Moonlight Run

One

I don’t want to remember my father’s face. But I remember my brother’s face, and I know many have said they looked alike. And it is a brutal thing, this memory I have of him, because while I want every day to keep Julius alive in my mind, I would be happy to never see Ivan’s face again. This made looking in the mirror a bit of a challenge, since I look like my brother.

Frustrated, I gave up on the braid I was weaving and threw the brush and hair tie on the dresser surface, sitting on the bed with a groan. What I wouldn’t give for thicker hair… my hair fell around my face poker straight, stringy and thin, the ends split all to bits. No amount of volumizing shampoo helped, either. When it could be curled in waves with an iron it looked good enough, but the time afforded for that was rare. Around the compound, here in the manor, a quick braid was as much as I could do, when my fingers could manage. I looked at them, calloused to hell and sore, nails bitten down. It was no wonder I couldn’t get a proper grip on my hair. 

“Whatcha doin, Isa?” A bubbly voice came from my doorway. It was Carina, my younger sister.

“Thinking to myself, what I wouldn’t give for a nail appointment, I guess.” I said with a sigh.

She c****d her head to the side, and saw my half undone braid. “Need some help with the hair?” she asked.

“Sure, if you have time.”

“I’ve got a minute.” She beamed. Carina skipped over excitedly. At fourteen now she was discovering a love for all things girly; hair and makeup in particular. She spent her free time watching online tutorials, and spoke of going to cosmetology school someday when she graduates, “If the Alpha will let me,”

I was sure he would. As the daughter of the Beta, Carina got off much easier than I did. Being put on morning laundry service sounded like a luxury compared to what I’ve spent my life doing. 

“Oh, you smell like straight up clorox.” She said as she worked her hands through my hair.

“Bathrooms today,” I said simply. 

“Well, at least you get paid for it now,” She remarked.

“A weekly allowance is hardly a living wage.” I rolled my eyes.

“No, but I bet if you and Pipa ate here at the packhouse with us instead of grabbing takeout all the time, you’d be able to save a bit to get yourself out of here.” She reprimanded.

“Okay, mom,” I teased.

“You know she’s not wrong.” Carina laughed, sat back and patted her work. 

“There, I did a crown braid, if that’s alright.”

I stood and looked back at the mirror above my dresser. She’d started with the pieces from my right side-part and braided all along to my lower left side. It was pretty, and I was grateful.

“Thanks. I had to skip a shower this morning so I wasn’t able to do shìt with it.”

“Sleeping in again?” She tutted. “Where were you this time?”

“Three Rivers,” I admitted. 

“You ran all the way to Pittsburgh?” She stood from the bed and looked at me, jaw agape.

“God no, Pipa drove.”

“What on earth were you doing on a Sunday night?”

I shrugged. “We saw a band, had a few beers…”

“With a few boys?” Her face turned to horror.

I smiled slyly. “Maybe.”

“I hope Pipa behaved herself… she’s going to get in trouble if she’s sleeping around and the Alpha finds out.”

“Pipa is twenty-one now, Carina. She is trying to find her true mate so she’s not stuck with whoever the hell Phineas decides to pair her up with.”

She kneads her hands nervously and isn’t looking me in the eye anymore.

“Carina, you know you can’t tell anyone.” I step towards her and she whimpers, still not meeting my eyes. “Carina…”

She sighs and looks up at me. “She didn’t come to breakfast this morning, and Alpha was suspicious you two had been out again. Something about a phone call… So dad told me to come here and find out and… and…”

“Carina!” I gasped. 

“He compelled me, Isa. I’m sorry. I have to tell him.” She turned on her heel and went running down the stairs and I followed behind. 

“You know you can’t outrun me if I shift!” I called after her. I really didn’t want to, as I knew another housekeeping uniform would come out of my allowance if I ruined it. I continued to follow her down the flight of stairs and into the entry hall when she slammed into Maeve, our head cook. She’d had an armful of clean plates and bowls in her hands and they all went crashing to the floor. 

“Carina!” she screeched, and then looked at me and extended her finger. “Isadora, were you chasing her about?”

“I– well, I…”

“Isadora,” a booming voice said, echoing throughout the entry hall. I looked around the stairway to find my step-father, Leon, standing at the end of the hallway that led to the administrative offices. “My office, now.”

I steadied my breath, shooting a glare in Carina’s direction as she knelt to help Maeve with the broken dishes, and made my way over to Leon. I followed him down the hallway to the left and he opened the door, motioning for me to enter. I stood in front of his desk as I heard it slam behind me and contained a yelp.

“Where is Pipa?” He demanded.

