Alpha Queen: First of Her Name

Chapter Thirteen

An awful taste lingers in my mouth, and sweat gathers at my temples. Something cold touches my leg before withdrawing almost as fast as it appeared. A desperate whine escapes my chapped lips. "Jackson...Jack shut the drapes." I roll away from the sunlight stabbing me in the eyes. My head throbs. My throat hurts as it constricts around dryness. Moaning, I try to wiggle my arm, but it feels like stone. I'm dead weight.

"Jackson!" For some reason, my older brother wants to continue his joke of always leaving my curtains open when he knows I hate waking up to bright light. A weak groan registers in my inebriated mind. With the energy I don't have, I force my eyes to open. It's like trying to pry apart a nun's legs, but after a few attempts, I succeed.

After gaining some of my senses back I realize that I'm not in Summerland. Jackson is nowhere to be seen, and it's freezing. "Everest?" My voice is a mumble, drool sticking to my cheek when I lift my head an inch off the cool ground.

A cold foot brushes my leg again. "Mmm."

Shutting my eyes when another intense headache throbs through my foggy head, I wince. "Where are we?"

"I don't know." Everest buries her head deeper into her arm. "Be quiet."

A chill wracks my entire body when a cold breeze billows past. Again I lift my head and finally notice that we're outside. Sobriety slaps me in the face. Hard. I smack the girl, panic ensuing. "Everest!"

She moans but opens her eyes. "What?"

"Where are we?" I fist the crisp grass beneath my fingers and look around us, not recognizing anything.

The waking Omega groggily sits up, her eyes slowly widening. "Huh?'

Trees surround us, towering above. The thickness of the forest causes me to scoot closer to Everest. "How? I don't understand."

"Hope, where are your clothes?" Everest frowns while pointing a finger at me.

Brown eyes widen further when I look down. My mouth falls open, a high-pitched scream echoing around us. "Aaaahhhh! Why am I naked!"

Birds caw angrily for being disturbed by my scream. I stand up and frantically search for my nightgown.

"Calm down, you're not naked." Everest grabs her head with a groan. "Please don't scream again."

I pull at the animal pelt that I have wound around my figure. "Everest, you have one too," I whisper and back away in alarm. As my animal pelt is most likely a deerskin, Everest's is similar to a bear.

She stands, clutching the fur to her body. "Okay, where did we get these?"

I give mine an experimental sniff and scrunch my nose in disgust. "They smell like the wilderness." Letting the matter drop, I spin in a slow circle. "Are we in the garden?" I search for the white wall or Solstice Palace. "I can't see anything."

"Hope, what do you remember any of last night?" The serious tone that Everest uses has me tensing up.

After a minute I tilt my head. "I think we robbed the kitchen for snacks." When Everest nods I shrug. "Wasn't it a full moon?"

"Yeah, we wanted to give an offering to the Moon Goddess." Everest steps toward me and glances up and down. "Did you get a tattoo?"

I glance down at myself and sure enough, a black tribal pattern spirals up my inner forearms. Frantically I rub at my skin and breathe a sigh of relief when the ink smudges. "What in the Luna did we do last night?" I shake my head and place my hands on my hips.

We seep into silence still gazing around the dense forest around us. "Did I transform last night?" Everest smacks her lips, pink tongue coming out to lick her lips. Everest groans while dragging a hand over her face. "I think we climbed the wall."