by J. L. Wilder
What he didn’t know was whether he could win such a fight.
So yes, all in all, the fact that he had seen no one for the past several days was a blessing.
He came to a pool of clear, clean water and halted beside it. He was thirsty, and he hadn’t eaten all day. This would make a good place to stop. In fact, maybe he would stay here for the rest of the day, filling his belly with fish, having as much water as he could drink. He would sleep in the shade of that rock over there, and tomorrow, he would begin ranging west.
He stepped into the clearing that surrounded the pond, lowered his head, and began to drink. The water was cool and refreshing, and already he was thankful for his decision to spend the day here. It had been the right choice. He was tired of running, and it would be good to have space to himself and a place to rest.
He eyed the water pensively. He could see several fat trout swimming below the surface. Would it be better to try to catch them in human or animal form? His fishing skills were roughly equivalent either way.
He decided, eventually, to remain in his wolf form. He hadn’t shifted back in a few days, and the longer he stayed in one form or the other, the better it began to feel. Ryker was not the kind of shifter who had a preference as to what form he took. He could live happily as a man or a wolf. What he didn’t like was adjusting between forms. That always took time and made him feel awkward, like a newborn colt.
He stood over the pond, eyeing the fish for a few minutes as they cut back and forth. They were lazy and stupid looking. There must not have been an abundance of predators in this part of the woods. After a few minutes of scanning the water’s surface, he darted forward, dropping his muzzle into the water and locking his jaws around a fish.
The fish flopped in his mouth, but he sank his teeth into it, enjoying the taste of the fresh meat. It was strange that when he ate in this form, he was drawn to raw meat, whereas in human form, he always wanted to cook it. But then again, that was the way that pure wolves and pure humans ate. Maybe it made sense.
He retreated a few feet back from the water’s edge and began to pick the meat from the fish’s bones, savoring his dinner.
When he was finished, exhaustion overwhelmed him. He supposed that was a combination of the effects of running so hard all day and the nice big meal he’d just enjoyed. He would hunt again later—he knew he needed to eat as much as possible while he was stopped—but for now, he wanted to sleep.
He picked his way around the perimeter of the pond, looking for a likely place to sleep. Someplace where he would be concealed if any bears showed up. He didn’t need them getting the drop on him.
Finally, he stowed himself in a crack between two boulders. It wasn’t a cave, but it was small and private. He wouldn’t be seen here. If a predator came, he would have the advantage. And that was what was important.
He settled down, resting his head on his paws, and closed his eyes. He listened to the sounds of the forest all around him and allowed them to sing him to sleep.
WHEN HE WOKE UP, THE woods were dark around him, and a pair of eyes were gleaming at him out of the darkness.
Ryker froze, his hackles up. A bear?
No. The eyes were too low. They were at his own level. And as his vision began to adjust, he saw that he was looking at a wolf. She was standing on the far side of the pond, her muzzle dripping wet, staring at him as if she had just seen him too.
Was she a shifter? Or was he looking at a wild wolf?
He watched her, unmoving, and after a moment, she returned her attention to the water. He watched as she tried, unsuccessfully, to fish.
He emerged from between his rocks and stood on the shore of the pond, unwilling to approach her yet, just watching for now. Her head darted up as he came closer and her lips peeled back, exposing her teeth, but she made no move to attack.
It’s all right, he thought. No fight. He laid down by the side of the pond to indicate that he wasn’t trying to threaten her.
She watched him for a moment, then returned her attention to the water.
Ryker pulled up a fish, dropped it on the ground, and backed away, looking at her. Inviting.
The she-wolf hesitated, then approached.
Ryker retreated into his makeshift cave.
The she-wolf approached the fish and began to eat.
He knew, watching her, that she was a shifter. There was something not quite natural about the way she held herself as she ate—as if she was used to being in a human body. He watched her eat, wondering whether he should approach her, wondering whether she would approach him.
It was not unknown for the wild wolves up here in the north to mate. But then, mate meant something different up here. When Ryker was young, living in a pack, he had learned the word mate as having to do with love and partnership, with cooperation. Your mate was someone you joined yourself to for life. Your mate was with you forever.
In the wild, mate was not a noun but a verb. It wasn’t a person. It was something you did. It was an event that lasted for a night, never longer, and in the morning, you went your separate ways. If a she-wolf became pregnant, she would take shelter until her cubs were born and raise them until they were ready to go their own way, but families did not cleave together. That wasn’t done here.
Ryker hadn’t been with a woman in quite a while. Most of the time, he preferred being on his own. He liked things quiet. He liked not having to worry about other people, about their thoughts or feelings or needs. He liked to focus on himself. That was why he had abandoned pack life in the first place.
But maybe this woman would be worth giving up his solitude for a night.
He had been alone for a long time, after all. His body craved the touch of another person. She could be that person.
He emerged slowly from the two boulders he’d been hiding between, trotted over to where she was just finishing up the fish he’d caught for her, and sat down beside her. He drew his focus inward, remembering his other self. His more physically vulnerable self. His more intellectual self.
