The Alpha's Fight

Chapter 5 - Another She-Wolf Problem

My head still ached the following morning. Even though Hawk had ceased his tirade of throwing insults around about our father, he hadn't quit his grumblings to himself.

The sun had barely broken across the horizon, illuminating the midnight blue of the sky. It couldn't be later than 6am but I was past being able to sleep anymore. I hauled myself out of bed and slipped on the first pair of shorts I laid my hands on from my dark-wood dresser. Like most werewolves, I slept naked, finding clothing at night restrictive and, because of our higher body heat of 41⁰C, borderline smothering. I flicked on my bedside lamps, to cast a gentle light over my room, softening the dark green walls with the forest mural. I loved the outdoors, there was no place I'd rather be than out in the woods and the meadows, around the lakes and the rivers. Anywhere but here. That's why I made my room my sanctuary so that when I locked myself away, it almost felt as though I was amongst the trees.

I stretched out my limbs, flexing my arms, popping my joints and wrapped my knuckles up properly this time. The steady rhythm of my fists making contact with the punch bag had become a soothing therapy for when I was either tense with pent-up rage or aching with a welled-up headache. I could almost close my eyes and feel myself slipping into a hypnotic trance. Until it was broken by the alarm clock blaring, signalling it was fast approaching 7am and I needed to get ready for school. I stilled the punch bag, resting my forehead against it to catch my breath, trying to steel myself for the last day before the weekend, already feeling my bones scream in agony from the breaks they would receive.

After showering, changing and tying my hair half-back, I headed downstairs to grab breakfast before I was summoned yet again to a private mealtime that left my wolf wanting to rampage. I had started to grow my hair out when Jayden had. She had been worried about other guys making comments about its length, so I decided to join her as an act of solidarity. They couldn't make fun of her without insulting me and I knew they were far too terrified to do that.

The dining hall was bustling with members coming and going, exactly what I hated. I grabbed a plate quickly and rushed to fill it and leave, to find a quieter spot. There was a small private room, rarely used by anyone other than myself, just down the corridor. When I found the main hall too chaotic, I would regularly eat there alone when Scott wasn't around. It was always kept locked and I always carried the key.

I entered swiftly but froze when the heavy mix of two scents alerted me to the fact I was not as alone as I thought I was…and the two she-wolf occupants were not as alone as they thought they were.

My plate slipped from my hand, crashing to the floor and throwing its contents in every direction. The scene before me could not be explained away as anything innocent.

A black-haired girl I vaguely recognised from my senior year at school had her skirt pulled up around her waist where she sat on the table, her top mostly unbuttoned and her breasts about to spill from the gap. She had clearly been engaged in a heavy makeout session with the brunette woman that stood between her legs, her skinny jeans unzipped, with the hand of her partner firmly inside and her flowing blouse completely undone and her chest bare.

I had never seen a woman being intimate before and I never wanted to again. This was just further confirmation for me that I was most definitely gay.

The silence wasn't just deafening, it was enough to be described as its own sound. I could tell from the look of abject horror, that the two girls were terrified. They hadn't even moved to cover themselves. I coughed awkwardly and averted my eyes.

"Uhh…I…uh…I won't say anything," and I hurried out of the room, shutting the door behind me and briskly walked back to my bedroom. All notion of hunger was totally forgotten.

What the hell had I just witnessed?!

'If I seriously need to have the s*x talk with you at your age, then you're a lost cause,' my wolf rolled his mental eyes at me.

'I know what they were doing! I just wasn't expecting something so graphic,' I felt my face heat just recalling the awkward display.

'I never want to see a boob again,' Hawk shuddered.

I snorted, 'don't look in the mirror, then.'

'It'd be you in the mirror, genius.'

…I guess I walked straight into that one.

I needed to head to school and get the f**k out of here, before I stumbled onto something else that I would need therapy for. A pang of guilt throbbed through my head at knowing that I had just left the smashed plate and ruined breakfast where they fell. s**t, I should really apologise for that…once I could actually look one of them in the eye without blushing to death. I grabbed my bag and bolted from the pack house, fumbling with my headphones to play some music on my fast-paced walk to drown out the fact my stomach was now protesting its hunger.

I was still a little early for classes, so I had decided to get some studying in, but I was too distracted and hungry to fully concentrate and gave up when the first bell rang. At my locker, I still had my headphones in and was hurrying to put my things away and grab the books I needed when a hand tapped my shoulder. I flinched, turning to see Scott staring at me with a bemused expression.