“In bed still, I imagine.”

“And where were the two of you last night?”

“We went out.” I crossed my arms defensively. “We’re adults — since when is that a crime?”

“I got a call about twenty minutes ago from the Beta at the Three Rivers pack… he tells me that they had guests arriving from the Niagara Valley pack last night. The Niagara Valley’s Alpha brought along his daughter, who’d recently turned twenty-one. They’ve been visiting nearby packs, keeping an eye out for her mate. Do you think she found her mate last night?”

“I don’t know…” His glare at me was furiously intense. “No?”

“No, she didn’t. Because that boy wasn’t at the dinner they threw last night. He went with another wolf to meet up with two girls in Pittsburgh… Would you happen to know who these two girls were?”

I gasped, knowing what he would say next. 

“So this morning, when these boys decided to stumble into their packhouse, they did so smelling like two female wolves… female wolves that were not from their pack, and were not their mates. And you can imagine the impression that made on his new mate.”

“Leon, please understand. They said they’d both been twenty-one for a while and had no luck yet. And I’m not even of age so there’s no harm…”

“There is harm, Isadora!” He leaned against his desk and pinched the bridge of his nose in frustration. “There is political harm. I know you are young and you have very little concept of diplomacy, and if you’d actually been raised as an Alpha’s daughter maybe you would understand the delicacy of these matters.” 

“And whose fault is that?!” The words fell out before I could stop them, but I threw my hand over my mouth to contain them, just the same.

Leon stalked over to me and took both my wrists in his hands and held them down at my side. “I have tried to make amends, Isadora. I have tried to give you the best life I could in my position. Your mother has sacrificed so much—”

“Yeah, like a son’s life and a daughter’s future. And for what? For you?” I spat back at him, deciding not to contain my anger anymore. 

I loved my sisters, Pipa who I was fortunate enough to call my best friend, and even Carina, our shared sister born from the union of our parents. But try as I might, I just could not get past my mother’s choice to marry Leon. I understood the politics of the decision, and how it let her have a small taste of the lifestyle she had when she was an Alpha’s wife… I even expected there was a good chance Leon treated her better than our father ever had. But his betrayal cost my brother his life, and I didn’t know where to begin in forgiving him for it.

Leon’s face contorted into silent rage, but he stepped back and released my wrists from his grasp. “Security,” he called.

I gasped as two men in navy suits entered the office and looked at my step-father, pleading, “No, Leon… please, no.”

“She can spend a night in the cells. Wake Pipa when you’re done, and bring her to me. When I’m finished, she can join Isadora.”

“Leon! Please,” I cried out as they carried me away.

“I hope one day you learn to value the freedoms you have here, Isa.” He shook his head in disappointment, closing the door to his office behind him.

I found myself curled over my knees on the floor while I waited for Pipa to join me. When she finally did, the guards were much more delicate with her than they had been with me.

“Fūcking Carina,” Pipa cursed as the silver gate shut in front of her. “She forgets that she has two older sisters who can kick her àss.” She threw her beautiful blonde hair over her shoulder, looking over at me. “And I’m going to, just as soon as we get out of here.”

I grunted in response, still clutching my knees.

“Can I have top?” She motioned to the bunks.

I nodded and returned to my balled up position.

“Hey,” Pipa knelt down toward me. “It’s one night. And honestly, better Dad than Phineas, right?”

“That’s easy for you to say Pipa, but I spent almost a whole year down here sixteen years ago, remember?”

She looked to the ground, ashamed. “I’m sorry. I just meant, one night compared to that… ya know, just saying that it could be worse.”

“I’m well aware,” I stood to my feet and made my way over to the bunk, where I curled up on the uncomfortable mattress, trying to put the painful memory from my mind.

***

16 YEARS AGO

It was the last happy memory I had.

My mother stood watching us in the field to the left of the packhouse. 

I had a rainbow colored ribbon wand in my hand and was chasing my brother, Julius, all over the lawn. “Tag, you’re it!” we cried out, handing off the wand and taking up chase of the other.

“You can’t catch me, JuJu!”

My mother was taking photographs of us and laughing, when a few men I recognized from my father’s security detail came upon us. I remember that she held her hand to her forehead, to shield her eyes from the sun as she watched them approach. I could hear them telling her that we all needed to come inside. When she asked why, they said it would be better to discuss without us around. I couldn’t hear everything that followed. I just remember following my mother as the men led us into the packhouse and then through the annex to the cells. I’d never been down there before, and for a brief moment I was excited… until the same men that we had known to protect us, to serve us, locked us in the cells.

My mother soon realized that it was a coup. 

