by G. Bailey
I jump, nearly letting out a scream as the book is slammed shut in front of me, and stare at Henderson’s burning red eyes as he leans over the desk, his face directly in front of mine. His wolf is here, not really Henderson, and his power feels very dark as it surrounds itself around me. Dark and powerful...and alluring. I almost forget everything as I settle into the darkness pressing against my soul, letting Henderson’s wolf see how much I am affected by him.
I don’t know why I’m not frightened.
I can feel his power, the shadows of his magic, of his essence, breathing in the air around me like it has a life of its own. Henderson’s eyes slowly bleed back to pale blue that reminds me of the sea at night. “We don’t make many rules in this house, but it’s an unspoken one that this room is off limits to anyone but alphas unless invited.”
I stand up off the chair and hold his gaze. Even if my hands shake a little bit from doing so.
“Maybe I should be told about this rule in advance. I wasn’t aware that reading books was against the rules.”
He tilts his head to the side as I speak, and I don’t breathe as he leans forward. His nose gently touches the side of my face, and I hear him breathe in my scent. Everything about how close he is to me makes my legs feel weak until he backs off, and I suck in a breath.
“You’re right. There are no rules for reading...just not this book,” he tells me a little more gently. Henderson walks to the bookcase and slots the book back in a place where there is a gap for it. “Some books home more secrets, and trust me, this is not a secret you want. You need to forget everything you read in there.”
“What are angels?” I ask instead.
“Nothing more than fairy tales,” he replies.
“Are they real, Henderson?” I ask, wanting a real answer and not the spin on it he just tried to pull.
He looks me dead in the eye as he answers. “As much as the gods walking this earth are.”
I have no idea what to think about that answer as we stare at each other. That was more of an avoidance of an answer, but I decide to leave it. I shake my head; I never seem to get a clear answer from any of them.
“Okay, I’m going back to my room,” I tell him as I walk around the desk and try to go past him, but his hand reaches out and clamps around my wrist, stopping me.
“No, you’re not. I’m taking you out for the night. I was coming to find you to ask if you wish to come on a hunt in the forest,” he asks.
“Hunting with someone who can’t shift? Why would you want me there?”
“We think you should come. It’ll be good for you. I know you’ve not shifted yet, but your wolf will be able to sense and understand the hunt,” he explains, stepping a little closer. “Please come on a hunt with us.”
I’ve always wanted to go on a hunt, truth be told. Many of my classmates went on them with their parents and loved to brag about it back in my old school. The thrill of hunting something is natural to a shifter, shifted or not. It’s electrifying. It’s all about the hunt. Wolves look to chase and kill, it’s natural to us.
I nod with a small smile. “Yes, I’d love to do that.”
“Good,” he replies, but he doesn’t let go. His thumb rubs a circle against my arm, and I close my eyes at the strange pleasure his touch sends through me.
“I-is it safe for me to leave the house? With the Ravensword alpha on my heels?” I whisper, the words feeling too loud for the small room.
His finger touches my chin, and I open my eyes as he tilts my head up, our eyes clashing. “Let him come when we are at your side. I will rip through an army of wolves to protect you.”
My heart pounds faster than ever before as he lets me go and walks out of the room, leaving me to ponder if he meant what he just said.
A voice inside my head tells me he did. It tells me I’d do anything to keep him alive too, and that is more dangerous than I can admit.
For the next few hours, I help Ragnar pack the car with tents, boxes of snacks and water, and everything we need to camp for the night. I pack myself a change of clothes and some things out of the bathroom that I need, like my toothbrush, into a small bag before meeting them at the car.
Ragnar and Henderson are near the car, talking quietly, when I come into the messy garage. When I come in, they suddenly go quiet and look at me, like that’s not entirely obvious they were talking about me.
“Ready, Mai?” Ragnar asks, walking over and taking my bag from me. He places it in the trunk of the car as Henderson crosses his arms, avoiding my eyes.
“Ready,” I answer with a small smile, despite how awkward I feel.
