However, before either of them could do anything, the doors leading to Mistress's chambers were flung open and from within came an insinuating scream.
"Enough!"
The mistress was standing in between Ashton and Donovan and she did not appear to be pleased by the situation she was witnessing in front of her. Donovan had his rapier drawn against Ashton who had transformed his hands into werewolf claws.
Had she been late even for a moment, the two of them could have pulled each other's throats out. She used her command over the werewolves to make both of them kneel before her. It was one of the most important abilities for a werewolf to control their underlings.
Only those who possessed the strength of being the alpha could use this skill and in turn, they could use it to keep those below them, in check. But even with this ability, the alpha can't force someone to do something that was completely against their will.
It was partially the reason the mistress didn't use the ability to force Ashton to sleep with her. As she gave out the command, Donovan had no choice but to obey his mistress's wishes. She wanted them to stand down, thus he had to do that. At that moment, fighting Ashton wasn't worth offending her.
As for Ashton, well, he didn't need to abide it as he wasn't a simple werewolf the mistress could control. He had the genes of a vampire and a zombie to resist the urge to give in to her commands. However, the system did send him a notification to inform him about what the mistress wanted him to do.
'It wouldn't be wise to ignore her command right now...' Ashton thought to himself and begrudgingly got to his knees.
He had to maintain a low profile. He was getting closer to his goals and thus did not want to mess it all up now. Either way, once he was out of Maddencreek he wasn't going to meet with most of them. Not all of them at least.
However, even though the two of them were on their knees, they were still engaged in a battle. Donovan's eyes were filled with rage as he wiped away the blood trickling out of his mouth.
The kick Ashton delivered to his chin wasn't strong enough to make him bleed. But since he was in the middle of talking when Ashton kicked him, his tongue was in between his jaws. Thus when Ashton kicked him, Donovan ended up biting his own tongue. As a result, the blood rushed out of his mouth.
But to everyone else, it appeared as if Ashton's kick was strong enough to make the second strongest werewolf in Maddencreek bleed.
In the meantime, the Mistress walked over to Donovan to check on him. As she did that, Ashton saw a smug look on Donovan's face as if he had won a prize or something. Ashton just shook his head in disappointment.
'He is supposed to be the strongest male here, but look at him behave like a lost puppy as soon as mistress touched him. *sigh* Just looking at them makes me want to vomit.'
However, Donovan wasn't the only one to receive the mistress's attention. As soon as she was done checking up on him, she walked towards Ashton and squatted down to his level. She was about to take his face in her palms when Ashton turned his face sidewards.
He was least interested in what the mistress wanted to do with him. He wasn't hurt, so there was nothing the mistress needed to check up on. But it seemed like Ashton's actions had angered the mistress because the next moment, much to Donovan's surprise, the mistress slapped Ashton hard across the face.
It wasn't the first time the mistress had punished him. But it wasn't as worse as the things Ashton had been forced to suffer through. Donovan was dying to see the expression on Ashton's face after that.
However, he was not expecting to see him... smiling. It wasn't a normal smile either, but one that only psychopaths could have. The expression only lasted for a second on Ashton's face and the next moment his face turned expressionless. No one other than Donovan had seen Ashton make the face.
Ashton kept his face down in the position it was left after getting slapped as the Mistress got up. In his mind, there was a counter going on... A counter that kept track of everything these bastards had done to him.
He needed to remember it all, otherwise how the hell would he be able to punish them accordingly? For each time any werewolf hurt him, the counter went up by one, every single kick, punch and whip... everything was accounted for and would be generously given back to them when the time was right.
"If the two of you want to duel it out. You have to do it properly." The mistress criticised both of them, 'We are not a bunch of hooligans who would do things in the heat of the moment. If you want a duel, you got it. Tomorrow morning, 8'o clock. Both of you will have a duel. Till then keep your differences to yourselves. Is that understood?'
Both Ashton and Donovan nodded their heads and the mistress headed back inside her room leaving them alone.