by Dakila Reed
Contents
About the Book
Copyright Page
Title Page
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Epilogue
Stronger than Truth
Dear Reader
About the Author
Other Books
Trademarks Acknowledgments
Acknowledgments
Note
“Against the fated omega of my beloved alpha… how do I stand a chance?”
All of Skye's life he has dedicated to the pack which took him in and cared for him.
Rustom, the district's supreme alpha, is his best friend, buddy, protector and his something deeper. They are lovers in the eyes of many, envied by those unclaimed.
That is until Rustom Vera's destined omega, Reece, makes an appearance.
Skye's place in the pack, his position in Rustom's life collapses and falls apart.
Will he stand a chance against his alpha's fated mate? Or wounded, fade away from the picture and let the course of destiny happen?
STRONGER THAN FATE
(Stronger than #1)
Copyright © Dakila Reed (May 2017)
All rights reserved.
This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
* * * *
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, brand names, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to real events, places, persons and locales, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
* * * *
Cover images:
Pixabay: Leandro de Carvalho (CC0 License)
Cover content is for illustrative purposes only.
Cover font:
Tangerine-Toshi Omagari | Tenderness-Dot Colon | Raleway-Pablo Impallari
Cover design by Dakila Reed
Eyes closed, the breeze smelled of fresh rain shower. Somewhere close to him, a drop of water from a tree leaf slid down, slowly as if fighting off the smooth surface before it clung to the tip, only to fall down and mingle with the wet ground.
He inhaled. The act causing his still young but nimble body to expand and sense everything ten times more clearly. When he opened his eyes, a wicked grin formed on his lips. Two of his friends were hiding behind a huge molten rock two kilometers from him. One omega girl was ducked behind thick bushes of roses a few meters behind him. She was unaware that her faint strawberry scent only contrasted and intensified her presence against the flowers.
"James and Jules never learn. As if hiding a little farther this time makes a difference," Rustom snickered. He bent and carefully removed his sneakers. His mother would kill him for dirtying the new pair so he made sure to put them on his hands instead of his feet when playing hide and seek. Then he slowly turned behind him, grimacing at the slight sounds coming from behind the bushes. "Mandie, are you even trying?"
A blond head emerged from the bushes. Her faint brows meeting in a frown. "I just got this new dress! Can't ruin it!"
Rustom rolled his eyes. "Right. Of course can't get that bright yellow and frilly dress ruined."
The girl scowled and started perching herself on a smooth and round rock. "Well, I'll watch over the base. Go drag those two show-offs back here."
Watching the little girl defiantly stare at him, Rustom couldn't help but smile. Mandie, along with James and Jules were his little 'pack'. It was just a game they were playing. But time and time and again Rustom's father had told him that being a leader was something to be earned. Not to be given. It was in his blood to take on the supreme alpha rule of their district. Still, he was never raised to be lax. If anything, at a young age the expectation on him to prove worthy of being a leader was higher than his eyes could see. And he loved it. He loved challenges. The harder, the better.
"Alright." Rustom tossed his shoes to the girl's direction. "Please keep my shoes safe. Mom will kill me if something happens to them."
Mandie nodded. "I hate it when Auntie's mad. So no worries."
With his shoes taken care of, Rustom faced the endless greens of the field and the promising chase at the thick foot of the mountains. He curled his toes into the ground, his skin prickling with a surge of energy. He bent his one knee, one hand on the moist ground and readied to dash.
One moment he was there. The next, he was nowhere. Despite being still in his human form he sprung into hunting mode. His legs were agile, his breathing calculated. His piercing golden eyes focused only on the faint traces his buddies have left behind.
Two young male betas meant two thinking heads. And those two were known for being geniuses at school. The search could only be tricky. But it was something Rustom wouldn't be able to get past through.
After clearing the fields, the foot of the mountain greeted him with the shower and burst of light from the narrow gaps between trees and their branches. The dead leaves, mostly still moist from the rain shower faintly scrunched beneath his bare feet.
"See?" Rustom laughed. He picked a discarded blue fleece belonging to James. "Trying to point me in the wrong direction? Nice try James! Jules!"
He licked his lips, taste of victory so close by.
Tying the fleece around his waist, he continued circling the foot of the mountain. No matter how unruly they could be, they still stuck to the rule of their parents not to wonder into the mountains without adult supervisions.
He halted and spun around. His eyes moving from left to right. Nothing. Nothing new or nothing dangerous as far as he could tell. But the new additions to the two hiding shifter presence was still there, continuing to grow in proximity. He looked down to his dirty feet and focused. Ignore the trails and traps Jules and James made. Ignore the leaves. Ignore the air. Ignore everything until his focus was only into the new strange presence.
Rustom straightened his back. By the river. There was something there.
He threw a glance at the darkness two old birch trees provided. In the middle of the two majestic trees was a dark-blue gigantic and jagged rock. He was sure his buddies were there hiding. But instead of going and claiming his victory as always, he turned to the opposite direction and ran. Fast.
