Authors: Aimee Easterling
I only realized the words were a threat when Justin turned on his heel and left the room, just as our father opened the opposite door to herd me into his study. Oh goody, time for round two.
***
Dear old Dad's lecture was par for the course, so I left the alpha's home just as bored as when I'd gone in. I have to admit that my tail
was
between my legs after this second tirade, though—a true alpha will do that to you when he's displeased, whether you're a bloodling or not. However, neither speech had made much of an impression. I still figured I'd take my Running Around time when, and if, Chase decided he wanted to explore the outside world. Unlike blood brothers, milk brothers watched each other's backs.
And, at first, life seemed to have returned to normal. School was boring as Mrs. Dickerson droned on about chi squares and about how werewolfism was a dominant, X-linked gene. I liked our biology teacher and knew that Chase found her words fascinating, but I still couldn't help tuning the woman out and instead focusing on the behavior of the young werewolves around me. To my wolf brain, it was far more intriguing to sniff out the web of attraction that bound my classmates together, especially since most of the young shifters were dating someone other than the wolf they were truly interested in.
By the time Mr. Shutters started delving into the wonders of theorems, my lupine brain had descended yet further, spiraling down to a primal level. As a wolf, I could spend hours just watching the birds out the window, which Chase would tell me did nothing for my GPA. But, let's get real—my GPA had nowhere to go but up since I couldn't even grasp a pencil in my preferred form. And what would I do with geometry in my future life anyway? Should I calculate the tangent or cosine of a deer's trajectory instead of simply running after the ungulate and ripping out her throat?
P.E. was the average school day's one saving grace since I could play dodge ball like nobody's business, making this the sole class I looked forward to. But as Chase and I approached the gym and saw the boys being shunted outside away from the girls, I realized it was instead time for our weekly dose of shifting practice. Along with everyone else, I whined a complaint, not relishing the upcoming lesson one bit.
Like most of my age-mates, I'd only learned to change forms within the last year, the big difference being that my transformation had been from four legs to two rather than vice versa. And also like them, I wasn't particularly enthusiastic about that change, although our apathy had different causes. The other fifteen-year-old members of my pack struggled with a shift that was difficult and painful, while I simply put my wolf brain to sleep and woke up as a boy.
So why was I critical of the endeavor? It just seemed like a pain in the ass to have to leave the wolf behind, even for an hour. What was the point when canine form had served me so well to date?
Still, I was an obedient little pup. So I stood naked and two-footed, feeling the chill air in a way I hadn't since last week's shifting practice and watching the boys around me struggle with their forms. A month ago, Chase had confided that his change felt like slivers of glass were cutting into every inch of his skin, which I'll admit didn't sound pleasant, and I hoped for my milk brother's sake that his transformation would be over soon. Our teacher promised that if we could just relax and go with the flow, the pain would fade with practice as shifting became second nature. But at fifteen, the transformation was still something most of us didn't do unless we had to.
The class was essential though, because mastering our shifts was probably the most important skill most of us would learn this year. The girls inside the gym would each change forms uncontrollably once a month, something that my human brain didn't want to think about but that my wolf brain found intriguing. Boys, on the other hand, usually shifted only at will...or if we got angry or scared. Here in the village, we were protected by our insularity, but when we visited the nearby town, being able to quickly shift back to the form we'd arrived in could mean the difference between letting our secret out and getting safely home.
Plus, the fastest shifters were automatically considered dominant werewolves. And who didn't want to be dominant?
Justin definitely
did
want the dominance points. As his furry body pushed past my fur-less one, I got lost in complicated human thoughts for a moment, wondering if my blood brother actually obeyed our teacher's admonition to practice shifting forms each night before bed. His speedy transformation was impressive, and I didn't realize the point of his effort until the wolf's teeth had sunken into Chase's thigh and my milk brother was screaming on the ground, helplessly stuck mid-shift.
I leaped on Justin in a heartbeat, but the teacher was there faster, tossing the wolf onto his back in a rare display of dominance against the alpha's oldest son. Chase faded back into human form, his hand pushing against the gash in his leg, and I used my own fingers to press a discarded shirt into the bleeding wound.
Despite the teacher's uncharacteristic lack of favoritism, though, the damage was done, and I got the message loud and clear. As I always tried to explain to Chase, a wolf can communicate quite effectively without words, and Justin had evidently gotten
that
part of wolf brain down pat. Justin's teeth said what hadn't sunk into my understanding during his earlier lecture—I needed to leave this pack before someone got hurt. Not me—Chase.
***
I hadn't thought it would be so hard to talk myself into leaving the pack. Half of the nearby adults hated my guts while half of the kids were terrified of my wolf form, never mind the reality that the latter would shortly grow into a wolf of their own. So you would have thought there was little to hold me in my childhood home. Still, the outside world was terrifying to a wolf like me who had probably spent fewer than fifty hours beyond the boundaries of our village in his entire lifetime. And, fear aside, my wolf brain allowed me to love with an intensity that few humans could muster. Chase wasn't just my milk brother; he was my left paw. Tia wasn't just my foster mother; she was the bones that held me up. Abandoning either seemed unthinkable.
While I vacillated, Justin didn't let up in his torment of my milk brother, and the bully soon branched out to the halfies and full-humans (meat, he called them) in our pack. At first, I tried to pretend that my blood brother was just being his usual domineering self, but Justin knew just how to catch my eye after tripping a human kid as the latter walked down the aisle to his seat. In the end, my blood brother's wolf and mine communicated perfectly.
