A Knight's Purpose (Book 1) ✔️

Chapter 2 - I'm Not Your Pack

The sheriff takes my elbow and leads me back to his car the way we came. This time he gestures to the passenger's seat.

"Better?" He asks gruffly as we begin to move.

"I think so. This door has handles," I try to make it a joke but it falls flat. As he drives, the silence falls awkwardly heavy. "So... Are all the law enforcement people around here Pack?"

"Most are, yes, but we don't discriminate. It's just that around here most people aren't interested in that sort of life and those who move in don't make up that much of the population."

"Tell me more about the people, the Pack." He slants a suspicious look my way. "Please?" I tack on the end.

"Well, you guessed correctly. We're a wolf Pack of near a thousand members, Heartford Vale Pack to be precise and can trace our origins back to one of the three original packs."

That was very important for wolf Packs, this pack must be more important than I originally believed. Guess I didn't do my homework as well as I thought I did; I try to stay away from the really important ones just to be on the safe side.

"We have contracts with three non-predatory groups for protection and housing. A herd of deer, a flock of sage grouse, and a prickle of porcupines, though truly there are only five of them. We also share a territory with a small convocation of eagles who are mostly the lawmakers in nearby towns."

"What is your Alpha's name? In fact, what is your name?"

"You can call me Sheriff Waters." And we're back to the glaring. "And you met Alpha Rose Bluecreek and her second-in-command Beta Max Moonacre."

My eyebrows are practically in my hairline, those are some old familial names they have.

"I thought the Alpha was Charles Riems," I respond casually.

"I guess he would still be on record, but he died a few years ago. The Council of Wolf Alphas has been informed but there hasn't been a call to Caucus since his death so there hasn't been a need for the official registries to be updated."

During a Caucus the leaders of each Council came together and discussed business, only the predatory ones of course. The non-predatory had their own system of rule but no one much bothered with it because discrimination is everywhere and in the supernatural shifter community, predators were top dog. If the non-predatory species made too big of a fuss one of the Alphas might get annoyed and eat the offender.

"How did your Alpha end up here?" I change tactics slightly. Know thy enemy and all that jazz.

Waters chuckles at me. "She just showed up one day after having run away from her home Pack, Max not far from her heels. She'd heard that Charles was a good Alpha and she wanted to know his ways. Well, Charles laughed at her and made her and Max start from the bottom of the hierarchy and work their way up after informing their Alpha they were old enough to make their own decisions and change packs if they liked. It wasn't long before they were trusted and as she grew in power he taught her his ways. She still hasn't made up with her family."

"Interesting..."

"You know who the old Alpha was. You know where our main home is. You picked Tershaw deliberately." He turns to give me a slightly suspicious look.

There's no real way to answer that without looking bad or lying so I ignore the implied question. I give him quick directions as we breach the trees that have ensconced us for most of our drive and reach the city limits.

"This you?" He pulls up to my apartment building, which was clearly two townhouses at one point in time.

"Yes. I'm in apartment 3C if you care to know," I snap a little snidely. I know he's only doing his job so I can't get too mad, but his job gets in my way of living a mostly normal life.