He picked up the pace even his father was finding difficult to match nowadays. For sure, James and Jules were starting to run after him, sensing his agitation for the new intruders. This was the side of their district land his father specifically entrusted to him. Part of his training. If he couldn't even watch over a small patch of land, how could he take care of a larger, much complicated one?
He almost stumbled and fell flat on his face. The wet ground disappeared and was replaced but sharp and uneven rocks. The sound of running water grew and thundered in his heightened ears as he got closer, nearer.
The massive and dangerous river was nowhere in sight. Today in the peak of summer, the zigzagging form of the ruthless river was calm and serene. Fishes jumped out of it, as if showing off to Rustom as the latter got closer.
Cool and refreshing, the crystal clear water started wetting the ends of Rustom's ragged jeans. It reached his ankles. His mom was going to have a fit but at least it wasn't mud. He continued walking along the side of the
river. Amidst the quiet and the calm of the water form, another sound was being carried. A playful gurgling.
Rustom narrowed his eyes. With his every step, the dirty white blotch from the distance started getting clearer. It was a bundle of fabric hanging from the mouth of a wolf. It was a natural wolf which was looking at him as though it'd been there waiting for his arrival. Natural wolves were always a part of the mountains. But this one was new, strange, and cautious. When Rustom inhaled some more, he scented burned wood, ashes and mud mixing into one.
Then the brown wolf dropped the bundle to the side of the river and took off. Rustom was about running after the wolf but the bundle made him halt. The bundle had these little hands poking out as if reaching to the sky. That made the young alpha in him sprint and leap to the last remaining distance, sending out splashes of water in his wake.
"What...?" He bent to the bundle half-soaked into the shallow side of the river. He ignored his screaming lungs for the over exertion and stared harder at the small face with large curious eyes gazing back at him. "Why are you—"
"Rustom!" James yelled. "What's going on? We were waiting like idiots over there—" The boy's protests died down the instant his eyes saw where Rustom was crouched. Him, with a silent and perplexed Jules gazed down at the bundle with surprise and horror in their eyes. "What's a baby doing there?"
The two betas looked around, in search of any other human or more likely a shifter nearby. But they all was met by the eerie blows and whispers of the wind cascading against the surface of the river.
"A wolf left him here," Rustom answered as he bent and carefully took the baby in his arms. "Let's go back to the main house."
Before Rustom could even make another step, James blocked him. Rustom almost snarled at his friend.
"No. Rustom I don't think it's a good idea."
"What is not a good idea?" Rustom growled. "A natural wolf had this baby hanging from its snout and dropped it the minute the wolf saw me. A baby here in the middle of nowhere! This baby could be injured or sick or maybe dying. We need to help her—" Rustom tugged slightly at the bundle and corrected himself. He thought he was right after sensing that sweet lemon grass scent. Sweet scents only came from female omegas as far as he knew. But he was wrong. "Him."
Jules stepped beside James. "Jame's right. We don't know if the person or whoever left the baby is still around. What if they come back and the baby's gone? They'd be in panic."
"There's no person!" Rustom snapped.
The young beta sighed. "Look. Stay here with James and I'll go take an adult or someone. Does that appeases you somehow? The natural wolf could either have brought that baby from somewhere over the border to save it. You know trained wolves are entrusted to do just that when a shifter pack is under attack right?"
"Or a bait for war to our district. That could happen if the person behind sending this baby accuses us of kidnapping," James added.
Rustom grounded his teeth, looking down at the tiny bundle in his arms. Betas really liked to super and intensely analyze things much to his annoyance. And these two along with him weren't adults yet. What more in ten or twenty years time?
He looked back at the massive bright eyes staring at him. They were orbs of sparkling bright blue like the hue of their summer sky he so loved. Clear and warm. As he continued looking, the thought of those eyes mirroring the sky vanished. The sky was failing miserably to the baby's orbs.
Rustom cringed. The baby felt so fragile. Like any minute it might break from the slightest touch. He was only seven and he'd seen a bunch of babies from his mother's maternity clinic. But this one was so tiny it was scaring him off.
"Okay. Hurry," Rustom replied begrudgingly.
Jules smiled and took off while James stood quietly as if studying him. He had that annoying grin on his face. "See," James started. "We will make a good pair of betas for you when you take over. You're too rash."
Rustom ignored James and found refuge under a huge tree. The baby was still eyeing him curiously unaware of its fate if a boar or maybe a bad person instead found it. James followed and eyed the bundle more seriously as Rustom started unwrapping the bundle naked. Rustom took off his own denim jacket and placed the baby on it, wrapping it delicately before carrying the baby back into his arms.
"Is there a note?" James prodded into the wet fabric.
"Note?"