This is your fault
, Justin's wolf reminded me.
I'm hurting these kids because you won't leave.
And, for once, my own wolf cowered in the face of confrontation.
To make matters worse, even-tempered Chase picked up on the subtext and grew angry on my behalf within a couple of days. "We're going to have to find a way to fight back," my milk brother told me as we walked home from school, a bruise darkening on his forearm where Justin had pounded my milk brother with a dodge ball during gym class. Chase wasn't angry about the bruise, though. Instead, we were both steamed about the way we'd caught Justin behind the schoolhouse feeling up a halfie girl who was struggling to pull away.
I shook my head adamantly at my milk brother.
We
didn't need to find a way to fight back.
I
did.
Despite the lack of words, Chase understood my meaning intuitively, his wolf brain tuning into my body language and deciphering my stance on the issue. "I know you think this is your fight, but it's becoming everyone's fight," he told me. "Your father is an asshole, but at least he's fair. Can you imagine what this pack will be like for halfies once Justin is in charge? He's
going
to be our alpha, you know."
I shook my head again, but this time because I knew deep in my gut that Justin never
would
be my alpha. Now I just had to find the courage to tell my blood brother as much.
***
"No leash?" Justin asked when I cornered him in his yard the next morning.
"No leash," I replied, my voice a bit rusty from lack of use. In fact, I was dressed in jeans and a t-shirt and figured I could almost pass for a real boy. Not that I would say that to Justin, who I had to admit was still pulling my strings.
Because I was here to admit that my older brother had won—I was going to leave the pack in his capable hands. But I saw no reason not to let him wiggle a little on the hook first, especially since my human presence seemed to daunt my blood brother even more than my wolf form did. Maybe the problem was that my human form had grown to be a full head taller than my sibling's and my arms were thick with muscles from my wolf sprints through the woods. In contrast, Justin looked scrawnier every day. But I'd learned the hard way that I couldn't bat the older boy down, not with all of the nearby adults hanging on his every word as they waited for Justin to grow into the role of alpha. So it was time to concede with as much grace as I could muster.
"Well?" Justin said at length, losing the silence contest just as he generally lost our staring contests in the schoolyard. If I'd been a wolf, I would have lolled my tongue in satisfaction; as a human, I was able to laugh. My mirth didn't last long, though, since my next words were bitter.
"I'm here to tell you I'm leaving," I said. "I'll go tonight. But don't think you can keep beating up on people weaker than you just because I'm not around to see it. I'll find a way to check in at intervals, and if you're being a bastard, I'll come back and I
will
take you down."
Justin looked away, his downcast eyes making it clear that he'd obey my command.
This
was at the heart of our antipathy—between the two of us, I was the real alpha, but Justin was our father's son.
I expected my brother to save face with some back-handed comment, "Good riddance" perhaps, or the more manly "Get the hell out of here." But instead, my blood brother just nodded and turned to leave. Our deal had been struck.
***
My last day of school was bittersweet. True to his word, Justin left the halfies alone, and Chase and I enjoyed a rare autumnal day of happy heckling amongst ourselves. My milk brother was thrilled that I'd decided to spend a few hours in human form, and I wanted to soak up every moment of my found-sibling's company before I slipped away into the night. In the end, I'd decided to don clothes that day not just so I could be completely clear about my blood brother's compliance, but also so my human brain could remember each word my milk brother spoke in what would become our last shared hours. Now and then, the human brain trumped the wolf.
At home, I spent a few more minutes two-footed. I'd debated trying to pack clothes and valuables, but I didn't own much, and the best solution I'd found to a bad situation was to try to make my way in the world as a dog, at least at first. So I just cut a swatch of fabric from the puppy blanket Tia had made for me many years ago, then pinned the cloth to the inside of my collar to remember her by. The collar itself would serve the same purpose in my milk brother's memory. Finally, I clasped the reminders around my neck, shifted into wolf form, and trotted out into the evening air.
The road was dark, only a rare car passing by, so I was surprised to hear voices ahead when I'd traveled only halfway to town. At first, I assumed Justin had found his balls and was throwing me a not-so-fond farewell party, probably complete with a three-against-one boxing match. But then I scented Chase's unmistakable aroma, and my anticipation for the fight stilled. What was my milk brother doing here?
"Come on out, Wolfie," my foster mother called into the night. "There's something we need to say to you."
So I was caught. Seeing no reason to put off the inevitable, I trotted around the bend...and found a third of our village gathered at the bus stop, bags and suitcases littering the ground as kids lounged in parents' laps. A sit-in? I hated to break it to them, but no peaceful resistance was going to change the reality of this pack for me.
"I figured you were leaving tonight when you came to school as a human," Chase said, walking up to scratch beneath my collar. "I'd hoped you'd ask me to come along...." His voice trailed off, and the halfie girl I'd protected days ago, starting this whole sordid mess, chimed in. "So we invited ourselves!" she exclaimed.
Invited themselves?
I looked up into Tia's eyes for an explanation, knowing my foster mother would be able to untangle this situation that made no sense to my wolf brain. Her mouth quirked up into a lopsided grin and the woman spoke slowly, the way she did when she knew my wolf brain was having trouble parsing human words. "We're coming along to start our own pack."
But a pack needs an alpha!
Chase stroked a hand over my ears, and I could tell he was reading my confusion from my body language. The older boy didn't like to admit it, but after growing up with a bloodling brother, Chase was often nearly as wolf brain as I was.
"Don't you get it, Wolfie?" my brother said softly. "
You're
our alpha."