“Well, s**t. If I thought I was about to make you leap outta your skin, I would’ve mind-linked first,” he said with his brows pinched together in confusion. ‘This isn’t about last night, is it? Your dad didn’t do anything to you, did he?’

I shook my head, taking my headphones out and stuffing them in my bag. ‘No…I…uh…just other stuff.’

“Oookaaayy?” He drew out, clearly weirded out by my vague reply.

“Here’s the other one. Hey…Jay?” Scott’s tone changed mid-sentence, causing me to turn and take in Jayden’s harried and slightly frazzled appearance.

She just mumbled something incoherent and rammed her bag into her locker, ripping her books out afterwards.

“Ok, why is everyone being weird today? And why the hell is that girl over there staring at you, Hunter, like you just killed her puppy?” Scott whispered his last words.

I looked over to see the same black-haired girl looking over at me with dread, mortification and fright shining in her blue eyes. I was fairly sure she was an Omega, or would be. Her scent was that of a wolf pre-shift, less musky, and the mind-link I tried to send her fell on deaf ears, meaning her wolf wasn’t present for the mind-link to work. But I made a mental note of where her locker was down the hall so that I could pass along a secret message and alleviate her worries that I wasn’t about to out her.

“I think her name is Imogen. She's in a few of my classes but I’ve never spoken to her,” Jayden muttered, clutching her books to her chest and looking a little more uncomfortable than usual.

She always hated having to dress as her male self. However, it was a necessity if she wanted to survive. Both she and Scott looked at me expectantly, waiting for me to explain. What the hell could I say?

“I can’t really tell you…but she’s got nothing to worry about,” I closed my locker, casting one final look at where Imogen had been standing.

The two of them quickly caught on that it wasn’t a case of it being a subject that I didn’t want to talk about, it was one that I shouldn’t, in the event of possibly being overheard.

“So, one question sorta answered,” Scott began again as the three of us went to our first class, the sea of students naturally moved out of our way as normal. “Next one.”

Jayden sighed next to us and took out her phone to quickly type out a message, sending it to both myself and Scott.

J | Not here. I don’t want anyone hearing. At lunch, k?

Our lessons passed uneventfully. The first two periods were the only classes we all shared. The rest of the day I would be solo. While in art class, which I had zero aptitude for, I wrote out a note to Imogen and upon leaving, before I went to finally grab some food, I headed straight to her locker to deliver it. I opened it once more, just to check that it gave nothing away, in case I misjudged whose locker it was or someone else read the note first.

Can we talk? Meet me in the same place as this morning, after school. You can either come on your own or with someone else.

I didn’t know her companion’s name or what they were to each other. She hadn’t shifted yet, so I knew they couldn’t be mates, yet at least. Both wolves were needed for the mate bond to be identified. My stomach’s painful twist reminded me I was starving and lunch period hadn’t come quick enough. Luckily, I had run into Jayden and Scott in the lunch hall so we were quick to grab our food and head outside. The two of them eyed my huge double helping of fries, four BLT’s and the biggest serving of cut fruit I could carry. Shifted wolves blew through a lot of energy in the day and needed large servings of food to meet those demands. As an Alpha, I burnt through more than most and, having not eaten this morning, I could easily consume several people's full portions and probably come back for more.

They said nothing and just shook their heads in dismay at what I could pack away. We headed outside to find the quietest spot we could, which at the end of summer was tricky with students wanting to soak up the last rays before autumn set in. We found an area by the tree-lined amphitheatre and settled down to dig in. No sooner had my ass touched the grass that Jayden was reaching across to steal my damn fries. I snatched them back because I was about ready to gnaw off my own arm in hunger.

“You wanted salad, you eat salad,” I snapped, shoving a huge mouthful of salty goodness down my throat. “I didn’t eat breakfast, so I suggest if you don’t want to lose a digit, keep your hands off.”

“You’re, like, the poster child for the Snickers advert. You know that, right?” Scott deadpanned, rolling his eyes at me. “So, what got you all worked up this morning, Jay?”

She sighed, stabbing the chicken in her salad angrily, “I think I’m going to shift soon.”

‘...And you denied her a fry? What a food-w***e you are,’ my wolf commented, making me feel even worse.

I slid them over, now feeling guilty I had griped about some dumb food when my friend was facing one of her biggest fears that had been knowingly creeping closer. She half-smiled and took a small handful, eating them one by one, slowly.

