Your Alpha Mate

The moon chose me.  That’s what the pack shaman said to me three years ago after my parents died during a rogue attack. I now sat behind an elegant desk lined with papers on pack affairs. The Winter Summit was approaching. This event was the perfect opportunity to voice my concerns as Alpha of the Shadow Moon pack and to propose solutions that could be attained through the pack's joined effort. The main concern being the rogues and their growing presence in the region. I was only seventeen and the whole weight of the world fell onto me ever since. But I took on it for them, for my pack. We picked ourselves up and rebuilt what the rogues had destroyed and came out stronger on the other side and I would be damned if I lose one more family member to those bastards. My eyes scanned the desk until they reached the frame on the left corner. A picture of my younger sister, Willow, and my cousin, Logan, hugging and laughing as they sat on the front porch after my ascension to Alpha celebration. My heart clenched in my chest, the only blood family I had left. But my family was so much bigger now and they all looked up to me. The door to my office shot open and my beta, Maia, came rushing in. “Cali, you need to come see this!” She said, the urgency in her grey eyes had me shooting out of my seat to follow her. I followed her through the packhouse, through the main hall lined with wooden tiles and contrasting white furniture. The portraits of past pack alphas hung in chronological sequence down the dim-lit hall. Our feet rustling swiftly as we approached the elevator. “What’s going on?” I asked her as we walked in and she pressed the last floor on the dash, the lookout. “White Claw pack is under attack.” Her voice was solemn, lips tight. Her blonde hair hung just above her shoulders but it was ruffled as if she had been running everywhere to find me. White Claw was our neighbour pack. They resided not 10 miles from the edge of our territory. Two years ago I managed to settle peace between our packs by offering them our protection in exchange for theirs in the event of an attack. When we reached the top floor I quickly climbed the set of stairs of the lookout tower. The sentinel on duty nodded in respect. I looked out toward White Claw’s packhouse but even straining my vision I could only see small figures running around. “Report,” I commanded with my alpha tone, a tone that surprised me every time I used it, even after three years of being appoint- chosen. “White Claw pack appears to be under attack. I can hear them struggling but they have not signaled their flags to us yet,” When we arrived at an agreement with the White Claw pack, we agreed on a distress signal. If they raised their pack flag along with a red flag underneath it meant they were in distress and needed our help. I strained my own hearing and made out faint growling and struggling noises. I could hear the cries of wolves being wounded and their pounding hearts, or was that my own? In the past three years, we have only had to deal with rogues a few times but their groups have been small, manageable enough to not need reinforcements. But this time there were more. My wolf could smell the large group of rogue scents drifting to our territory, she was writhing under my skin, begging to be let out to tear through those rogues. Eager to kill. “Quickly,” I turned to Maia who was just a step behind me waiting for my decision, “Call forth a group, your best 20 wolves.” Maia nodded without hesitation and turned on her heels and disappeared as she descended the stairs three at a time. Let me know if anything changes I mind linked to the sentinel. Yes Alpha, He nodded again, bowing his head deeper this time. I turned and headed down to the entrance to meet Maia and the rest. As soon as my feet hit the grass my wolf leaped and tore through my human form and began running toward White Claw territory. I didn’t bother to check behind me, I knew they had all done the same. I could feel them running right behind me, I could hear them through our mind link. They were as eager as I was to get to those rogues. They had the same thirst for revenge. Rogues had taken enough from us and we would not allow them to take any more. ❈ My wolf was covered in blood by the time the conflict was over, and none of it was my own. There had been more rogues than I had anticipated. But my wolves managed to tear through most of them before they retreated back to the wild. My hunter instinct urged me to go after them but I knew there was damage control to do. A teenage boy in White Claw colours approached me with spare clothes in his hands. He was hesitant to come too close, understandably as my wolf towered over him by a fair few inches. He laid the clothes down a few feet from me and I nodded in gratitude and he retreated quickly. I willed my wolf down, my