"Well, that's how it works right? Some parents who have no choice but to abandon their baby leave a note of apology or something." James carefully tugged inside the discarded roll of fabric and found none. The young beta tossed away the dirty cloth with a groan. "Well. Of course it doesn't usually work that way."
* * * *
It didn't take long for one of the district council members to show up along with two enforcers. It was Jame's father. A beta of the current supreme alpha. The man instructed the two enforcers in hushed voices and in an instant, the two bulky men turned and disappeared. To Rustom, he could hear their faint steps through the slight tremors from the ground no one should even be able to pick. They were checking the grounds for possible intruders or trap.
The man, Jame's father named Alton then turned to their direction. He had a kind sheen in his eyes, more so when the man's gaze landed to the creature gurgling and making all funny baby noises in Rustom's arms.
The man crouched and let his thick finger brush along the infant's cheek. "Jules said a wolf left this baby here the minute it saw you. Is that correct?"
Rustom nodded, watching with fascination as the infant smiled toothless grins at all of them. Beta Alton smiled back at the baby, with a face all dads make towards their child. A dorky, funny kind of face that made the stranger baby cackle in abundance.
"Describe to me the wolf you saw. Every thing that caught your attention, Rustom," Beta Alton said as calmly as possible. He even sounded like he was just asking if playing hide and seek had been fun.
"The wolf..." Rustom ransacked his memory. "The wolf had been coffee brown which is kind of different from the usual dirty white in our mountains." Rustom scrunched up his nose. "There were traces of burned wood and ashes and mud too in the air around it."
Beta Alton nodded, as if he had this entire deduction and it had been confirmed just like how he predicted it to be.
"We will bring the baby back to the clinic first and let your father decide what we'd do with him."
"We can?" Jules asked with surprise. "That easily? This isn't a set-up or something like what happened to the Marces Pack?"
James glowered at his cousin. "Marces Pack and all that happened to them are untrue. You sometimes mix your comics with reality."
Standing in his full height, the beta towered all the kids. He glanced into the mountains as if apologizing towards the unseen behind those ridges and then smiled back at them assuringly. "Yes. We can take in the baby that easily. It's a job of a shifter to help another shifter. What's more, it's a baby male omega."
"Male omega?" James repeated as he started patting off dirt and wet leaves clinging all over his pants. His gray eyes much like Beta Alton’s showed utter interest. "Are they really that rare?"
"Well, how many male omegas in our district do you know?" the man asked with an amused tone in his voice.
"None." Jules and James replied in unison.
Beta Alton smiled and let Rustom carry the baby as they started walking back to their district proper. "They said for every five hundred omegas, only three are male. Their needs are quite different but that's a lesson for you children once you reach ninth grade."
James and Jules started tossing off trivia questions in the air their entire trek. The second they saw the first few signs of houses and civilization, the two started running, leaving the others behind. Rustom who was usually the first to take off and dash away was content in walking along side Beta Alton. He was more concerned towards the baby who wouldn’t let go of his gaze or of the hem of his t-shirt tightly clutched by the infant in his little fist.
* * * *
It was all he could do to stay put all through out their morning classes at the elementary school outside of their district. All young shifters were encouraged to join in the human schooling system to get exposed in the human world while their other personas were safely tucked away deep. It was much safer to keep peace and equality this way. Things were much less complicated and not surprisingly, a lesson thought for all members of Allied Districts.
Rustom threw his bag over his shoulder, eager to take on full speed. However, the road was full of his fellow elementary pupils, humans and shifters combined and he had to show some restraint. He couldn't just pedal a bike at eighty kilometers per hour without appearing like super human or a freak. And so Rustom, along with his close friends James and Jules, rode their bikes at the acceptable speed.
"You think they'd let the baby into an orphanage?" James asked aloud when the three of them had to stop for a red traffic light. "Dad says it could be possible. No newly wed couple would take a stranger baby, mom says. And well... babies are hard work."
"Orphanage?" Rustom grumbled. He hated it that he wasn't able to ask his dad that morning for sleeping in late. "Maybe Dad came up with a better plan?"
Jules shrugged. "Well, all we can do is hurry up to the clinic and find out!"
The three pedaled the best they could in human standards. By the time they reached their district’s well equipped health center, separated from the main hospital, all of their faces were slicked with sweat. Their uniforms clinging right into their sun-kissed skins.
Nurse Patty, a born omega working in the center threw them all a reproachful look. They must have been reeking of sweat.
"Supreme Alpha Randon is inside that omega baby's room with Doctor Francis so you guys behave and wait for your turn to visit."
The three nodded and headed to the last room at the end of the hallway. There were a couple of human visitors too, having their sprained ankle checked or getting their high blood pressures taken. The odd thing about their health center was it wasn't harsh in the nose. Many shifters hated the smell of hospitals for the intensity of antiseptics and cleaning materials. Their health center made it their rule to make it much more comfortable. Apparently shifters or not, a health care facility smelling of fresh green apples was more desirable.