The moment when our wolves came out of their hibernation, where they had slept since birth, was one of the most pivotal moments in a werewolf’s life. No two shifts were ever the same, each a unique experience. Our wolves were essentially ourselves, another part of our soul that embodied a wolf and allowed us to shift to their form. They weren’t a mirror reflection, they were more like the other side of a coin. Once we shifted, everything else about us began to change; our mind-link formed, we had to learn to adjust to another voice in our head, a whole rush of new hormones that could make our moods irritable and irrational for a time, there was a risk of shifting sickness, though, that affected Omegas more and resulted in feelings of nausea, sweats and aches…it was like going through a second puberty. But one of the biggest changes, the one I knew Jayden was panicking about most, after the whole mate thing, was how our bodies changed.

“I'm starting to get all the first signs that my shift is coming. I’m getting this weird pressure in my head, my skin feels itchy and I keep getting random heart palpitations…” Jayden listed off.

Her shift could come at any time. For some, it came after a few hours of experiencing symptoms, others it could be days after. Mine came three or four days after my first strong heart flutter. The shift was most likely to come at one of two points in the day, when the moon was closest, although it was never guaranteed; something about how gravity affected our amygdala? Biology was never my strong suit. While a werewolf couldn’t sense when the moon was closest pre-shift, we could after we shifted; it was a feeling of invigoration. With any luck, either me or Scott could message her when we felt the sensation as a heads up. The light of the full moon also seemed to influence our first; I knew of very few wolves that came forward on a lunar eclipse.

“My body’s gonna start changing. I’ll start putting on muscle like other wolf males…I'll start looking more and more like one of them,” her lip trembled at the prospect of her body becoming more masculine against her will.

She had some muscle definition that came naturally from training, but after her wolf came in and the testosterone started to flow, all that would change.

“And, goddess, what do I do if I find my mate here?!” Her voice began to rise. “What if they don’t accept any of this,” she gestured wildly to herself. “...What if they report me…and…”

“They won’t,'' I interrupted. “Because if they even hinted at that, I’d stop them.”

“Yeah, and if they didn’t accept you, it shows who they really are. You don’t want someone like that in your life,” Scott joined in to console her.

“I know you’ve been dreading all of this and it’s a lot easier said than done…but, honestly, try and enjoy getting your wolf. They’re the one that will stand by you through everything,” I smiled to myself, remembering when I first heard Hawk’s voice, how I suddenly didn’t feel so alone anymore.

‘And your private time with sweet blond boy fantasies have never been the same since, ay spanky?’ Hawk howled with laughter.

…Maybe I should warn her that her wolf will come with a lifetime supply of snark and ribbing.

‘Naw, let her find out the fun way.’

I could tell she was still tense, but unfortunately, our lunch period came to an end much faster than any of us wanted and we needed to get back to our classes.

When the last bell finally rang out, I hurried out of the classroom and to my locker to grab my bag and everything I needed for over the weekend. As I left the building, I mind-linked Scott to see if he could spend some time with Jayden, since she was going through a transgender existential crisis and I had a lesbian she-wolf to meet with in secret, so she knew she wasn’t about to be executed publicly…I was beginning to wonder what wolves in normal packs did with their days, where things like this didn’t need to be so clandestine.

As I passed the main gates and was about to cross the road, the most perfect scent wafted through the air, one that had my head turn on instinct; the scent of sweet rain. My head swivelled around in each direction, but I couldn’t see the mass of dark-gold curls that set my pulse galloping wildly. I had been treated to him twice yesterday only to be denied today.

I exhaled loudly, about to carry on my disappointing walk home, when a feminine voice shouted out and came running to grab my arm.

Bernice.

Dammit! I didn’t have time for this!

“Hunter! Why are you avoiding me? We were barely together and you just called things off? Why?!” Her face looked truly hurt.

Goddess, like I couldn’t hate myself more!

“I’m not interested, Bernice, ok?” I tried to shake her off and get back home.

“Just talk to me. You never even gave me a chance,” her dark brown eyes widened and I was sure she was purposely pouting her full lips.

To many guys, I would assume her honey-caramel hair, tanned skin and full red lips were irresistible. But for me, they did nothing. There wasn’t even so much as a wiggle in my pants as I looked down at her.

‘My father has a chosen mate lined up for me, you know this. You also know what he's capable of. Do you really want to draw his attention? To make him see you as someone to be removed?’ I pressed, trying to make her see some version of the truth. ‘Don’t involve yourself with me. Go find your mate or literally a million other things. Just go be happy.’

She let go, stunned, stepping backwards away from me. I stared at her with my trademark hard expression, hoping something had sunk in and turned to leave. She didn’t call out again or try to stop me and I spared no glance behind me either.

I had another, bigger, she-wolf problem to calm.