A moment later, he was human, feeling rather defenseless beside the powerful wolf. If she didn’t accept his invitation to speak in this form, he would have to shift back quickly. She could rake him open with a flash of her claws.
She looked him up and down.
He waited.
She shifted.
She sat down beside him and picked up one of the fish bones, sucking the remains of the meat off of it. Her hair was in a tangle and her nails were dirty.
Immediately, Ryker could tell that he’d made a mistake. He didn’t want her at all.
There was nothing wrong with her. Her appearance was just a reflection of her wildness, and he was sure he didn’t look any better. But now that she sat in front of him in human form, she was no longer an enticing possibility. She was a real woman.
What was he going to do? Fuck her right here by the pond and hope no predators showed up?
He didn’t know what he had been thinking.
Still, this encounter didn’t have to be a waste. They were here, and they were both in human form. They were cautious allies, at least for the moment. An exchange of information was always a good idea in the wilds of the Arctic.
“I’m Ryker,” he said. By volunteering information about himself first, he hoped to make her feel more secure.
She looked up at him suspiciously, then back down at her fishbone. “Kate.”
“Do you live around here, Kate?”
“Who are you?” she asked suspiciously.
He got that. There was every reason to be suspicious, living on your own this way. Anybody might be an enemy. “I’m nobody special,” he assured her.
“Are you with the southern packs?”
“I’m not with any pack,” he said. “I’m on my own.”
“Are you an alpha?”
He nodded. He knew that made him more of a potential threat, but he wasn’t going to lie about it. “I am,” he said. “But I’m not going to try an
ything here. I just want to talk.”
“I don’t want you to come back to my cave,” she said.
“Okay,” he agreed. “I just wondered if you could tell me about this part of the woods.”
“What do you want to know about it?”
“Is this the only water source?”
“There’s a river,” she said, pointing.
“How far away?”
“Don’t remember. Maybe a day. I wasn’t running full speed, though.”
He nodded.
“It’s my territory,” she said with a scowl.
“I’m not staying,” he assured her. “Not moving in or anything. Maybe just for a day or two before I move on.” He sized her up. As long as the two of them were in the same form—human or wolf—he could beat her in a fight. But he didn’t want to fight her. He hoped she wouldn’t attack. “You stay here permanently.”
“I’m not taking you to my cave,” she said again.
Her defensiveness was beginning to be annoying. “I don’t want to go to your cave,” he told her. “I’m just trying to get some information.”
“Why should I help you?”
“I gave you that fish, didn’t I?” he pointed out. “I didn’t have to do that.”
She shrugged. Clearly, the fish hadn’t done much to buy her loyalty.
This was the problem with feral shifters. They didn’t give a damn.
Still, Ryker knew he belonged among them. It was pack life that had always fit him badly, like somebody else’s shoes. He had spent the early years of his life fighting to fit in, to feel like he was the person his pack wanted him to be. And it had never worked out. He had never been able to obey, and he had always felt like a disappointment because of it.
The best, most freeing day of his life had been the day he’d realized that he didn’t care whether or not he was a disappointment. He didn’t need to make anybody happy other than himself.
Here, in the wild, he was happy.
“I’ll tell you what,” he said to Kate. “I’ll get us some more fish. Maybe you can start a fire. We can cook them properly, and then you and I can sit and talk about this area. Would that be okay with you?”
“Why do you want to know so much about this part of the woods?” Kate asked. “If you’re not planning on staying here, what difference does it make?”
“It’s always good to know the terrain,” Ryker said. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you that?”
She stared at him silently, hostility in her eyes.
“Maybe it’s time someone did,” he said.
She glared. “Just get the fish,” she snapped and turned to collect firewood.
Ryker smiled. He didn’t need her to like him. What he needed was information—information that would help him make a plan and keep himself safe. And now it looked as though he was going to get it.
Chapter Three
SOPHIE
She had nothing. She was utterly alone.
She walked for a while, unsure of where she was going, feeling naked in her mating ceremony dress. The least Josh could have done would have been to allow her to go inside and get something to wear. But she was sure he had sent her away like this on purpose. Of course, he would want her to be as degraded and helpless as possible. If she wasn’t going to belong to him, she ought to crash and burn. That was no doubt what he was thinking.
She had no money. She hadn’t eaten that day—knowing that the ceremony lay ahead of her, she hadn’t been able to summon an appetite. Now that was beginning to seem like a terrible mistake. What was she going to do for food?
Sophie knew that all her problems had one answer. She could shift. As a wolf, she would be able to leave this awful dress behind. She would be able to hunt for her food. It was the only practical thing to do.
But shifting meant leaving her human body behind. It meant leaving a part of herself behind. And Sophie couldn’t help feeling as though taking on animal form would mean it would be that much harder to go back to human life. After all, if she did shift, she would have to leave the only piece of clothing she had. If she wanted to be human again, she wouldn’t just feel naked. She would be naked.
