Rejected But Chosen

The Hunters Mark

North meant county road. North meant humans. North meant I could disappear if I was smart.

I wasn’t smart. I was eighteen, wolfless, wearing a Beta’s jacket and carrying a knife I didn’t know how to use.

But I walked.

The sun was up and the trees thinned. I hit the road after an hour. Asphalt. Hot already. A semi went past and didn’t slow. The driver didn’t look at me. Good.

I stayed on the shoulder, behind the guardrail. I kept the tree line close. If a car stopped, I was gone before the door opened.

The pup was gone. The note said run north. It didn’t say why. It didn’t say who wrote it. Korr? The pup somehow? The moon?

Didn’t matter. I ran.

My feet hurt. Reed’s socks helped but the boots were still mine. Thin. Cheap. Aunt Amy bought them two sizes too big so they would last. They didn’t.

I made it three miles before I heard the first howl.

It wasn’t pack. Pack howls were deep, layered, a song. This was one voice. High. Long. Hunting.

Council.

They were at the cabin.

Reed’s lie was done.

I got off the road. I went into the ditch. I crawled under a culvert pipe. It was wet and smelled like rust. I pulled my knees up. I put the knife on my thigh.

I waited.

A truck went by. Then another. Then quiet.

Then boots.

They stopped above the culvert.

“Smell that?” A man’s voice. Not wolf. Not human. Council. They had a smell like cold metal.

“Silver,” a second voice said. Female. “Faint. She was here. Hour ago, maybe less.”

“She’s running.”

“They always run.”

“Beta scent too. Strong. He was with her.”

“Report says Beta Reed of Shadow Creek. Twenty. Unmated. He lied to his Alpha. Council wants both heads.”

“Orders?”

“Track. Don’t kill. Council wants her alive for the claiming.”

My stomach turned. Claiming. Not execution. Claiming.

The boots moved on. North. Following me.

I stayed in the pipe until I couldn’t hear them. Then I stayed longer.

When I came out, the sun was straight up. Noon. I was shaking from cold and fear.

I drank from the water bottle. Half left. I needed more. I needed food. I needed Reed.

I got none of it.

I walked.

Shadow Creek square was not loud anymore.

Reed stood on the dais alone. Jax was gone. Elder Marrow was gone. Korr was gone.

The pack was gone.

Only one wolf stayed. A girl. Young. Omega. She held a piece of paper.

She ran to Reed when he stepped down. “Beta. They left this.”

Reed took it. Council seal. Black wax. A wolf head with a line through it.

He broke it.

_Beta Reed of Shadow Creek.

You harbored Silver Blood.

Penalty is death.

Your Alpha has fled. Your pack has scattered.

You have 24 hours to deliver the female to the North Gate.

If you run, we hunt your bloodline.

If you comply, your sister lives._

Reed read it twice.

His sister was twelve. She was at the Academy two territories over. Safe. Supposed to be safe.

He crumpled the paper.

The Omega girl watched him. “What do we do?”

“We?” Reed said.

“You’re still Beta. I’m still pack. Even if it’s just us.”

Reed looked at her. She was thin. Scared. But she stayed.

“Go home,” he said. “Pack a bag. Go to your aunt in River Glen. Don’t tell them I told you.”

“What about you?”

He didn’t answer. He shifted. Storm gray wolf. He ran.

West first. To the cabin.

It was empty. Door open. Bed made. Board in place. No pup. No Aria.

But there was a smell. Council. Two of them. And under it, silver. Faint. Going north.

He shifted back. He pulled on his spare pants from the chest. He took the rifle from over the door. He checked it. Loaded.

He left the cabin. He didn’t lock it.

He ran north. As wolf. Fast. Faster than he’d ever run.

I heard him before I saw him.

Not the Council hunters. Not Jax.

Him.

I was under a bridge. Night was coming. I was cold. I was hungry. I was thinking about giving up. Thinking about walking to the North Gate and ending it. Maybe they’d let Reed’s sister go if I did.

