The Forgotten Twin

Chapter 3: Realization

............8 months later............

One month before Alexa and I turned 16, for celebration of him becoming Alpha, Cillian invited a few wolves on a camping trip. I said yes, I hadn't been camping since shifting. Alexa didn't like camping so our parents decided they weren't going to take us. It was almost too cold to go but, I missed being in nature, plus Crescent loved spending the night in the woods. Cillian said we would be gone three days and we would be too far from the pack to mind-link. 

The morning of I packed four days worth of clothes and a two sets of pajamas. I put in a sweater and two boxes of granola bars. I grabbed a lighter and a compass, not that I would need it, I packed water shoes and a small bottle of soap and deodorant. I finished with my packing and left the house grabbing an apple on the way out. Mary and John, my parents, were probably waiting on Alexa some more. I sighed and met Cillian at the pack house with a few other wolves who stared at me in shock. Both of the other girls had suitcases, they boys were carrying sleeping bags and tents.

"What?" I asked.

"What are you gonna sleep in?" Cillian asked.

"Wolf-form." I replied shrugging my shoulders.

"What if it rains?" His beta Terrance asked.

"I have string and pocket knife, I can easily make a shelter." I said as Terrance raised an eyebrow.

"What if a creepy animal comes around?" Terrance's mate Ellie asked.

"I can scare it away in wolf form or with fire." I smiled at her as her friend huffed. I ignored her and set my bag down in the back of the SUV. Cillian's gamma Henry drove with Ellie's friend Sasha in the front seat. Ellie sat on Terrance's lap and I sat in the middle between them and Cillian. We played a stupid game and wasted time on the 2 hour drive to a spot in the middle of the Adirondack Mountains. We hiked up into the woods and decided to find a place closer to water, we found a marshy area with quite a few different little brooks. There was sign of two humans and a small female dog, based on the tracks the dog was around 45lbs. They had been there the day before us, so we calmly found a more hidden away spot and made camp. The clouds were dark and it had been raining on and off all day, so I pulled out my knife and went searching for some large branches with broad leaves. When I had enough I went back to camp to see everyone struggling with their tents. I dropped my leafy sticks and went back in the woods to find stronger sticks for support. I got what I needed and began making my shelter.

When I was done I looked at it proudly, it was a beautiful shelter with a wide opening and slanted incline to keep the rain from bringing it down. I looked around at my pack mates who were all getting the girls tent set up. I wandered back into the woods and found small dry sticks and larger chunks of dry wood. I brought everything back to camp and dug a small hole under my roof. I cleared the area around the divot in the earth and placed the small dry sticks inside it. I found white birch bark and set in under the small sticks and lit it with my lighter. Once my fire was going good I stripped down to my underwear and bra and set my clothes on my bag, I walked away from the fire and looked at the wolves who were staring at me. 

"Don't let the fire go out, I'm going to get dinner." I turned back to the woods and pulled off the rest of my clothing and shifted, the pain of the bones breaking and realigning stopped after a while, I let Crescent out and she began sniffing around for our meal. We smelled a black bear and decided against it, some would go to waste, the beaver was too small and so was the doe and fawn. But we had never seen a moose up close, we would have to judge by sight. We tracked the moose over three miles and looked at the size of it, definitely too big. We turned around and snuck away, we got on the heels of a nice sized buck and killed him by snapping his neck. Crescent and I dragged him back to camp to see the other wolves eating processed s**t. I snarled and ripped the back strap off the deer, then shifted to human form and made a usable pan out of a flat rock. I set the meat in the pan and shifted back to wolf form and washed off in the brook. 

When I was done I walked back to my underwear and threw them on before flipping my meat, I saw a few more pieces had been added and that someone had cleaned the deer. I noticed Henry was missing, and I smelled around for him, he was roughly 700 yards to the east dumping the entrails. I sighed and stayed alert until he was back, everyone else was talking and giggling. I ate my food when it was finished and talked with the group before Cillian called lights out. I stripped again and shifted, I pulled what was left of the deer far enough away from camp to keep the coyotes away. I went back to my shelter and curled up away from the dying fire. I expected to see the woman burn, instead I saw a dark skinned man being skinned alive, his crescent mark was different from mine, it was a lighter silver with a white outline. I felt my skin separate from my muscles with each cut of the blade he took. We both passed out from the pain after the skin on our right arm was gone. 

I opened my eyes to see Cillian looking down at me with concern, his dark hair was messy, yet he looked wide awake. I looked at my arm which was still burning, I sighed and rested my head back as my body cooled off.

"I'm fine, it was a vivid nightmare." I said lightly.

"You sounded like you were dying Ashlyn."

"There was a man being skinned alive, I felt every ounce of pain he did." I told him.

"You felt it?"

"Yes, I felt the skin being pulled from my arm leaving nothing my red muscles for the world to see."

