Instinctual

Chapter 12.5

Marcus felt some of her terror, and not because of any emotional manipulation. He realized that exactly what Clarissa had feared was coming true, and while Liz had said that none of this was his fault, Marcus also knew that if he hadn’t been here, maybe none of this would have happened – maybe this pack, this family, would still be happy. Would be whole. Thinking back on the last four years of his life, on the run and falling apart at the seams, Marcus realized that he wouldn’t wish his life on his worst enemy.

He lurched clumsily to his feet, feeling pins and needles in his nerves, and stumbled over until he could wrap a hand around Declan’s shoulder. Before he could speak, however, he was once again cut off – but this time it wasn’t with an attack, but instead a mental prodding.  Marcus blinked in surprise as he felt Declan clumsily opening up a telepathic link with him, his voice coming through with lots of static, but understandable, ‘Trust me, Marcus.  I know what you’re going to say, but… trust me.’

It wasn’t an order… but Marcus paused and kept his mouth shut anyway. That didn’t stop him from gathering together his courage, and telepathically replying to the Alpha, ‘If you take her pack away from her, she’ll be like me. She’ll die.’

‘She’ll be like you, but she won’t die,’ Declan assured, the link strengthening a little bit with use. The Alpha had stopped speaking briefly, but now turned his attention back to the matter at hand, expression hardening with one last comment to Marcus, ‘Which might be more than she deserves.’  The connection finally buckled and broke then, leaving Marcus blinking in surprise, his fingers still digging into the muscle of Declan’s powerful shoulder.

Declan finished like an axe falling, “-I retract all that the pack stands for and all that it is.  As my second-to-last command to you, Clarissa Fen and Rob Karly, you shall never speak of Marcus Rushton, or his time here in this city or house.”

The Alpha’s tone demanded obedience with the power and unbreakable might of a chain, and Marcus shivered even as it rolled over him to its intended targets.  Marcus’s vulnerability made him feel like he’d been scorched for a second, standing too close to a roaring flame, but his first reaction was to hold onto Declan more tightly – since the other young man was the most solid item available. He was also an Alpha, Marcus reminded himself belatedly, even as the heat of the command was pushed aside by the utter power of the one who had wielded it.  Marcus sighed in relief, both embarrassed and ridiculously glad to be in the Alpha’s shadow, even if it was only borrowed protection and not really his.

By now, Clarissa was no longer fighting; she was resigned, like a sheep to s*******r.  Rob hadn’t bothered to rail against his fate, no doubt knowing that he at least stood a chance on his own, as a Beta.  However, most Betas his age weren’t packless, so other Werewolves would be suspicious of him, and it would be a long journey to finding a pack again – if he ever did. Still, the stigma against a lone Beta wasn’t a death-warrant, so he looked grim rather than devastated.

“And as my last order,” Declan said, and the whole room held its collective breath, even while the Alpha himself spoke with deceptive softness – a war-hammer wrapped all in mist.  “I command you to transform.”

Clarissa did so with such speed and reckless haste that it had to be her own will to do so.  Her clothing shredded around her as she simply tore free of it, jaws snapping as her body fell down onto all fours.  Then she was trying to escape, because she knew what was coming, and probably hoped that if she escaped it, then perhaps she still could maintain her ties to the Fen pack. Declan was just as fast, however, and Marcus jumped  back even as the Alpha similarly transformed without wasting time or focus on something so trivial as clothing – his entire concentration was on the bending and  breaking of his own skin.  Mere seconds after the words had left his mouth, two more wolves populated the room, and the black one was snarling to bare all his teeth.

Realizing she couldn’t do anything with Clarissa that Declan couldn’t do better, Liz shifted her focus to Rob.  The Beta was also changing shape as commanded, but more slowly, and with Kobi already watching him, the Beta showed no inclination to run. He’d wait his turn for the final steps of his banishment. 

