The Alpha's Powerful Luna

Chapter 17

**Jade POV**

I could feel my nerves intensifying the closer we got to the woods. I’ve always heard shifting for the first several times could be difficult and painful, so I wasn’t too excited for that but I was curious to see what Astrid looked like and what it felt like to run as a wolf. Elliott guided me to a larger tree we could hide behind and began to strip immediately.

“I’ll shift first so Aries can support Astrid through her shift. I’ve heard from wolves who shifted the first time with their mate that it helped with the pain some. Cleo said leaning against Jasper in his wolf form helped her through the process.” Elliott explained and I halfway heard him. I was too busy taking in his naked body. If I thought seeing him without a shirt was a problem, this was way worse. His legs were just as muscled as the rest of him, and a brief daring glimpse at his manhood told me that area was equally impressive. I suddenly felt hot all over, a single bead of sweat sliding down the middle of my back.

Before I could even feel bad about how openly I was ogling my mate, he winked at me and began shifting. Obviously, he was a powerful wolf because his shift was nearly noiseless and took what felt like a fraction of a second. In place of my glorious mate now stood a large, midnight black wolf. He stared at me with bright green eyes, blinking slowly as if to try and communicate something to me. I stood in awe of him for a moment. If I thought Elliott was intimidating, this wolf was downright frightening. He stood at least 6 feet tall on all fours, he was absolutely massive! I could hear Astrid howling in my head at the sight of him.

“Our turn.” Astrid said gently, and I could feel myself shaking uncontrollably.

“I’m scared.” I linked back.

“Don’t be, I know what to do. You just have to clear your mind and let me take over.” Astrid instructed and I knew to obey her. I began to hesitantly take my clothes off and Aries didn’t move a muscle. I could tell that where Elliott was more gentlemanly and considerate, Aries was more possessive and primal. Somehow, his watchful gaze didn’t seem to concern me as much as I thought it would. I felt oddly safer while he had his eyes on me.

I closed my eyes, trying as hard as I could to think of nothing and it seemed to work. I felt like I was being moved backwards in my mind, seeing everything from slightly farther away and I could tell that Astrid had successfully taken control. Before I knew it, I felt consumed by this burning sensation and heard the cracking of every individual bone in my body as we shifted. I fought back a scream as I felt Aries nuzzle himself up close to my side and rub his head across my back soothingly. Within a few minutes, the pain subsided altogether and I opened my eyes to see paws beneath me.

“We did it!” I cried to Astrid in my head.

“Yes we did!” She cheered right back.

“I wonder what we look like.” I mused.

“I hear a stream just a few minutes north of here.” Astrid announced as she took off into a sprint. I could hear Aries just behind us.

If I were in human form, running through these woods at any speed would be pretty challenging with all the twigs, uneven ground and tree roots weaving through the ground, but somehow as Astrid, we were careening through the woods at impossible speeds. Aries’ foot steps became more and more distant behind us and I wondered if he was giving us our privacy.

We began to approach the water and I was consumed with suspense. I was about to see my wolf in the flesh.

I gazed into the crystal clear water beneath me and saw a pair of piercing, deep blue eyes staring back at me. Something about these eyes felt familiar. They seemed to be absolutely filled with wisdom and knowledge, they looked much older than Astrid and I. Tearing myself away from what were apparently my wolf’s eyes, I noticed the rest of us. We were somewhat petite for a wolf but what really struck me was our fur.

“We’re WHITE.” I gasped in my own head.

“Yes, we are.” Astrid declared like it was something to be proud of. I had to admit, I was absolutely mesmerized at the sight of my beautiful wolf, and the more I thought about it, the more I realized I’d never seen an all white wolf before us.

I heard footsteps approaching and turned to see what looked like everyone else’s wolves appearing just behind us. One wolf stuck out at me, impressively sized and all silver. I recognized her her scent and realized she was Leona, Emma’s wolf and she and Astrid eagerly approached each other, crouching into a play position immediately. We circled each other playfully for a few minutes before I led her to the stream to look at herself.

She stared for a long time, perhaps longer even than I did. I couldn’t blame her, I’d only seen a few gray wolves in my lifetime and I loved to sneak out to watch the warriors shift for guard duty at night so I’d seen my fair share of wolves. What was more interesting than Leona’s fur was the color of her eyes. They were gray with hues of purple. She was an absolutely gorgeous wolf.

As I gave Emma and her wolf some privacy, I took in the wolves around us and realized I somehow could tell who each wolf was. Obviously, Aries was closest to me, but there was a reddish brown wolf of similar size that I recognized as Cameron, another black wolf with gray peppering the ends of his fur, similar in stature and looks to Elliott who I assumed was William, a delicate looking chocolate brown wolf who appeared to be Cleo, a dainty and graceful golden wolf which appeared to be Vera, and my wolf took an involuntary step back as she locked eyes with the largest wolf of our group. He was white on his legs, stomach, and halfway up his back. His top half was a dark gray color, and his eyes were black as night. He was arguably larger than Aries which was exceedingly uncommon for an alpha wolf to be smaller than one of his ranked members. I knew this wolf had to be Jasper’s. He dripped authority, lethality, and had a commanding presence that greatly exceeded that of a normal beta. This wolf was at least 7 or 8 feet tall on all fours, and almost equally as long. He stood stoically overlooking everything that happened, and my wolf averted her eyes to avoid setting herself into a panic at his sheer presence. Aries had an equally if not a slight bit more commanding presence, but possibly the mate bond our wolves shared made him less frightening.

Finally, Leona tore herself away from her reflection and Aries approached us slowly, c*****g his head toward the clearing we could see through about 100 more feet of trees. Without warning, Astrid took off into a sprint once again toward it.

Running as Astrid was the ultimate high. I felt invincible, I felt like I was flying. I began to hear the footsteps behind us fading even more but I couldn’t bring myself to care. I was puzzled that out of all these experienced wolves who’d shifted probably hundreds to thousands more times than us, no one seemed able to keep up.

“Are we faster than them?” I asked Astrid.

“I….. think….. we might be…. an enhanced wolf?” Astrid sounded hesitant.

“You think maybe we have…. Like, super speed?” I asked, perplexed and coming to a complete stop.

“I’m not totally sure, but I think we’re faster than average, that’s for sure.” My wolf sounded just as confused as me.