The Lost Heir

The Alpha

4 The Alpha

“Where were you yesterday?”

“Did you miss me?”

“God no! I wanted help with the math test.”

“Which math test? Is there a math test?”

“Oh, I take it you still haven’t asked around on what you missed.”

“What math test Elsa?”

“A math test from the math teacher of course.”

“Are we going to do this? Like seriously?”

“Okay fine, the teacher came in and gave some questions saying they would, or might reflect in the end of semester exams. If anyone can finish up fast enough and submit, he would mark and tutor them on what they didn’t understand. As you can see, I need the tutoring from you first before going to him but it seem like I’m mistaken!”

“Is it really compulsory?”

“Jesus! Didn’t you hear what I just said?”

“So it’s not. I’m not going to do it?”

Elsa’s face squinted with curiosity and confusion. It was unlike me to say that I would skip any sort of test in school. I did them all even the optional questions in exams. Elsa and I would sometimes do some reading together but mostly, in my perspective, I wanted to spend more time with her. Talking to her felt tranquil and alive.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes! I’m fine. Do I look sick?”

“You look like s**t and what’s with you eyes? They ..”

“The f**k! What do you see?” I said with my eyes wide open while rubbing them incessantly. In my head, I couldn’t stop thinking about how my werewolf side had begun to show off and I was unable to control it.

“Now if you continue doing that I can’t see anything. They’re just red. Did you smoke anything?”

“What?”

“Where have you taken Meridian? This version is deaf and dumb. You’re eyes are red. Unless you smoked something, you should see one of your fancy doctors.”

“No! I don’t smoke.”

“Oh really, you don’t do what now?”

“It was just that one time. Trust me. I have never!”

“Trust is something complicated but hey, the test. Are you going to help or not?”

“No. I have something I need to do?”

“What other thing?”

Before I could answer Elsa, I left her presence and rushed to the cloakroom to see how red my eyes were. Considering the concoction Zuri had given me, I shouldn’t be experiencing such things. The medicine was supposed to hide all this.

“Hello, Zuri, its not working.” I my eyes were red hot and my iris had started to release a glow that anyone could see if they focused on me. I was shocked by this and the only person who knew about my situation was Zuri.

“Did you take the medicine I gave you?”

“Of course and I don’t know what’s happening with me. someone had to tell me that my eyes were red. What should I do?”

“Then that means it’s stronger than I thought,” whispered Zuri.

“What’s stronger?”

“Listen to me, drink the remaining medicine, all of it?”

“What! You said i..”

“I know what I said and I’m telling you to drink the rest. Unless you want to start growling in the middle of your classes!”

“Wait, growling? What is happening?”

“Your transition is much faster and just drink. We’ll meet in the evening.”

That day, hours felt like days as time dragged itself like a snail. I couldn’t wait to leave school and stay away from everyone before I let the cat out of the bag. As for Elsa, who wanted us to hang out, I was left with no other option but run away from her each time I saw her coming my way. I didn’t want to destroy the good thing we had and if she had a hint of who I truly was becoming, she might be scared and I would lose her too. When classes were over, I took off as fast as I could, heading home to meet Zuri so that we could contain the situation.

Only one person I didn’t want to see, my grandfather. I hadn’t gone to see him as he requested the previous day and that morning, I rushed to school even before we could meet. I had decided that if I limited the time I spent with him, I would have a chance to hide my werewolf side from him at least until the transition was complete, or when I knew how to get rid of the werewolf part altogether. I was still undecided if I wanted to be a werewolf or wanted to live a normal life, normal mafia life. But my grandfather wasn’t someone I could just evade like that, after all I lived in his home. Coming back from school, he was on the rooftop, watching over the city. As soon as I entered the compound, he signaled to me that I should follow him to where he was. With my red eyes, I started working on an excuse. Maybe I should say I had chilli on my eyes. But then again, chili can only affect one eye, and for a limited time. Or maybe, those were the side effects of the medicine Zuri gave me. That looked like a better vindicate, and as I grinned with satisfaction, I walked straight to where my grandfather was.

“How are you feeling today Kiddo. It seems yesterday you had more time ti recharge. I didn’t see you.”

“Yes, Zuri’s medicine was to strong and I just felt like sleeping. I’m better now.”

“Glad to hear that. I wanted to show you something about you.”

“About me? what?”

“It’s more of your father.”

“What about him? Did you find him?”

“About that especially. We had found a lead that his clan resided deep in the valley and I sent men to capture him. But ..”

“Do you know how he looks like? Do you have a picture?”

“Can you not interrupt me while am speaking?” barked my grandfather. He never liked anyone jumping to the end of a conversation with questions when he spoke. I just couldn’t help it because it was my father he was speaking about. I had never seen a picture of him in all these years and no one dared to show me. I used to wonder if they were looking for him, then there must be a reference being used to identify him.

“Yes, sorry.” I replied with tepidness as I looked away from his harsh gaze. Sometimes, I would feel like my grandfather was bipolar because he would change from a moment of happiness to anger or any other emotion, but mostly anger and disappointment in a blink of the eye and before you understand what happened, he’s back to his normal behavior.