My father, Alpha Ivan Petrova, was a tyrant of a ruler. What the people of the Cuyahoga Valley pack didn’t know was that Ivan Petrova’s tyranny fell on us, too. His love for his family extended to us, but in particular to Julius, only as far as his use for us. But even Julius, his golden child that would further his line, could not meet his standards all the time. I remember my mother stroking a bruise on Julius’ face as she held a compress to it… and I’ll never forget crying in a broom closet while he screamed at her in the packhouse hallway, afraid I’d be the next target of his wrath. 

So when my father’s Beta, Leon Fournier, along with our people, sought to have him removed as Alpha of the Cuyahoga Valley pack, they took us hostage out of desperation. They were sure that we were the only things he cared about; my mother, my brother, and myself. But my father wasn’t that kind of man… 

So for many months, my mother, brother, and I lived in those cells… we were visited only by the staff for meals. Sometimes Leon would come by to pass updates to my mother and ask for her help in securing my father’s surrender.

“Marisol, if you would just link to him— he’s blocked us out. Please, make him see reason,”

“Don’t you think I have tried, Leon?” My mother cried out. “He won’t hear it. He doesn’t believe me. He thinks I’m a part of this… that I’ve conspired with you.”

No, my father was not a family man. He was the kind of man who made sure he was always owed a favor. He called on a nearby pack, the Allegheny River clan, who owed him just that kind of favor. And that’s when Alpha Phineas and his warriors came to my father’s aid, to seek out and destroy those who would dare stand against my father’s rule.

But Phineas was no fool; he was a survivor, and Leon knew that.

Phineas’ pack numbers had taken a hit in a series of rogue attacks just a year before, a problem that my father had sent his warriors to help him overcome. This was the favor that Phineas was now in debt to my father for.

“What if your numbers could triple?” Leon offered. “The people plan to install me as their Alpha when Ivan falls… but if you help us, I will throw my support to you instead, and our packs can merge. I only ask to stay on as Beta.”

“And the people will follow me?” Phineas scoffed, but he was intrigued.

“They follow me. But I do believe at this point they would follow anyone that wasn’t Ivan. And if you have my support, then you’ll have theirs.”

“Well, I did lose my Beta in the rogue attacks last year…” Phineas smirked.

And so the deal was struck. The terms were many, but Leon was sure to include that my mother and her children were to go free and be permitted to live among the people of the pack. 

Phineas was not fond of the idea, particularly when it came to Julius. “And let a future Alpha be raised here in my pack, where he could one day challenge my line for a title he sees himself fit to inherit?”

It was a hard argument for Leon to win, but eventually it was agreed. In just a few short weeks Phineas’ men had forced my father into surrender. When his trial was over, he was sentenced to be driven to the edge of our territory, where he would live out his days as a rogue. 

We were released to say our goodbyes, and we met him at the edge of the compound, where a circle of SUVs were parked and armed guards with rifles— no doubt containing silver bullets — stood by. One-by-one he kissed us goodbye, the first time I believe I ever saw him show any emotion towards either my mother or I in my life. I’ll never forget the last thing he said to me. 

“Never forget how old you were today, when you last looked at your old man.”

“Okay, daddy,”

He pulled me towards him and whispered in my ear, “How old are you, babygirl?”

“I’m five, daddy,” I said with a sheepish grin.

“Five? What?” He faked outrage. “No, not my girl. You’re four, you silly goose.”

I remember giggling at him. “But mama said I’m five.” 

He looked at my mom and smiled. “Well, you tell that mama she needs to learn to count. Our baby girl is four. She won’t be five until June. Isn’t that right, mama?”

My mother registered a look of confusion for a moment, but then smiled back at him, nodding. And then she kneeled beside me. “That’s right, sweetie. You’re four.” And she pecked me on the cheek, nodding at him again. 

Next, he knelt before Julius, a single tear falling from his cheek. My mother had just motioned me away, to give my father a private moment while he said goodbye to my brother. But as I reached for my mother’s hand and we took a few steps towards the packhouse, there was a large blast. Everything felt hot around us— the ringing is still as fresh in my memory as it felt in my ear that day.

When the ringing stopped, the smoke had cleared, and the fire was eventually put out. The two guards closest to my mother and I had leapt to shield us, saving us from the blast… But my father and JuJu had been reduced to ash.

That was the worst moment of my life, and I’ve rarely known a moment of happiness since.

Being back in this cell now, reliving those memories… those agonizing months leading up to that day, living in this cold silver box with my brother and mother… every second I’m in here feels like it might be the second worst moment.

But could it be worse?

Yeah, I guess it could be worse.