Besides, she had never been very good at hunting. She had never had to fend for herself before. She had tried her hand at it a few times, when she and her pack had been camping together, but it had mostly been a joke. The others had treated her like a child trying to keep up with the adults. No one had ever expected her to get food for herself before, and she had never really learned to do it.
I’m not going to survive on my own, she realized. There’s not a chance.
Okay. Panicking wouldn’t help. The thing to do was just to find herself a new pack to join. That would be easy enough to do. There were several packs living within a few miles of the Vancouver pack.
In fact, she knew, there was a small pack just over on the outskirts of Burnaby. They were smaller than the Vancouver wolves, and not as powerful, of course—they were kind of the rejects of the Vancouver pack. But that made them a perfect fit for Sophie right now.
They’ll probably be thrilled to see me, she thought. She had seen the way their alpha, Lou, had looked at her on the few occasions the two packs had crossed paths. The Burnaby wolves didn’t have an omega. They hardly had any women at all. They would love being able to take Josh’s omega right out from under his nose.
Sophie didn’t love the idea of going to live with them. They were rednecks, and they were always dirty when she saw them. But if it was the Burnaby pack or dying alone in the wild, she would take Burnaby.
She waited at the bus stop. When the bus she needed pulled up, she began to explain to the driver that she didn’t have any cash. He got an eyeful of her in her mating dress, then waved her back to take a seat.
Sophie nodded and proceeded down the aisle, wondering how many doors that was going to open for her.
It wasn’t a long ride to Burnaby. She leaned her head against the window, arms wrapped around her torso, doing her best to shield herself from the view of the other passengers. She knew she was being looked at, though. As long as she had this dress on, she was a magnet for attention.
She would ditch it as soon as she could.
She got off the bus in Burnaby and thanked the driver, feeling vaguely dirty as she did so. He hadn’t helped her because he wanted to do something nice for her. He had helped her as a way of paying her for the free look at her tits he had gotten.
But it had gotten her here. And after all, worse things than being ogled by a bus driver had happened to her today.
She didn’t know where to find the Burnaby wolves. She had no idea where the pack lived. She was going to have to follow her nose. A part of her wished, again, that she could shift—her senses were so much more acute in animal form—but she definitely wasn’t interested in showing up on the Burnaby pack’s doorstep naked.
She walked around town for a few hours aimlessly, hoping to pick up their scent and finding nothing. It wasn’t until the sun was beginning to sink low in the sky that she finally registered the smell of wolf.
It was easy enough to follow. Several of them must have come into town together. She made her way through the woods on the outskirts of Burnaby until she found a sprawling log cabin.
It had probably been very nice when it was new, but now it was falling apart. Sophie stood in the trees and stared at the rotting wood. Could she really live there? The Vancouver wolves had such a nice house. This was appalling by comparison.
But what other choice did she have? She would never make it on her own. The Burnaby pack was her only hope of survival.
She crossed the lawn and went up the porch steps to the front door, half afraid that the steps would crumble away beneath her feet. She hesitated outside the door, summoning her nerve, and then knocked.
The door opened.
It was Marcie Gray, one of the few women who lived with the Burnaby wolves. Marcie was roughly Sophie’s own age, though Sophie didn’t know her well enoug
h to say for certain. She had dirt on her face, and she looked as though she hadn’t showered or combed her hair in weeks.
She frowned. “You’re that omega,” she said. “From Vancouver.”
“Sophie,” Sophie said.
“Okay,” Marcie replied. “What are you doing here?”
“I need to see your alpha.”
“Why’d they send you?” Marcie asked. Sophie didn’t think she was being rude—it was a valid question. Why would anybody send her if they were trying to forge a connection between packs, which Marcie must think was what this was all about?
“I’ll explain,” Sophie said. “But to the alpha.”
“Lou’s busy.”
“I’ll wait, then.”
Marcie looked her up and down, and Sophie knew she was taking in the dress. “Fine,” she said. “Wait on the porch. I’ll tell him you’re here.”
“Can I come inside, at least?”
“No.” Marcie slammed the door in her face.
Sophie sighed and went to sit on the steps. Living here, being a part of this pack...it was going to be pure hell.
If only there was some other way. She felt she would take just about any other option.
She waited on the steps for about fifteen minutes before the door opened again. This time, it was to reveal Lou, the pack’s alpha.
“You’re Josh’s omega,” he said.
Was that the only thing anybody knew her as? Josh’s omega? Now that Josh had exiled her from her pack, who was she? “I’m Sophie,” Sophie said. “Can I talk to you?”
“I don’t want a territory dispute,” Lou said.
“I’m not anybody’s territory,” Sophie said.
He looked her up and down. As with the bus driver, Sophie could tell that he was getting an eyeful of her in her dress. She forced herself to stand there and take it. If she stayed, she would have to become his omega. She would just have to hope that there would be no public mating ritual to endure and that Lou would be a bit more considerate of her than Josh had been.
“We’ll talk out here,” he said.