Then a sound. Paws. Steady. Not hunting. Coming.

I held the knife. My hand shook.

A wolf came out of the trees. Storm gray. Big.

It stopped ten feet away. It sat.

It was him. I knew it. The way he held his head. The way he looked at me and didn’t look away.

“Reed?” I said.

The wolf stood. It shivered. Bones moved. Fur pulled in. Man stood there. Naked. Breathing hard.

He had the rifle across his back. He had dirt on his face. He had blood on his hands. Not his.

“You’re alive,” he said.

“You’re stupid,” I said. “They’re hunting you.”

“They’re hunting you. I’m just in the way.”

He walked to me. He stopped two feet away. He didn’t touch me. He looked me over. Feet. Legs. Face.

“You’re hurt.”

“I’m fine.”

“You’re not.”

He shrugged the rifle off. He dropped it. He took his jacket off. He had a shirt under it. He took that off too. He held it out.

“Yours is bloody.”

I looked down. The pup’s blood. The dress blood. It was all over me.

I took his shirt. I turned around. I changed. His shirt went to my knees too. It was warm from his body.

When I turned back, he was watching the road.

“Council took the pack,” he said. “Scattered them. Jax ran. Elder Marrow too. They left a letter.”

“What did it say?”

“That they have your sister.”

I stopped breathing. “I don’t have a sister.”

“Not you. Mine. Lila. Twelve. They took her from the Academy.”

The air went out of me. “Reed.”

“They want trade. You for her. North Gate. 24 hours.”

“Then we go.”

“No.”

“Reed—”

“No,” he said again. He looked at me then. “You don’t trade for me. You don’t trade for anyone. You run. I go to the gate. I tell them you’re dead. I show them the dress. The blood. I sell it.”

“They’ll kill you.”

“They’ll kill me anyway. At least Lila lives.”

“She’s a kid.”

“So are you.”

“I’m not,” I said. “Not anymore. Not since last night.”

The pup was gone. The cabin was gone. The pack was gone.

It was me and him. And the Council.

I stepped to him. I didn’t touch him. But I was close. Close enough to see the scratch on his jaw. Close enough to smell pine and smoke and blood.

“We go together,” I said. “We don’t trade. We don’t lie. We end it.”

“How?”

“I shift,” I said. The words were out. I didn’t take them back. “On purpose. In front of them. No Alpha claimed me. The bond cut at sunset yesterday. It’s been 20 hours. I’m free. If I shift now, nothing happens to anyone.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know I’m tired of running.” I looked at the road. At the way north. At the way back to Shadow Creek. “I’m Silver Blood. You said the moon made us to end tyrants. The Council hunts us. That makes them tyrants.”

Reed was quiet.

“Teach me,” I said. “You taught me how not to shift. Teach me how to do it. On my terms.”

He closed his eyes. When he opened them, the gray was gone. His Alpha red flickered. Just once. Then gone.

Beta born. Alpha made. If Jax was gone, if the pack was gone, if he chose me…

“Reed,” I said.

“I’m not your Alpha,” he said.

“You could be.”

He stepped back. Like I burned him.

“Don’t say that,” he said. “Not unless you mean it. Not unless you’re free when you say it.”

“I’m free now.”

“Are you?” He pointed at the road. “Council is that way. My sister is that way. Your death is that way. If you walk there with me, you’re not free. You’re brave. It’s different.”

I didn’t have an answer.

He picked up the rifle. He checked it again.

“We move at dark,” he said. “We stay off the road. We head for the North Gate. Not to trade. To see. To know what we’re facing.”

“And then?”

“Then you decide. Shift or run or fight. But you decide. Not the moon. Not me. You.”

He held his hand out. Not to take mine. Just out. There.

I looked at it.

I took it.

His hand was warm. Rough. Real.

We walked into the trees. North.

Behind us, the sun set.

In front of us, the Council waited.

And under my skin, the light waited too.

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