Alcyde
Steam rises from three hundred breakfast plates while I navigate the mess hall's careful choreography of submission and dominance. The transformation is immediate—spines straightening, cups settling with deliberate quiet, the collective intake of breath as wolves recalibrate their behavior around their new Alpha. The air tastes metallic with anxiety, sweetened by bacon grease and the particular musk of too many predators in one room.
Billy Joe occupies the Beta's seat at the raised platform, Kentucky bourbon still sweating from his pores despite the early hour. His sprawl is calculated casualness, but I catch how his eyes track Lou's movement through the crowd, the way his fingers drum against his thigh when she laughs at something Willow says.
The Alpha's chair receives me like
