by Harry Nix
“You really think we don't talk?” Juno asked and gave him a wink.
Alex groaned and then decided to ignore them as he went to sit down.
To take his mind off what his mates were discussing (there was a lot of giggling) he turned to the two old ladies.
“My name is Alex Lowe, nice to meet you,” he said.
“This old floozy as Esme,” the first one said, waving to the other.
“This harlot is Lydia,” Esme said, waving back. They were both chowing down plates of bacon, eggs and fried tomatoes. As Alex watched, Esme opened a bottle of whiskey and topped up their coffees.
“So you’re the new Alpha. Well, you have a nice butt. Way better than Jasper,” Esme said.
Lydia nodded in agreement.
“Saw a lot of green sparks shooting out the window just then. It looks like you were having a good time,” she said.
Juno, Nia and April had stopped their gossiping and were now grinning at the two old ladies like they were going to be soul mates.
“Um… great to meet you, Esme and Lydia,” Alex said. In desperation he turned to the three younger girls.
“What are your names?” he asked.
They were Dana, Pearl, and Yvonne. Although the three of them were blondes and quite similar in appearance they told Alex they weren't related.
As Jacob walked across to get some more bacon from the tray in the center of the table Alex saw the three girls watching him. Jacob grabbed his food and then sat down, blissfully unaware he was under observation.
Alex turned to his food and started eating as Juno, Nia and April began talking to Esme and Lydia, all five of them cackling like witches. Alex blocked it out and focused on his food. Most of the jokes were sexual and related to him being the new Alpha. Eventually the conversation turned to discussing the animals around the small village.
“So, Alex, all this is yours if you can hold it,” Esme said.
Alex drank some coffee, wondering whether we should have added a shot of whiskey to it to get through this breakfast. He hadn’t intended to have a big serious breakfast meeting but there was no time like the present.
“There’s something we need to decide today. It wasn't exactly my plan to come here and challenge Jasper. If he hadn't tried to burn down the cabin we would have returned to Baxter. Now suddenly there's chickens, pigs and goats, vegetable gardens and solar panels. Is this what we want?”
The two old women looked at each other and then back to Alex.
“So you think this is a democracy and not a benevolent dictatorship?” Lydia asked.
“I'm kinda new to this werewolf thing so I don't know exactly how it’s meant to work. But yes, I think it's fair the people in the pack get a say.”
“Sounds like he spent a lot of time with Julius. All these new ideas about how werewolves should do things,” Esme said, not unkindly.
Alex gulped down the last of his coffee and then looked around at the surrounding cabins and gardens. There were chickens out now, pecking around their yards and clucking to themselves. In some other circumstance, like say when they weren’t being pursued by psychotic mages, this would have been bliss.
“We could stay here. Grow the pack. Learn to live off the grid and hope that the insane mages that had been coming after me decide to stop, which might be unlikely because a great cost hasn't been inflicted on them. Or we leave. Go to Baxter, make some money and buy some land there.”
Esme, Lydia and the three younger girls didn't appear to like this idea by the way they screwed up their noses.
“I don’t like the smell of the city,” Yvonne said.
“Me either,” Jacob grunted, focusing still on his food. From the beaming look on Yvonne's face you would have thought he'd just said the most deep and meaningful thing she’d ever heard. The young werewolf girl was practically panting over him and he was still chewing away, oblivious, even burping into the back of his hand.
“Some of the ones who left last night will come back today. It’ll make it safe enough that you could go to Baxter to take care of your business,” Lydia said.
Alex turned to Nia. “Can I give this territory to your dad?”
Nia quickly shook her head. “Although dad is trying this whole ‘civilization on top of wildness’ thing, it really doesn't work like that. We could abandon this, leave entirely and eventually some other werewolf would move in, but all the packs generally know what's going on. You can’t abandon it and coincidentally my dad takes over half an hour later. It wouldn't be… honorable, if you know what I mean. You can either abandon it and let the chips fall where they may or try to hold and grow the pack.”
He looked back to Esme and Lydia who were topping up their coffees with more whiskey. By this point it was surely just cups of whiskey with a small amount of coffee in them.
“What would the two of you do? I only became a werewolf a few weeks ago. I'm apparently the only werewolf mage in the world. I’ve been attacked by a blood golem and crazy necromancers. The building where I lived got blown up and possibly Corvus are after me. My neighbors went missing and then one of them turned up raised from the dead. She attacked me and tore my hand off. Give me advice,” Alex said.
“You’re going to take advice from this lush?” Esme said with a laugh and then clinked her cup against Lydia's. Both of them gulped down their whiskey coffee mix and then filled their cups again.
“How about this: just check out the area and see what you think. If more werewolves arrive today you can decide then whether you want to hold it or go back to Baxter,” Lydia said.
“What happens if an Alpha come to challenge and I'm not here?” Alex asked.
Esme shrugged and took a mouthful of her drink, spilling a little of it down the side of her cup.
“It depends whether they’re following Julius’ rules or not. It's dishonorable to attack a pack when the Alpha is gone but some still do it. Probably all that happens is they arrive, make their presence known and then leave, waiting for you to come back so they can challenge you directly.”
