Chapter 2. Awaiting the Inevitable

We were never ready for it.

They were farmers; they were peaceful and had never had to fight in their lives. Like human legends and stories dictate, not all wolves are savage killing machines or feral beasts. Some are quiet, land-loving people who never want to experience the thrill of a hunt or the warm blood of another being in raw savagery. In a whirlwind of months, we were dragged into a battle to the death, and children were left in the care of the old and frail or the pregnant.

We waited endlessly to find out who of our loved ones would come home to us until one lone night. When the people who cared for me in their absence, the last of the Whytes who were too vulnerable to follow them, were slaughtered by invading vampires in our own homes. On the far edge of the farmlands, I was a lone survivor who was then shunted to the orphanage. The events of that night are so foggy and hazy. I don’t really remember it or why I was even spared. I was just a child.

I still remember the agony of the day I watched others return en masse, the battle truly over with the vampires in retreat, and no one, not a single person from my bloodline, came home. An entire pack of over forty people I called my own was all gone, everything I knew… every single last one of them. I was all alone.

There is no pain compared to an eight-year-old child learning that everyone she ever loved and was protected by was never coming home for her. My security was shattered and my future dead, and all I have known since was the isolation and solitude of being one of the many who were thrown here to rot.

So now here we are, a house full of teens who bear the only living connection to our past loved ones. A mixed bunch of leftovers, but no one in the packs will bond to us for fear of producing weaker offspring. It’s all about dominance in our world and power, standing, and ability. DNA is everything. They call us the Reject Pack, which sums up exactly why we are overlooked.

We don’t belong to anyone anymore, even though by rights we should be part of the united wolf community, this new singular pack location bonds us after all. We’re not, though; they see us as cursed children and deny our mere existence, throwing us to the dark-shaded side of the mountain, so they don’t have to see us. This house is the only home we know now, and the people who care for us do so out of duty but not love. They’re afraid we curse them by proximity.

It’s forbidden to abandon a pack child, even if they come from a shamed bloodline. The Fates and traditions have laws and rules from old that we have to abide by, and abandoning the vulnerable is abhorrent. So, we are given a home, shelter, food, and education. Basic care on the understanding that we get to leave upon our awakening. Severed like a rotting limb.

We can go out, find our path, and fend for ourselves. Turning gives us gifts and abilities to go it alone. Find a pack who wants us, if that is even possible. Solves their problem and shirks off any responsibility they have for us, which sucks if you happen to turn at a young age while caught here with us.

So, that’s where I am now. Just a mere four hours before we have to climb to Shadow Rock for the full moon, and I’ll transform for the first time in my life. Changing from child to woman and my gifts will manifest along with the first emerging of my entire wolf self and whatever that will look like. Not that I have any clue what those will be if any at all. Not all of us have a special gift, and it’s unlikely I will. My parents never talked of theirs.

I’ve watched this ceremony once a month for many years, and it still terrifies me to know I will be one of them. Finally, standing in the center, terrified of what the new light will bring. It’s a blood moon tonight, meant to be symbolic or biblical or some nonsense. Signaling the end of times. Not that I paid attention to our lunar studies, as they held little importance to me.

With a first transformation comes pain and a lot of it. It’s inevitable. You hear the cracking of bones, the tearing of flesh, and the howling of those going through it, haunting you for eternity. It’s awful to see, it traumatized me the first time as I was still so young, but they tell us it only hurts that way the first time. After, we’ll be different, and the pain will be far less clawing because we can heal and withstand it so much more as a stronger breed.

I’ve seen it. Physical improvement, they call it. It’s the leaving of childlike features behind, firming up, muscling over as though somehow you get an injection of superhuman enhancement. All who have turned become superior in every way, even in terms of attractiveness, which explains why most females consider ‘Lord’ Colton, a god. His genes are strong.

Not that I want to change. I’m already tall, slim, and athletic, and I wouldn’t say I was ugly. I’m on the pretty side of plain, with full lips, mousy brown hair, and abnormally green eyes. I take after my mother, and when I look in the mirror, I’m haunted by her memory in the most bittersweet way. Proud to carry her face with me but broken that it reminds me of what I’ve lost.

I guess I am what one would call a ‘girl next door,’ but it’s another flaw in my genetic makeup.

The Alphas are all handsome or beautiful and physically perfect. You can’t deny good genes when it’s shown in every single little way. Compared to humans, they are like gods among men.

Now all I can do is wait.

Shower, dress, brush my hair, and pace like a maniac as I watch the clock and count down the minutes to the first moon of my new future.

This could be the first step in changing everything.

I can leave after tonight; I can walk away from this mountain and the people who treat us like we are nothing. I’ll be free to run far away, with no bond to anyone or anything. No one to care if I never return.

I need to get through it first, and then it’s the start of a whole new existence for me.