“Good,” he replies with a grin and opens the car door for me for the front passenger seat.
“Since when am I not sitting shotgun?” Henderson quips.
“Since women always come first,” Ragnar replies, sharing a smirk between him and Henderson.
“Touché,” Henderson replies with a chuckle. It takes a few seconds for me to understand the insinuated joke that I missed, and my cheeks turn red. I slide into the passenger seat, and a few minutes later, Trey, Phim and Henderson climb into the back. Ragnar shuts the boot of the car and gets in a few moments later.
“It’s been too long since I’ve hunted,” Phim says and leans forward, patting my shoulder. “Are you excited, Mai?”
“Yes,” I tell her, and she leans back, looking at Henderson over Trey, who has headphones in his ears and his eyes closed as he lets out a long yawn.
“You seem tense today, Alpha Henderson,” Phim points out.
“It’s been a strange day,” he bluntly answers. I feel a little bad for snooping in their things, but I want to find out more about them. I can’t shake this feeling about them. Like something isn’t right. It’s no doubt something to do with the secrets that I haven’t figured out about them yet, like where they came from, what secrets they are desperately trying to hide from me. We drive in silence through the pack, and I find myself almost drifting off to sleep after an hour of driving out of the city into thick forest land.
Eventually, we go off the path altogether and straight in the forest on what looks like a dugout dirt path before randomly stopping near a clearing. We all climb out, and Phim hands me a torch light so I can see what we are doing. This one is bright and powerful and works far better than any torches I’ve seen in my whole pack, making me curious how they got this. So many things in the pack look so new it’s like humans recently sent them here, but that’s impossible. Humans haven’t come over the border in years, and we don’t have much contact with them anymore. I don’t say anything at the risk of annoying them, though. While Ragnar and Henderson make the tents up, Trey, Phim and I go in search for sticks to make a small fire. When we come back, we light the fire—well, Phim does with expert skill—and sit down around it, watching the alphas. It doesn’t take them too long to put up the two grey tents and click on lanterns inside of them.
“I’m sorry, but I do snore, and you’re sleeping in a tent with me tonight. I bet the alphas didn’t mention that,” Phim chuckles. I shake my head, making her laugh.
“So the alphas and Trey are going in the other one?” I ask.
“Yeah, it’s got three zip-up spaces,” she explains. “Ours has only got two.”
“Okay,” I reply. I’ve never exactly camped out in the middle of the woods on my own, unless you count when I was twelve and was found in the forest, but I don’t. But it should be interesting.
“I’m happy you’re not one of those girly types who never want to go camping,” she says. “It’s nice to have a girl out here instead of just guys.”
“I’m glad to be here,” I tell her.
“We’re going to team up,” Ragnar announces, clapping his hands together. “I will take Mai, and you three can go together.”
“That’s not fair. We all know you’re the best hunter,” Phim says with a pout. “There’s no way we’re going to find the prey before you.”
Henderson just smirks. “He
won’t be the best this time.”
Ragnar just grins back. “Bring it on, brother.” I love their banter and smile to myself as Ragnar nods his head to the side. I pick up my torch light, and he takes it out of my hand.
“No, not this time. I’m going to shift, and we need to stay in the dark. The moonlight will guide us,” he gently tells me, putting the torch down.
“I can’t see in the dark like you can,” I remind him.
He moves closer, and my breath hitches when he reaches out and tucks a stray strand of hair behind my ear. “You’re a wolf, Mai. Let your wolf guide you.”
“Okay,” I whisper as he steps back and starts undoing the buttons of his shirt.
I look away, hearing more rustling of clothes and then inhaling the telltale sign that they’ve shifted when everything smells like magic for a brief second. I look back, shocked and in awe at the black-furred wolves, which are just beautiful. All of them are pitch black, but Henderson’s and Ragnar’s wolves really do stand out compared to Trey’s and Phim’s since they’re quite magnificent wolves. They are literally twice the size.
