Pack Law
247 Words
Cael ran the entire way back to Duren territory.
He needed the wind on his face, the burn in his legs, the simple animal clarity of motion to push down the thing twisting in his chest. Mara's voice — get out — replayed on a loop he couldn't silence.
He hadn't lied to her. He had simply chosen, for three weeks, not to tell the truth completely. There was a difference. He had believed that, fully, until he watched her face change in that kitchen.
His alpha was waiting at the territory line, exactly as expected. Word traveled fast among wolves.
"She knows," his alpha said. Not a question.
"She knows everything." Cael didn't slow down. "The grandmother left a letter."
His alpha's expression sharpened with interest, not concern. That, more than anything, made something cold settle in Cael's stomach.
"This changes the timeline," his alpha said. "The council will want to move before the coven solidifies their position with her."
"She just told us both to leave her house."
"She's seventeen and overwhelmed. That will pass." His alpha's tone carried the particular confidence of someone who had never once doubted the pack's claim to anything it wanted. "Bring her north within the week, Cael. Whatever it takes."
Cael stared at him. Whatever it takes.
For the first time in his life, those words from his alpha sat wrong in his chest — like something he was supposed to obey but no longer fully recognized as right.
- Writer
