SWNOVELS Chapter Wheels in motion
The pack started to disperse, the excitement over for the night, but the story will go on for a while, the Omega who took on the pack leadership and won.
There are snippets of conversation going on in most of the groups as they move back to their houses and work.
It makes Delta Alek smile, a pup got one up on them all, but that in itself brings about far more questions than answers, time to get some of them resolved, turning to Alpha Matthews he starts to speak.
“Alpha Matthews, can you tell me a little about her history, she’s a strange she-wolf?”
“She is, we found her a year ago” he begins
“A rogue pup, swimming up near the start of our territory, although being young and having no wolf, she was effectively a lost human, no rogue attributes, but then rogue status only applies when they have a wolf, as you know.
Even now, I would guess no one noticed the change of smell that is triggered once she shifts because she’s an orphan, so has no constant single adult supervision, maybe something we need to change.”
Alpha Matthews is lost in his thoughts briefly
“Anyway, I assume she had entered the river to wash, but the river current is strong in February and she accidentally got pulled over the boundary.
She’d have got away with it, except there was a patrol team up there training.
She swam into them, before realising she’d crossed the border, turning she sprinted out of the river towards the boundary, she was fast, Charlie was only just faster, so to be sure, he shifted and caught her in no time, she was terrified and crying, so was brought before me.
Born a rogue then orphaned, poor pup, I couldn’t banish her, how would a thirteen-year-old survive alone in No-mans-land?
Nor would I sentence her, an innocent, who accidentally crossed our border to death, so I offered her the blood oath and taught her about pack life, she was a quick learner and thrived with us.
I’m guessing her skills were taught to her by her parents to survive as a rogue.”
“You had no idea she was weapon trained?” Delta Alek asks
“None at all, she certainly has never borrowed a bow, nor practised with anyone from the pack.”
Alpha Matthews lets out a sigh
“Maybe we should have asked her more about her past, but I needed to assimilate her into the pack, help her realise pack life was better than a rogue’s life.
It’s so much harder for a female out there,”
Alpha Matthews shakes his head sadly pausing slightly
“Innocence and youth give no protection from evil”
“You did the right thing Alpha, every pup should be protected”
Delta Alek nods, but his eyes are watching Toni.
As she enters the pack house, he notes how she moves gracefully, almost as if she’s trained to move lightly and leave no footprints, no heaviness in her step, her moves definite, defined and controlled, not at all like a normal teenage shuffle of most wolves, there’s an innate grace in her movements.
Lean and well trained, you don’t get that muscle from jobs around the pack, so who is training her he wonders and when.
She’s also taller than most her age, is it possible she’s older than she claims, the thought is squashed before it begins, there was no sense of a lie when she admitted her age earlier, and some of her other answers didn’t exactly feel open, like she was only partially honest, but not about her age.
Fourteen, that’s way too young for anyone to shift, and if she went through it alone, it’s painful and confusing at the best of times, usually an adult helps coach a young wolf and guides them in their first run, he’s not sure he’s heard of a solo shifter before.
But then a pup avoiding twenty-five fully fledged warriors and trackers, breaching the protective ring, as well as taking down all three hunters was a mystery, plus the size of her wolf, what would she be like size-wise as a fully-fledged adult?
If she is fourteen now, she could be the one they were looking for, her wolf is larger and appeared earlier than expected, but she’s an orphan of the right age.
Her skills are too good, hell she’d probably beat the wolves in the sixteen to seventeen-year-old groups easily in the Royal Pack training group, and their standards are high, so she has to have had formal training Alek muses as he thinks about her actions.
“How long was she alone as a rogue?” he finally asks
“Not long I don’t think, she wasn’t underfed, so I doubt she’d had to fend for herself for long, dirty yes and fast on her feet, so definitely not starving when we found her, why the interest?”
The Alpha looks at Delta Alek as he finishes his answer
“We were looking for a lost pup, about her age, but she’s been missing for three years not one and I definitely wouldn’t expect the missing pup to get her wolf for another few years.”
Alek’s jaw tenses involuntarily as he tries to settle his thoughts if she is the pup they were looking for, isn’t it better that she’s left to grow up in a pack like this, it goes against his Alpha’s wishes.
“May I be present when you talk to her tomorrow, ideally with Charlie there?
I’d like to hear about her capture, from them both”
Alpha Matthews nods his consent
“One last question Alpha Matthews, how attached are you to keeping her in your pack?”
Later that evening Delta Alek enters his guest room and walks to the window, the moon casts a gentle light over the front of the pack house, lighting up the woods and giving the view a relaxing hue, it’s a peaceful pack, usually, he likes visiting this place as it brings him some calm from the boisterous nature of the Royal pack for a few days, more than that and he misses the bustle of activity.
Rubbing his hands over his face, he sits down, leaning back into the chair to read the file on Antonia Emma Marshall, she’s only been there a year so it doesn’t take long.
He’s struggling to understand how Alpha Matthews can’t see what’s so obvious from her file, an alleged rogue-born pup going from someone unschooled to consistently scoring B’s, never more, never less in one year, it’s too miraculous, too consistent and too coincidental.
He picks up his phone and dials, he’s going to need to inform his Alpha.