Clarissa’s tail was tucked firmly between her legs as she thrashed free of the last of her torn human clothing, and she let loose a bark that was more of a squeal as Declan charged her.  Marcus watched, entranced.  He’d never seen someone being ostracized from their pack before, but everyone knew how it worked, and at least half of all wolves were ritualistically ‘banished’ from their birth-packs when they went to live with the pack that would be their new family. Even today, Marcus could remember his mother – the pack’s Alpha – padding up to him, both of them cloaked in their wolf skins and watching one another with wolf eyes.  She’d leaned over him and closed her jaws around his nape, where puppy-fur was giving way to the more bristled ruff of a grown wolf, and had bitten down.  The bite hadn’t been hard, merely enough that the bruises lingered later on his human skin – a temporary symbol of his expulsion.  At that moment, his telepathic link with her and the rest of the family pack had also been severed.  That had been a time of bittersweet celebration, as he’d left home. 

This was nothing like that. 

Clarissa didn’t even make it to the next room, although maybe she would have made it further if her wild scrambling hadn’t made her skid and collide with the couch, hitting it so hard it nearly overturned.  Declan was right on her back-paws, and as she was brought to a halt, he leapt and pinned her to the floor with his pure bulk. She twisted and let loose enough cacophony to make Marcus’s ears ring, and even tried to twist around and snap at Declan, but he just let loose a roaring snarl.  ‘Take this with dignity, Aunt,’ Marcus just barely thought he heard, as if he were just catching the barest echoes of the telepathic words Declan was broadcasting.  There was pain behind the words, too, but it didn’t stop Declan from surging downwards and clamping his jaws around the back of Clarissa’s neck.

The symbolism, Marcus knew, was that anyone leaving the pack left violently – like something hunted.  The back of the neck symbolically snapped like everything else was, although Alphas were not supposed to kill anyone in this procedure.  Entrance into the pack was a more human thing, a gesture of trust: a bite to the throat, done while in human shape.  Now, Clarissa was making noises like she was being murdered, but when Declan released her and stepped back, there was only the required amount of blood wetting her ruff.   It would scar. Other packs would be able to see that she’d left in disgrace. 

Now, she huddled on the floor like the most pathetic thing to walk the earth, and Marcus felt a deep sorrow for her, and pity.  Tentatively, he reached for that quiet space inside of him that was his Omega power, where he used to be passably good at radiating calmness. Now, he tried his best, hoping that he wasn’t so scrambled and messed up inside that he couldn’t do at least a little good. 

Heads and ears turned, everyone lupine now but Marcus himself, and suddenly alert as if to a sound that no human ears could hear.  Body language shifted – stiffened limbs eased, challengingly raised tails drifted lower, and hackles flattened.  Last of all to look at Marcus was Clarissa herself, getting her paws under her and looking at him with naked shock as he did his best to calm her.  Declan had told Marcus to trust him, so he had to believe that there was some hope for Clarissa, and as horrible as she was, he didn’t want her to leave in the same sea of terror that he’d arrived to this house in. 

Marcus had first arrived at the Fen-pack residence shaking, cowering, and bloody. Clarissa left the same way, but the difference was – she did so alone. 

Declan’s long snout turned to watch her go, and he released a very human-sounding sigh before turning to Rob. The other disgraced Beta shook a bit, and his snout twitched as if to snarl, but he lowered his head and averted his green eyes obediently. Rob was a pretty big wolf, with a mottled, dark-grey coat, but he still looked helpless in Declan’s soot-black jaws when the Alpha came over to finish his banishment. Rob struggled then, the pain making him whine, fear probably making him lash out with clawed paws, although Declan took the rake across his forelegs with barely a flinch – the responding snarl that bubbled up his throat was truly terrifying, however, and Rob subsided and gave in. He, too, was bloodied now, and wouldn’t look anyone in the eye as he looked the way Clarissa had gone and then quickly raced after her, like an adolescent pup following the scent of a parent. There was silence in the room, until Declan slowly tipped his head back and howled. There was blood smeared on his snout and chin, darkening the fur like wet ink, and the call that echoed up his throat was just about the saddest thing that Marcus had ever heard.