I don't want her to get hurt."

Alarick walks towards Matt and places his hands on his shoulders and says, "She won't."

Alarick is able to convince Matt and Matt reluctantly agrees with me being a part of Lucy's plan while Darius doesn't need too much convincing, which surprises me.

Suddenly, my phone starts ringing. Lucy's name flashes across the screen. "Hey," I greet her as I answer the call.

"Hey, since Selena agreed to support us, our team is complete. Now, it's time to execute our plan. How about this Saturday? You and Selena can meet me at my pack house and from there we'll start approaching the pack leaders," Lucy suggests.

"But which pack should we approach first?" I ask. By now, everyone's eyes are on me since they know whom I'm talking to.

"The pack where it all started," she says determined. "The Scarlet River pack."

The four members of this very same pack assaulted Kate so it's only apt that we approach this pack first.

"Okay. I'll see you on Saturday," I tell her.

"Okay."

We say our goodbyes and end the call.

I look at my friends and mate and patiently wait for them to say something but they don't. Instead, Alarick walks towards me and engulfs me in his arms. "I wish you all the best!" He says.

"Isn't it too soon to wish me luck?" I ask in amusement while I continue to hug him. "Five days are still left for my departure. You can come to me on Friday and wish me luck then."

When we pull away, he tells me, "It won't be possible for me. I'm going to be very busy during this week. So, I'm wishing you luck now."

"Oh," is all I say.

"I should now take your leave," he says. He bids farewell to everyone and leaves.

After he's gone, I go up to my room. I take my laptop and decide to have a video conference call with Lucy and Selena. Once, I'm connected with them, we start dicussing various tactics and strategies that would help in making our plan successful. We need to be the best of ourselves so that we can give a tough fight to the leaders.

When we are done with the discussion, we end the call. As soon as I close my laptop, Darius enters my room.

"Hey," he says as he sits on the bed facing me.

"Hi," I respond.

"I just wanted to talk to you about Matt," he starts.

"What about him?"

"You're misunderstanding him," he says. Before I can open my mouth to protest, he cuts me off, "He just wants your well being. He just wants you to be safe. He just can't go through all the pain again. You know, when you were injected with wolvesbane, he was so worried about you. Seeing you in that state almost broke him. Chriselda, you need to understand that it's not easy to see your friend fighting with death. When Charles had found the antidote and you started recovering, Matt had promised that he won't let anything happen to you. And he's still trying his best to do so."

"But Darius, he needs to understand too that Lucy won't hurt me. If she wanted to hurt me then she would've long time back. Matt just needs to trust her," I say.

"Chriselda, Matt is never going to trust Lucy. He won't ever be able to trust someone whose brother was responsible for almost killing you," Darius says and gets up. When he reaches the door, he pauses, "Try putting yourself in his shoes and you'll know where he's coming from. He's just concerned for you. And he has never doubted your capabilities."

With that, Darius leaves the room.

*

With only a few days left for Lucy's plan to take place, I started prepping myself and focused on training and making myself stronger. When I wasn't doing any of these, I used to find myself in my room trying to pluck up all the courage within me to face Matt and have a heart-to-heart conversation with him. But everytime I tried to approach him, my past conversations with him about Lucy started replaying in my head. And since I couldn't find anything to say to Matt to make our conversation stray away from the typical way our conversation tended to go nowadays, I used to take a step back and give up on the idea of approaching him altogether.

There's no way I can change the perspective that Matt has about Lucy. There's no way I can make him trust her. What Darius said was right; Matt can never trust the person who's brother tried to kill me. And there's nothing I can do about it.

I know when I'll be gone to Lucy's pack, Matt would be worried about me. There's no way I would let him accompany me. I don't want him to see me fight; I don't want him to see me get injured. I wish there was a way to make Matt not worry about me.

*

When the day arrives for me to leave my pack, Darius hugs me while Matt tells me to take care. I simply nod. And with my belongings, I get inside the cab and leave for the airport.

After reaching the airport and boarding the plane, I make myself comfortable in my seat. As the plane takes off, all I can hope is for Lucy's plan to go as planned.

*

After the plane lands, I take my belongings and head for the exit. When I'm outside the airport, I find Lucy's Beta, Derek, waiting for me. After greeting each other, I get inside the car with him and we  drive towards Lucy's pack.

*

After reaching Lucy's pack, Derek and I get out of the car. When we're inside the pack house, I expect to find Lucy, Lucy's Gamma and Selena to be waiting for me. But seeing Selena's Alpha, Brent also present is quite unexpected.

Him being here wasn't part of the plan.

All stand up upon my arrival. I greet all the anticipated people. When I reach Alpha Brent, I shake hands with him and ask, "Hi Alpha, what are you doing here?"