Alex sat back after pouring himself some more coffee, feeling the food settling in his stomach.
He felt like he was lost with no clear direction ahead of him. Henry's words about making it cost the mages significantly still weighed heavily on his mind, as well as what Howey had said concerning asymmetrical warfare.
As far as Alex could see there was no reason the mages wouldn't send another blood golem or something worse rushing over the hills in the middle of the night. Aside from that, there were mysteries he wanted to unravel himself. The fact that he’d had a spell upon him for twenty-three years was first and foremost. There was also Henry’s story of the werewolf and witch who’d destroyed mage compounds and apparently killed vampires around the time Alex was adopted.
If he was right, surely they couldn't be anyone other than his parents.
It seemed certain that there was a mage, or mages, somewhere who knew who he really was. Working his way bloodily up the ladder greatly appealed to the wolf side of him. There had to be someone to explain why they were after him, although Alex suspected it was because he was the only werewolf who could use magic.
Thinking about magic, Alex realized he'd been hit by plenty of green sparks while in bed with April. He pulled up Know Thyself but there was no additional bar of mana. He’d definitely felt the magic, so why hadn’t it appeared?
Alex wondered if there was some variance in when it appeared. Remembering how the virtual spellcasting system had appeared when he simply thought of it, Alex concentrated on a new bar appearing, imagining it colored green with nature written beside it but there was no response.
Now had the screen open he idly checked through the pages, seeing that he was fully healed up now. He closed the spellcasting screen and sat staring into the middle distance as he sipped his coffee. His small pack was chattering around him, except for Jacob who was focused on getting as much food into his belly as possible.
Alex eventu
ally decided he would take Lydia's advice. Besides, it would be good to run in his wolf form. He stood up from the table and only then noticed that someone had taken Jasper's body away. There was still a small pool of blood and black liquid on the ground where it had been.
“Do we still have Jasper's body?” he asked.
“All I did was drag around the corner, so we didn’t have to look at while we were eating,” Jacob explained.
Alex turned to April and Juno. “Can you to see if you can work out that black liquid was? I can't understand why when I cast purify it got pushed out of his body,” he said.
“Yet it was weird because usually purify doesn't touch things you want like potions or medicine or antibiotics. It seems to know the difference between things that are helping you and bad things,” Juno said.
“That potion or whatever it is was definitely helping him. His bones were as hard as iron before it came out. Nia and Jacob, come with me. Jacob, I want you to take me around the boundary of the territory so I can find out what is technically mine now,” he said.
“Yes Alpha… I mean, Alex,” Jacob said, standing up. He immediately began stripping off his clothes. Alex realized the young werewolf didn't have a shifter charm. Dana, Pearl, and Yvonne watched eagerly.
Alex wondered for a moment if he should say something, but then figured he was just being a prudish human rather than a child of nature, as Jacob and the other werewolves appeared to be.
There was a moment of naked young man before he shifted into his hybrid form. He was about seven feet tall, muscled but still slender. Alex could see he still has some growing to do. He also saw Yvonne literally licking her lips as she looked at Jacob.
“We definitely need some babies to grow this pack,” Lydia said and then she and Esme started laughing after clinking the cups together and sloshing whiskey onto the table.
Jacob frowned and looked at Alex, who just shrugged. Alex could recall doing a similar sort of thing when he was Jacob's age (and sometimes even older): being completely unaware when a girl liked him. Alex remembered a hot girl at college had asked him to her house for coffee and he’d said no, he didn’t drink it and had left. It was only when he was halfway home that he’d realized his mistake.
Alex cringed a little at the memory and then shifted into his hybrid form, leaving the table with Jacob and Nia following behind him.
It was still reasonably early in the morning. The overnight chill had been pushed away by the rising sun. Alex walked past a cabin and saw where Jacob had dragged Jasper's body, laying it in the grass by the side of the path.
In the light of day the dead werewolf appeared to be a pathetic thing. His fur was matted and although he'd been tall and strong now he appeared to Alex to be some broken thing, something to be pitied.
“Take me to the boundary Jacob and then around it. Lead the way,” Alex said.
Jacob shifted to his wolf form and Alex felt the pull strongly, so he went with it, shifting too. Nia followed suit.
Jacob was like Alex in that form, pitch black, although slightly smaller in size. He set off jogging out of the village and then sped up as they entered the forest, following a well-worn pathway. Alex tried to push the image of Jasper out of his mind, but he couldn't seem to get away from it. What had he said last night? That he hadn't been behind the attack attempting to burn them alive in the cabin? Could it be possible he'd been telling the truth and Alex had challenged him anyway?
Had he killed an innocent werewolf, taking all that was his?
As Alex padded along behind Jacob he got the feeling he was embroiled in something that was a mash-up of chess, Risk and Monopoly with a touch of violent murder on the side.
Eric had really driven a stake of doubt into everything.
Maybe there had been a spy amongst the werewolves who’d used the wand and set the fire, trying to pit him against Jasper. He in his rage had stupidly stomped along the path and now he held valuable territory. What next? Would it just be Alpha werewolf after werewolf coming to attempt to overthrow him?