“So I was saying, I had sent people to look for him, but unfortunately, there was an attack, seems like an ambush but nobody knew we were going, so I take it it’s an attack. Some people were hurt and others lost their lives in the fight. Unfortunately, the men who survived said they saw wolves, huge wolves who were controlled by their attackers.”

As my grandfather explained tome what happened, I was lost in my thoughts as I started to connect the dots about what Zuri had told me earlier about being a setup. And the wolf part scared me the most to the point where my face started forming funny expressions which became evident to my grandfather that I was scared. So its true, my father is a werewolf. s**t! Consequently, I noticed how my grandfather felt bad he lost some of his men whom he trusted with such a task. He was the type of person who only has specific people for specific jobs and finding my father only had several men entrusted with the job. Looking at his face, his spirits were low and it almost felt as if he was on the verge of giving up. Almost two decades were being consumed and he still did not find his daughter’s rapist. To my grandfather, my father was the reason why my mother died because shortly after being pregnant with me, I was told that my mother started having health issues that were unexplainable. As the pregnancy grew, her health deteriorated until the time I was born; a five-kilogram baby boy who was heavier than a typical child. It was thought that her health would be optimal after the pregnancy but shortly after I was born, roughly a year later, she started having trouble breathing, combined with other digestive tract diseases. Soon I was three years and my mother passed away even before I could recognize her face. It’s so strange how we don’t remember anything from our childhood. A least I would have remember the short time we spent together. Even so, everyone told me that she loved me more than anything and even with her condition, she still found time to play with me when I had started walking, stay with me all night as I cried my lungs out, the thought of that gives me satisfaction that I was loved, even though it was for a short time. On the other hand, I didn’t know how it felt for my grandfather but I was sure he wouldn’t stop looking for my father.

“What will you do to him when you find him?” I asked while looking at him. I knew he wanted to kill him for what he did because at first, my grandfather was against me being born in the first place. He had advised my mother to get rid of the pregnancy which meant I wouldn’t have existed if things went his way. Thank God for my mother’s stubbornness, because if weren’t for her, I wouldn’t be here today. Despite everything that happened, my grandfather still had it in him to raise me on his own.

“I don’t know,” answered my grandfather after looking at me straight in the eyes. I couldn’t know what emotion he was expression neither did I know why he said I don’t know because that wasn’t the answer I was expecting from him. I wanted to know exactly what would happen to my father because unlike him, my satisfaction would come from answers.

“Come, follow me!”

“Where are we going?” I asked impatiently.

“Meridian, a good leader is the type that listens first before the speak, observes before giving their input on anything. Right now, you are throwing everything I taught you in the wind and I’, wondering if all this time I had been talking all by myself. Do you learn anything?”

Embarrassment engulfed me like a pathogen to its host and I found myself looking down, unable to maintain eye contact with my grandfather. It wasn’t my fault though, I wanted to know more than I was told and how my grandfather operated was serpentine. It was hard to know what he really had behind his sleeves which was nauseating to me because I wanted to have everything at once. Combine that with how he talked slowly, listening to him could be a job of its own. Maybe that’s how old people are like, it just didn’t fit with me.

“Yes sir.”

As we walked down the stairs, I started hearing a ringing in my head. The sound started mildly but progressed faster with each step on the staircase. Unanticipatedly, hell broke loose and tinnitus took over making me wriggle with pain as I covered my ears. My grandfather who was just two steps in front of me was met with astonishment as he wondered what happened to me from the moment he finished talking and taking the lead to his destination. I screamed at the top of my voice as I wished someone would come help me. The goggles I had worn to mask my red eyes fell on the floor and I began seeing the visions Zuri had tried to suppress with his elixir. My hard was pounding faster and I could feel the air in my lungs getting heavier. All of a sudden, a low growl started to emanate from my vocal box and at that point, I knew that the transitions were getting worse, Zuri’s portion wasn’t working.

My grandfather tried collecting me from the floor but I couldn’t let him because he would hear my low growl and connect it to the beasts who attacked his men. But there was nothing I would have done, I wasn’t able to help myself from there and all I could think of is hiding my true self from my grandfather. I knew it would break him in half if he knew I had my father’s DNA in me because that would mean something else for the entire family.

“What’s wrong kiddo? Didn’t Zuri give you medicine to help?”

“I’m fine, I just..”

“No you ain’t fine,” consoled my grandfather while looking around if anyone was coming our way. “Can someone come over, and bring Zuri along!”

Then, I started to feel like someone was draining energy away from my body. Slowly, my vision started to disappear as the ringing in my ears faded simultaneously. I heard several pairs of footsteps of people and as I closed my eyes, I saw a face I didn’t know telling me he was there, nothing would happen to me. I was too weak to concentrate on his face but I noticed the beard and a scar that run from his left cheek towards where his beard started. I didn’t know why I believed his words when he said that but deep down I felt I was in safe hands. It was a vision of some sort that lasted only several seconds before I blacked out, not knowing what happened afterwards.