Wolfpack

The Return

Warning: this chapter contains some content that may be perceived as mature.

Wolves of the north were often regarded as haughty; so caught up in their ancient blood and proximity to the moon that they couldn't be bothered to see other packs as anything near equal.

Perhaps it was true. Still, if the other packs knew what it meant to have ancient blood, to be subject to the moon's curses as heartily as they were subject to her blessings, Noah doubted that any wolf would wish that upon themselves. Hell, even he didn't wish that upon himself.

Before seeing Emme for the first time in the wood, Noah had teetered dangerously close to the darkness. When he hunted, he had felt the very brush of the rogue against his coat, calling him to turn from the moon.

Cryo had seen the darkness that ate at Noah's soul, but what he had seen hadn't been enough to sway him into forbidding Noah from participating in hunts. The fact of the matter was that Noah was skilled, perhaps even more so than the ranked males, and the dwindling numbers of the pack dictated that all available men hunt and protect the pack.

The past year had been trying on Noah's soul and mind. The northern winter approached slowly, bringing nights that were deeper, and a cold that was more frigid. It would be some time yet before the winter fell upon them, perhaps a few years, but that didn't stop the night walkers and rogue packs from testing the northern boarders.

It wasn't a secret that the northern pack grew weaker with each season that came and went without the birth of new pups. Noah had been forced more than ever before in his life to respond to threats with deadly force. It was his duty as a pack member to attack first and secure a kill, his fate to die first as an unranked male.

Noah had looked evil in the face, had stared into the darkness of his nature and turned from it, had greeted death as an old friend.

And still, nothing had prepared him for this moment.

He had emerged from the haze of the hunt, expecting to feel the familiar caress of his moomate's voice against his mind. They hadn't completed the mating ritual, so the darkness called seductively to him, the rogue wolf howling to emerge. He had welcomed Emme's touch, desperate to remind himself of his hope, his reason against turning. There was no touch, no shadow of Emme in his mind, nothing. He hadn't panicked - he had supposed that she was upset with him, and despite her inclinations otherwise, she refrained from reaching out to him. He broadcast his thoughts to her, coaxing her, calling for her, but she had not answered him. Noah knew that she would be suffering in his absence, even more so since she had been marked.

But even Emme's strong will should have bowed in the face of the moon's curse.

When his wolf neared the camp, Noah shifted immediately, shameless in his nakedness as he reached for his neatly folded clothes. He dressed in silence, trying to forget the details of the hunt, trying to forget what he had been made to do. The kidnapped females whimpered as they shuffled behind the men, silver bracelets digging into their flesh to prevent them from shifting. Noah shuddered. The darkness whispered to him. His soul, without Emme, was a barren winter.

Without asking permission from Julien, Noah departed from the group. The sky was in the early hours of morning, the sun stretching lazily in the sky as Noah walked towards his home, calling out to Emme with each step he took. Silence roared back at him, quickening his heart and his pace. He had placed a series of complicated runes on the home, preventing Emme from escaping and chasing after him. He wanted to protect her, keep her untainted by the horrors of the hunt - this hunt in particular. He fumbled as he undid the runes. He tried to still his mind. Emme was probably fine, or sleeping.