Wolf Prints

Defeating the Alpha

Defeating the Alpha

The full moon hung suspended as if held there by invisible strings, the light brightening the forest, illuminating the nearby lake and making my skin glow a ghostly shade. I took a deep breath of fresh air, enjoying the peacefulness the forest offered at nightfall. The overwhelming scent of Pine was a pleasant distraction from the many werewolves who had gathered here. Too many to count.

They stared at me as if I was a puzzle they had been tasked with solving. A riddle. It was annoying, but entirely unsurprising. Chastity was probably the only other female werewolf any of them had ever seen, and she was nowhere nearby. Hiding, probably. She didn't strike me as the type of wolf who would willingly mingle with the lesser wolves of her Pack.

Not that I was, either. But then, they weren't my Pack.

We stood apart for it, Draken and I, watching the wolves from a ledge some fifty feet above them. Feeling the hum of electricity in the air, the call of the moon trying to bend us to her will, my wolf snapped impatiently within me, demanding a release I would not give her yet. She howled a sound only I could hear, and I mentally tethered her to the ground.

Fortunately, I was above the moon's call. And while I felt the pull as much as anyone else, I only answered it when I wanted to. As a matter of fact, it was one of the many things that made me such an abnormality. Most werewolves had to shift periodically, or risk having their wolf take control. An outlet of sorts with dire consequences. A wolf who has overtaken it's human counterpart is our biggest taboo. There is hardly anything more dangerous.

Patience. I whispered to my wolf. She whined, but backed away obediently. I felt my lips lift in a smile. The night of the full moon was always the hardest time to keep a wolf in check. Many of the lesser wolves had already succumbed to their other nature and were walking around on four paws.

It was this that made our wolves restless. This intangible energy that the moon called forth, making my skin tingle with the promise of freedom. Which is all our wolves really wanted. Freedom from the human bodies that enslaved them so fully.

I sat on the ground and dangled my legs over the edge of the mountainous ledge Draken and I had claimed as our own, peering at the people below. We were so deep in the woods no one would ever find us, but it looked more like spring break freshman year in college, than the night of the full moon for a Pack of werewolves. Not a single one of them looked to be older than twenty-five. It was normal for me, but a human would have found it daunting. They joked, and laughed, and wrestled. Most of them walked around shirtless, gearing up for the run we would take when the moon was at its highest. No one thought twice when someone fell to the ground, bones snapping and re-mending, as they became an animal that should only exist in the wild.

Which is exactly where we were. The wild.

For a brief moment I tried to see them as a human would. Mythical. Dangerous. But it was impossible for me. The harder I tried, the harder it became to envision.

I picked up a nearby twig and began angrily snapping it in pieces and tossing them off the ledge one by one as I curled my knees up to my chest. "My dragon is defective." I huffed angrily. "I want a new one."

If Draken was the slightest bit curious over my sudden declaration, he didn't really show it. He peered down at me from the corner of his eye, hands shoved into the pockets of his solid black trench coat, and finally tipped his head back to gaze upward into the vastness that was the night.

"I'm serious." I continued as I threw the last of the broken twig to the ground below. "Something is wrong with mine."

No words left Draken's lips, but he looked down at me again and lifted a single dark eyebrow in question.