Chapter 196: The human wife with guts.
Before Sienna could use her own mental strength to fling it away, Linera slapped the can with her wing, sending it flying out of the window. But, it didn’t touch the ground. It was pulled back, using mental strength, straight into the arm of the owner.
Suriq slammed it on the floor, yelling over Tomlin’s voice. "Foxes are foxes, panthers are panthers."
"Shouldn’t ability matter more than race?" Tomlin bellowed.
Six times, Sienna yelled ’silence’ and all six times went ignored. In fact, the arguments just got louder. Sienna turned to Timothy and asked, "Are they always like this?"
The rabbit beast man sighed and replied softly. "They are afraid of the fox lord, so they keep it to a minimum. Most don’t even attend these meetings and send representatives instead, unless its a very important matter."
In the midst of the loud arguments Mrs. Miller stormed into the room, hair wild, clutching Ali in her arms. The cub’s cheeks were flushed from crying, her eyes glassy with fever. "Sorry for the interaction, Ali has been crying since you left! Listening to old men and women argue about taxes should not be more important than raising your cubs."
The old men and women gasped!
"I am not old." Someone muttered.
Sienna shot to her feet, heart pounding. Before she could speak, Timothy grabbed her arm, suddenly pale and breathless. "My lady, there has been an incident. A tribal leather and fur processing factory has collapsed. The roof caved in. Workers are trapped."
The chamber erupted in chaos. Elders scrambled to their feet immediately, some looking paler than Timothy. Sienna snatched Ali from her mother’s arms, strapped the cub to her back with a large shawl and strode for the door.
She left behind some stunned individuals.
"Sienna!" Linera and other fox guards chased after her. "Where are you going?"
"To the scene of the accident." Sienna replied with determination. "Elias is not here. I am."
Linera grabbed her arm. "What are you going to do there? You don’t have the physical strength to help."
Sienna shrugged her aunt’s hand away, and continued. "If the factory belongs to our tribe, then those lives belong to me too. I won’t sit idle while they suffocate. If Elias were here, he would go."
"You are not Elias." Her aunt shouted.
Sienna didn’t turn around, or address those words. She could not be stopped either. In no time, she was on a flying ship, comforting Ali, while watching Eli sleep in her mother’s arms.
**
The news was already covering the collapse of the factory. But the pictures on BeastNet were nothing in comparison to the site itself. It was devastation incarnate. Smoke and dust hung thick in the air, beams twisted like broken bones, and the cries of those trapped echoed beneath the rubble.
Ali was strapped to Sienna’s back firmly, and the little one whimpered. Feverish tears soaked into one spot on Sienna’s shirt. Sienna would have preferred to leave her on the ship, but the cub cried if she did not sniff her within touching distance. So, she had no choice but to bring her to the site.
Rescue teams were already at work, beast men with mental and physical strength, moving debris away, to pull out survivors. Others were using their claws to dig, never mind their bleeding hands. They were working in a hurry because it was snowing. If those trapped were not rescued soon, they would be buried under snow within hours.
A reporter tried to interview Sienna, but the guards pushed him away.
She didn’t stand out. Sienna grabbed a shovel and joined the rescue team. The fox guards tried to block her path, all six of them, and Linera.
"Sienna, this is madness."
Sienna’s glare could have frozen rivers. "All of you, grab shovels or use your abilities to help."
The fox guards faltered, then bowed their heads. No one dared argue further.
She dug with ferocity, her muscles burning, sweat streaking her face. Dust coated her hands, mixed with drops of snow. Even when her lungs screamed, she refused to stop. Every cry from beneath the rubble was a dagger to her chest.
It was amazing how Ali slept through the work. Maybe it was because she was hidden under a thick jacket, or the work of the medicine she had been given on the ship. But either way, the little one did not make a fuss.
After two hours, Elder Tomlin approached Sienna, looking concerned. "This is men’s work. And I am not saying it because I think women belong in the kitchen. I am saying it because you have a cub on your back and some cuts on your hands."
She continued digging. "I am fine."
He thrust a pair of large, thick, gloves at her. "If you insist on being another Vinira, I wont stop you. I do think you are being stupid, however. The work your guards are doing counts as yours. Your presence alone is a show of support. Don’t break your bones trying to impress anyone. At the end of the day, they will still go home and sneer because you are human."
Her hands froze, for a moment. She raised her back and looked at the elder coldly. "I am not trying to impress anyone. I am here out of duty. I can’t help being human, so even if the tribe looks down on me for it, there is not a single thing we can do to change it. Now is not the time to talk about this." She tossed the shovel aside, "Help me move the rock, someone is trapped down there."
Tomlin grunted, but did as she asked. He moved a large rock, and two more that were pressing against it. Sienna pulled a young woman free from the wreckage. Her face was streaked with soot, her eyes were filled with terror.
Sienna touched her head. "If you can walk, find a medic. If you can’t let Tomlin carry you over."
Tomlin lifted the woman, and hurried away before the young woman could explain her situation.
Hours passed. Sienna’s arms trembled. She took a break from digging and started passing out water and food, while her mother and Timothy counted the survivors.
By 4:14 P.M, the rescue work was over. The factory was a ruin, but all the workers were accounted for. Some were being carried away on stretchers, others were leaning on one another, whispering Sienna’s name with reverence.
She stood at the center of it all, talking to the families of the workers. People who had rushed over frantic, when they saw the news.
The council elders at the scene followed her with their eyes, in stunned silence.
"Lady Cadelaria would never have done something like this." Elder Vinira finally said, with a smile. "The human wife of the fox lord has some guts. You have to respect her for that."
Elder Grace stretched out his hand, revealing a small charred metal. "She has her work cut out for her. This collapse was no accident, the supports were sabotaged."