Would the mages eventually figure out he was there and send teams of snipers?
Alex realized he wasn't paying attention to where they were going when he nearly crashed into the back of Jacob, who had stopped abruptly on the edge of the forest where it thinned out before returning to grasslands
“This is the edge of the territory, roughly the side of the forest,” Jacob said, speaking slowly, making sure to form the words correctly with his wolf mouth. “Are you sure you want to run the whole boundary? It’s going to take the whole day.”
“We need to do it,” Alex said. Jacob set off without a word and Alex and Nia followed behind him.
The young werewolf hadn't been wrong. They ran for miles through the forest, across plains and squelched their way across wetlands that became boggy. Sometimes they came across wild boars that bolted at the sight of them and the occasional deer, as well as the countless other small animals, and birds and mice.
They came to a grove of fruit trees – lemons, oranges, and pears, which had been mostly pecked away by birds. There were the charred remains nearby of cabins that had clearly been burned down years before. The three of them shifted back to hybrid form so they could talk more easily.
“I think that was one of the attempts to build on the land ages ago, but then some werewolves burned it down,” Jacob said.
Alex walked around what was left of the charred remains that had been thoroughly weathered and rained into the ground. There were still a few fence posts quietly rotting away with bits of wire around them. Someone had attempted to set up a small village.
Alex walked over to the grove, glad that the attacking werewolves had spared the fruit trees. The pears were mostly gone but the orange tree was laden down with fruit. Alex split an orange open, the juice running down his hands. They’d been running for half the day now, and aside from drinking some freshwater for a creek he hadn't had anything to eat. He gulped down the orange, enjoying the delicious sweet taste. Jacob and Nia started eating too.
“This is a good orange,,” Nia said, juice running down her fur.
“Do you really think you want to take the pack to live in Baxter?” Jacob asked out of nowhere.
Alex was glad to see that Jacob was relaxing. In the beginning, he’d seemed almost terrified of him. It appeared he’d realized Alex wasn’t Jasper.
“Maybe. I mean, what happens if I do take my mates and leave?”
“Oh no, you can't do that,” Nia said quickly. Jacob looked shocked he'd even suggest that.
“Abandon your pack?” Jacob asked.
Nia turned to Jacob. “He didn't mean that. He really is new, like seriously a couple of weeks new so he’s still learning how to werewolf.”
Then she turned back to Alex. “Alphas don't abandon their packs. Once you make it, it’s yours until you die or go wild and they put you down.”
Alex could see that Jacob was still little shaken so he clapped him on the shoulder, accidentally getting some juice on his fur.
“Just ignore what I said. I'm new,” Alex said with a smile.
They finished eating and set off again, the grasslands transitioning to hard dirt with only a few scrubby weeds growing here and there. Sometimes they came across the remains of animals in various states of decay. They found a boar carcass slowly rotting into the ground, covered in ants stripping the flesh away.
Every now and then Alex caught the scent of other werewolves. It was fresh but he couldn't be sure if they were the werewolves from the Greenacre pack, the ones who’d left or whether they were werewolves from other packs testing the boundaries.
Running around in his wolf form, Alex could feel the influence of the shape on his mind. There was a joy in the wildness, a vicious pride, that made him want to defend what was his. He wanted to hunt, to chase down a boar and drag it back to his mates and for the pack.
Alex could understand why they were werewolf packs who hardly ever shifted out of their wolf fo
rms. It was supremely enjoyable to run as swiftly as the wind, to be strong and sure. The human version of him had worries and concerns, complicated stupid things. The wolf dropped them all and just ran, a free wild thing.
It was late evening by the time they finally returned home.
As they came over the hill,. Alex saw a crowd of werewolves standing just outside the village boundaries.
At first he felt a shock of fear that they’d come to attack, or maybe already had. Then he spotted April and Juno down near the main house, plus Esme, Lydia and the three girls.
Nia quickly shifted to hybrid form and nudged Alex to do the same. As soon as he’d shifted, she clasped his hands.
“This is the most serious thing I’m ever going to say to you. Those werewolves down there want to be part of the pack. All you need to do is draw the line on the ground and pull them over it. But if you do that, it’s permanent. They’re the pack until you die or they do. You don’t have to decide now. Sometimes Alphas make werewolves stay out there for days, like a test. But if you do, you must know it is irreversible. They will be your pack and your responsibility.”
“I understand,” Alex said, looking down the hill. He counted ten werewolves. It was an equal gender split of five men and five women. Some of them were clearly couples.
Alex looked down at the main house where April, Juno and the rest of his tiny pack were looking back up at him. He’d grown his pack by six without even realizing he was doing it. But what was meant to happen last night? He should have told Jacob, two old ladies and three teenage girls to leave?
He felt a battle inside him – the wolf part of him finding these human thoughts cringeworthy.
Alex shifted again, now to his human form and felt the influence of the wolf lessening. Although it felt like he was fighting with himself, he had to be able to think through what would happen next clearly.
If he brought these ten werewolves into the pack, he was responsible for them. They’d probably move back into their old homes. He’d suddenly have sixteen werewolves, plus his three mates. The Lowe pack would be twenty, all up.
