A Cold Wind Blows (Forgotten series, #3)

Chapter 18

A week later

The phone rang in my ear again and I wanted to curse violently as it wouldn't stop. Brice was ignoring my calls. He had been having his pack members push the territory lines, testing them along that border and I was not happy. I had been trying to get a hold of him for the past four day to get him to stop. He was my brother but I only had so much patience for his small tantrum. I should have had him placed further away than Mollitiam.

I set the phone down and ran my hands through my hair, tugging on the strands. It was almost getting too long but I didn't have time for that. The large grandfather clock chimed the time at two in the morning, I had been at it for nearly six hours. I had wanted to simply talk to Brice, to remind him that his territory and mine had been allies for over two hundred years and his pride shouldn't ruin such a long and prosperous union.

He had so much to learn about being an Alpha. He was simply doing as he wished and his pack would crumble under such a poor leadership. I picked up the phone and tried again. The line rang and rang and I let out a heavy sigh, rubbing at my face.

"What the fuck do you want?" Brice's voice was snarled and I nearly jumped in surprise. I hadn't expected him to actually answer the phone. "It is two in the goddamned morning." He sounded agitated and it made my wolf's hackles rise in return.

"If you would have answered the phone six hours ago I wouldn't be bothering you at two in the morning, Brice." This would have been taken care of at eight if he hadn't been so petulant about answering the phone.

"Cry me a fucking river. What do you want?" His disrespectful tone riled my wolf up but I tamped him down, I needed to be civil if I were to get my point across to him.

"You need to watch the attitude, Brice. You are an Alpha now and you need to remember to be formal." I kept my tone as civil as I could as my wolf snarled in the back of my head. It was hard not to have the sound translate into myself.

"Fuck your rules, Azrael. You woke me up." There was that petulant tone to his voice that he got when he was younger and was called out on bad behaviour.

"Stop sending your pack members to test the territory lines." I let out a sigh and there was a scoff from his end. I wanted to groan, there was no talking to him when he got like this.

"Not my authorization." He snapped it out and I pinched the bridge of my nose in irritation. His disrespectful tone was not helping anything at the moment.

"Then find out who is doing it and get them to stop." I knew he was lying but I wasn't about to call him out on it. I needed to be civil. "Our packs have been aligned for nearly-"

"Two hundreds years, blah, blah, blah. I don't give a shit. If you can't control your own territory lines, maybe they deserve to be tested." He sounded almost smug at the thought and I ground my teeth together. He had so much to learn about being an Alpha. I had to repeat to myself and my wolf that he was essentially a juvenile at the position. Learning to be an Alpha was a hard task and he had only been one for a few months.

"That is not how this works. If I control the lines, your pack members will end up dead." It was the only way we could curb the behaviour and the reason I needed to speak with him. If I controlled my lines better, there would be Mollitiam pack deaths. The members pushing the territory lines would be killed. It was what I did with every other pack on my borders, I was holding back because of my ties to Brice. He was my little brother.

"So be it." His flippant attitude had a growl rumbling my chest. He was such a novice, such a juvenile. His attitude had not changed in the slightest since he was younger. He was still a flippantly cocky bastard who shirked at his responsibilities. I loved him, I did. He was my brother, my family but I also knew when the truth was the truth.