bones snapped back into place. It didn’t hurt anymore though. I had shifted so many times that the snapping of my bones had become a familiar discomfort. Once my wolf had stripped and I was human again I crouched by the folded clothes, nudity was not something we wolves were ashamed of. It was our natural state after shifting, so no one looked twice as I slid the white shirt over my exposed body. I slid my legs through a pair of wide pants and kept my feet bare. No trace of blood on my body. “Thank you for coming,” Orson, White Claw alpha, said as he approached me. I tilted my head in respect and he did the same. “Why didn’t you raise your flags?” I asked as we began walking towards the packhouse to see the damage. “By the time I realised we needed back up my entire pack was engaged, I couldn’t even afford one of us to abandon the front.” Orson had managed to keep the rogues from coming into the main packhouse, though the east wing looked as if it had been hit with the force of a hurricane. The front door was torn in, claw marks ran along the frame. My gaze swept sideways over Orson, and I could tell he was in main as he rigidly spoke with someone from his pack about the damages. “Did you lose anyone?” I blurted. Regretting the personal question, unsure if that was even something he would have wanted to share with me. His dark eyes found mine and in their solemness, I found my answer. I turned back to the main entrance, my pack members were helping wounded wolves, Maia herself was hauling a woman to her feet and helping her limp to the medical wing. Alpha, the startled voice of the sentinel echoed in my mind. What is it? The rogues! I didn’t need further explanation and by the way, the wolf from my own pack snapped their heads to me I knew they heard him too. We all began running again, back to Shadow Moon territory, I leaped and my wolf took over. I hit the ground and ran, we all ran like hell. ❈ How stupid of me. To take my best wolves and leave my own pack, my sister, without its best line of defense. By the time we made it a few rogues had managed to infiltrate the main packhouse and were tearing through whatever they could find. There weren’t as many of them this time, but with my own wolves worn from running and fighting so much, it would be harder. I let my wolf completely take over as I caught up to one of the rogues. My jaw locked as I bit through his jaw. The whine the wolf emitted didn’t even make my wolf stir as I ripped at its throat. The whining stopped and the blood flowed freely. ❈ Only two hours had passed since Maia had barged into my office, yet somehow it felt like I’d been going all day. The rogues that infiltrated the packhouse had been taken out, and yet there was no relief. Just a heavyweight on my chest as I sat by Willow in the infirmary. Her frail handheld between both of mine. She had gone head to head with one of the rogues that were trying to reach the children’s quarters. Even without any training, she managed to take down the rogue, but not without being badly injured herself. She had a large gash down the side of her right cheek and a deep wound on her abdomen and leg. The pack medic said that we were lucky we found her when we did of she might have bled out. Not even wolf healing would’ve been able to fix the gash on her inner thigh fast enough. My wolf whined and called to hers without any response. My hands shook as they held hers, but repeated to myself and my wolf that I needed to remain calm. My pack needed a leader, not a girl that freaked out the moment things got bad. Maia sat beside me and placed her hand on my shoulder. Her eyes remained on Willow and I bet she was thinking the same thing I was. We shouldn’t have kept for training another year. Seventeen was old enough to learn to fight, to kill those who may threaten her life or her pack’s. I just didn’t want to accept that for her. I wanted her to have a better life. To live without the guilt of someone’s life on her shoulders. And yet I’ve never regretted killing anyone. Every wolf I’ve taken out was a threat to me or those I care for. “She’ll be alright,” Maia stood beside me and offered me her hand. “I know, I just feel like this is all my fault,” I sighed as I took her hand and stood. “If only I had let her come to training, learn how to defend herself…” I trailed. “That’s done now, she’ll start her training as soon as she can shift again,” Maia squeezed my hand before letting go. “For now, your pack needs you, Cali,” Her eyes cut through me with a determination that made me admire her, the determination why I chose her as my beta. “You’re really good at your job you know?” I smiled at her weakly. She straightened, pride and loyalty spilling from her almost visibly as she bowed her head to me. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it, having people I look up to looking up to me.