Henderson’s wolf looks over at me, bright red eyes glowing in the dark and looking like embers dancing to the beat of a flame. His wolf’s eyes bore into mine before he growls once, then runs off into the forest, kicking up the ground with his giant paws. Trey lets out a long howl before running off in the direction Henderson went, followed by Phim, leaving nothing but a pile of clothes on the floor. I quickly fold everybody’s clothes for when they get back, and put them in the tent before grabbing a coat from my bag and putting it on. The coat is black with silver buttons and made of thick sheep’s wool, keeping me warm. I will have to thank Phim for buying me it. My wolf keeps me warm, but it is bitterly cold in the forest. Ragnar’s wolf is waiting for me when I come back out of the tent.
I see so much of Ragnar in his wolf, even the way his wolf stands tall and proud screams Ragnar.
I stand very still as Ragnar’s wolf comes closer to me. Each footstep on the ground crunches across the snow, broken leaves, and the occasional twig in between us.
His wolf nose gently brushes against mine, his hot breath blowing against my skin. I stand staring into the eyes of an alpha wolf. Who never really should let me get this close to him. The wolf should be forcing me to be on my knees right about now in submission, like he would do to any wolf who stared him down.
These alpha wolves make no sense. They break every rule known to shifters. They break rules like they aren’t anything at all.
And I should be very frightened...but I’m not. Eventually, he moves back and circles around me before walking off into the forest slow enough that I can jog to catch up with him. It takes me more than a few seconds to get used to the forest once the light at the campfire has drifted away, and I breathe in all the scents that I can smell. I can smell everything from the damp leaves littering the floor to the frosty snow that’s stuck to all the trees around us, and of a scent that comes with the forest, like the musky scents, the trees themselves. My ears twitch, hearing the distant sounds of other animals that roam around, like rabbits and squirrels. Nothing big to hunt that I can sense.
My eyes take time to adjust, but I see better than I ever have in my entire life. Ragnar stays close to my side, occasionally sniffing the ground before changing in rapidly different directions for what seems like hours on end. My legs tire after a while, but I don’t pause or slow my pace as I enjoy the hunt. It is peaceful in the forest, even as we hunt, and I spend a lot of the time thinking about the alphas more than I should. I stay close to Ragnar’s side, trusting him completely, and then he comes to a sudden pause. He crouches down low, and I do the same at his side, looking across the clearing in front of us. Right there in the middle of the clearing, there’s a huge stag. The grey stag is giant with massive antlers that stretch up into the sky.
He is far bigger than the alpha wolf next to me, and each one of those massive antlers could easily kill us. I don’t think that’s going to stop the wolf at my side; he isn’t just a wolf after all. He’s an alpha, a magical being with such power that I can’t even understand. A power that comes from a forbidden god that is clearly more powerful than anything I’ve ever seen. Suddenly, he moves quicker than a bullet through the trees, leaving me far behind with no chance of catching up. He’s across the clearing and landing on the heels of the stag, who tries to bolt off. A growl echoes through the forest from Ragnar as he chases the stag, cornering him in some trees within seconds and jumping on his back. I run into the clearing just as Ragnar’s wolf digs his massive teeth into the stag’s neck, and it lets out a long whine that sends shivers through me, a thrill through me that I’ve never felt before. The stag collapses underneath the wolf, and Ragnar lets go, taking a few steps back before shifting into his human form. I walk over to see Ragnar crouching down, nothing more than a naked man in the middle of the forest, blood coating his lips and dripping down his chin.
He wipes it off and looks over at me before going to the stag. He leans down and places his hand on the stag’s forehead.
“The gods thank you for your sacrifice and welcome you to the afterlife. May you roam in peace.”
His deeply spoken words make me shiver, feeling like the gods are watching for a second. I try not to stare too much at his naked body as he stands and looks at me. He looks anything but human right now, and he feels like raw power. Raw, possessive and commanding power. I find it hard to look away from his gaze.
“Are we ever going to speak about the unspoken between us?” he asks. I assumed my attraction to him was a one-sided thing. He could have anyone...why would he want a rejected mate?