"That is horrifying." I heard Terrance say.

"At least he passed out, before it was a woman tied to a stake, she was alive the entire time she burned." I took a deep breath and put my left arm over my eyes.

"How often does this happen?" I think it was Henry who asked.

"Every night since the day I shifted. Tonight was the first night of the man, I had actually gotten used to being burned alive every night." I said with a sad chuckle.

"So the screaming at night is you?" I heard Ellie ask.

"Unfortunately so. The worst night was after the blood rouges attacked and I rolled onto my broken ribs." I laughed dryly. 

"Do your parents know." Cillian asked.

"Yeah, they know there is nothing that can be done about it though." I lied. Not once had Mary and John asked about the nightmares. "Now can we go back to sleep. The nightmares only happen once a night and are extremely exhausting." I groaned. I shifted and rolled onto my belly putting my head in my paws for punctuation. Everyone went back to their tents and I closed my eyes, I was in a new place standing in front of a pure silver wolf, the mark of a crescent on its inside right pastern (wolf wrist), like mine. 

"Hello Crescent and Ashlyn." The wolf said to me.

"Hello... I don't know your name." I said. The wolf chuckled a little and looked down at us with a fondness I hadn't seen in a while.

"Call me Slate. I am your direct ancestor, it is from me you get the mark on your arm."

"None of my other family members have it, but the people in my dreams do."

"The crescent mark only appears on those in our blood line who are worthy enough to be called Crescent Wolves. I know you don't know what that is seeing as there hasn't been one in over 300 years. The last was Kraya, she was burned at the stake during the witch trials."

"Kraya was the woman in my dreams, that actually happened?" I felt a bit sick to my stomach.

"Yes, Hashame was skinned alive after he showed his human mate what he was. You saw him in your dream too correct?"

"Yes." I breathed out. "If I may, how did you die?"

"Peacefully, my mate Anetta lived and died together in our sleep." I let out a deep breath and looked into his eyes. "Now before I leave, I wanted to tell you how to do something I know you have wanted to do for a while."

"Cut the bond." It was the only thing I wanted at this point, I had blocked myself from my sister, but I could still feel her strongest emotions and if they were strong enough, they could ruin my day.

"All you have to do, is mix your blood with that of your twin, with a hint of wolfsbane and say "I hereby cut the bond that binds me to you Alexa Blake" then you must drink it."

"Drink the wolfsbane cocktail?" I asked taken aback.

"I am afraid so Ashlyn." I groaned and fell back to the ground. I closed my eyes but was woken up by a sudden glare. I opened my eyes to see the sun peaking over the mountain, I was back at camp. I got up and stretched then went down to the stream and got a drink. I layed by the brook and watched as a small deer got a drink just upstream, I was down wind, so it didn't smell me and run off. I watched it for a while before I got up startling the little critter. I jogged back to camp and shifted, I got dressed before anyone else was even awake. I went for a run and nearly ran into a couple of unsuspecting humans.They were whispering about seeing a black bear and how big they wanted it to be. I ran back to camp after I knew they couldn't hear me. Everyone was waking up and getting out of bed, I heard noise and I heard the two human boys talking. I cleaned the camp of bloody evidence of my deer hunt and packed up for the day. 

Everyone was packed up in ten after hearing the humans. I left my shelter up and kicked dirt over the fire place, then I had the guys pee on it to make it look like it had been there a while. We walked all day and had some rabbit for dinner. The day after we made our way back to the first camp, we saw conservation officers at our camp and skipped a fire and walked another two miles east before we all shifted and slept in wolf form. The next day on the way home I realized I never told Mary and John I was leaving for a few days. They were gonna be pissed. I was fretting the whole way home, I hoped they would be understanding seeing as I hadn't seen them before I left. 

We pulled up to the pack-house and said goodbye and I walked home. I went to the room I shared with Alexa and set my bag down, I went to the back yard where I heard them all chatting away and walked out. They all ignored me, until Alexa sighed.

"I want my own room Ashlyn." She said.

"There are rooms down stairs, feel free to move your s**t whenever." I said crossing my arms and raising an eyebrow.

"I wont be moving, you will." She said snubbing her nose.

"Are you gonna make me, last I checked I'm a hell of a lot faster and stronger than you." I growled.

"Alexa will not live in the basement, that is where the vermin goes." Mary said waving her hand while not looking at me. I felt my eyes sting as I finally realized just how little I meant to them now.

"Then why are you and John still upstairs?" I snarled at her back. She jumped up from her seat and growled at me. I kept snarling and she shook her head and blinked before she spoke again.

"Ash, just move your things, don't you want a room of your own?" She asked nicer than I had heard her in months.

"Does the vermin get a say?" I asked pissed off, I walked away and went to Alexa's room and began packing my things.