The Golden Choice

Laundry Maid

Chapter One

At Five fifty-five, my alarm would go off. This was the normal everyday routine for me since as long as I could remember. I could not think of a time when I had a chance to sleep in.

That is why I was always tired. It felt like I would always have permanent dark under eyes until the day I died. They wanted you to wake up early and get started on chores, but there was never any telling how long your days would be. Last night, I only slept for three hours.

There was a huge pack meeting happening tomorrow night and the pack house was in shambles. Everyone was running around trying to make sure that everything was perfect. All hands were on deck; however, we were just working harder than everyone else. This life sucked. I did not care too much about dealing with all of this on my own, but I did not want this life for my parents. They were going through this too and it was not fair. It made me sick to my stomach. Elder wolves were supposed to be treated with respect. Grey hair carried wisdom. The Golden River pack did not honor that. Elders with low rank got treated the same as any other underdog wolf. That treatment was not pretty.

I wanted my parents removed from this life, nevertheless I was an even bigger nobody. We were not born into any fancy wolf linage or royalty, but we were amazing people. They were all I had.

My little sister, Brianna, shot up in the bed in a panic. She was breathing heavy and had sweat running down her face.

"Brianna? What's wrong?" I asked sitting up next to her.

She looked over at me and began crying softly. "Kelsey... it was so real". She buried her face into my chest as she sobbed. I stroked her shoulder length curly hair. "We finally got out of here. We finally made it out".

Brianna was thirteen but being trapped in this life seemed to make you older. She didn't have a normal teenage life like I'm sure she dreamed of. I was turning eighteen in a couple of weeks, so I knew a normal teenage life for me wasn't going to happen. For Brianna, I wanted it to be possible. It wasn't fair for her to have to grow up like this. It was miserable.

Ever since my sister was eight years old, she would have these unexplainable dreams that seemed to happen some way shape or form. They were never serious dreams, usually small dreams that my parents would call coincidental. I hoped this current dream wouldn't be any different. Making it out of here would be a fantasy fulfilled.

My high school graduation was two weeks ago, and I spent it cleaning the pack house. My parents had a small celebratory moment and that was honestly enough for me. I stayed up all night with my best friend and that was how we celebrated. Four years of high school was over and now we would face our adult years as low rank house cleaner for the pack house. No bright future for me.

My alarm finally went off at five fifty-five cutting our sisterly moment short. We wouldn't be able to have a moment life this for a while.

Every year there was an annual pack meeting that was held at the pack of choice. This meeting brought together all eight packs from the region and usually lasted about two days. The packs got along with one another pretty well, but there were some rules put into place to help promote the peace. There had to be, or everyone would think they were superior. Each pack did something or produced something that made them special. Our pack, Golden River, was famous for producing the Aconitum plant. Many packs knew it as Wolfsbane. We had the largest garden in the region, but Aconitum was our best product. It was not something you 'grew' but rather 'treated' or as my father would say 'raised'. He worked as a gardener since joining the pack fifteen years ago and his love for plants grew. He started to study plants more and knew how to use them for medicinal solutions. He could probably save someone's life with his methods if he really needed to. His skill would never be recognized by the pack Alpha or elders. Especially when it came to Aconitum. They only cared about the recognition Aconitum gave the pack, not so much the larger benefits it had. Aconitum was the Queen of Poison and could do horrible things but there were healing factors to it. No one would ever listen to a lower ranking wolf. That was madness. Aconitum gave Golden River a powerful reputation.