“I don’t know what you mean,” I reply, wondering if he meant something else. He can’t mean what I think, what I feel.
“Any wolf can pick up a scent of attraction,” he tells me what I already know. I can ignore my reaction to them, but my body is clearly betraying me.
“Being attracted to someone doesn’t mean it would be a good idea,” I gently tell him, rubbing my arm. “You’re an alpha...you know the rules.”
Everything about him is toned as he stands up, and I stare. He suddenly shifts back into his wolf, leaving our conversation at a very strange end. It’s only then that I hear the crackling nearby and turn around just as Henderson’s wolf comes out of the forest, followed by Trey and Phim. Henderson’s wolf lets out a long growl, which Ragnar returns. I look over to see Ragnar with his paw on the dead stag, claiming his prize.
Phim makes me jump when she speaks, and I turn to see her naked at my side for a second before I look away. I will never get used to how most wolves care little about anyone seeing them naked.
“The alphas will carry the stag back. How about we three walk back to the campsite?” she suggests. Henderson walks over to Ragnar, and they growl at each other.
“Sure,” I say to Phim as Trey comes to my side, his wolf brushing against my leg.
I gently run my fingers over Trey’s fur just a second, feeling how soft he is. When I look back, the alphas are still watching me, and instead of being hunted, I feel like it is a protective stare.
Eventually, I manage to pull my eyes away and continue down the forest back to the campsite, with Trey and Phim nearby, knowing the alpha wolves are on my heels.
“I’m surprised you know how to do this,” I say to Henderson, sitting down on the log next to him around the fire. “Cook the stag, I mean.”
Henderson and Ragnar made quick work of stripping the stag, cutting the meat and cooking it with a bunch of things they brought with us.
“We learnt from our parents,” Henderson tightly says, but then a ghost of a smile appears on his lips. “My mother was the hunter, and Ragnar was the only one who inherited that skill from her teachings. My father preferred to cook, and I learnt from him.”
“I never really asked, but are all four of you blood-related brothers?” I ask. “Only you look—”
“Different. We aren’t bloo
d-related, but we were brought up together from infants,” he explains to me. “You can ask me anything, Mai, but I might not be able to answer everything.”
“So where exactly were you brought up?” I question.
“I get the feeling you’re going to keep asking that until one of us slips up and gives you an answer,” he replies.
I smile. “You’ve got the right feeling.”
He laughs and shakes his head. “We’re not going to tell you. We haven’t told anybody here where we came from, and it’s best that way.”
“I’m going to find out. I’m too curious,” I reply.
He looks me dead in the eye. “I bet. But how about you tell me something about you. Like perhaps what you liked to do before you came here, in your spare time.”
“Drawing,” I start off, rubbing my icy hands together. “I never had much, but there was always paper and a pencil around. I used to take it around with me and draw parts of the forest. There was a waterfall nearby the foster home that I loved to draw in different lights of the day and night. My favourite was at sunset one day when it was almost purple in the sky and cast pink lights on the water.”
“Funny, you’re not the only one who likes to draw,” he counters.
“Do you like to paint?” I ask, and his eyes narrow.
“Just a little bit, and yes, I wrote the book. You might as well just ask exactly what you are thinking.”
“It was a very good painting of the angel creatures,” I answer, but I won’t ask anything more because I see I have pissed him off in my quest to find all the answers. “I can see it’s a tense subject for you.”
“I am going to sleep,” he answers before walking off, leaving me alone by the fire as Trey and Phim went to sleep over an hour ago and Ragnar was getting more wood for the fire.
Ragnar comes back to the camp a little later as I stare at the fire.
“All alone?” he asks, and I nod. He sighs, dropping the wood by the fire and adding a few logs he has found before going to his tent. I’m surprised when he comes back out with two tumbler glasses and hands me one as he sits next to me. I take a sip, tasting a fruity and rich drink that I’ve not tasted before, and it burns my throat on the way down, but somehow makes me feel warmer.
