3. THORN
THORN
The early morning light slips past the horizon, casting the world in pink and orange light.
The snow refracts the sky, making it hard to tell where one starts and the other ends.
For a moment, it’s easy to forget where we are.
Just wolves. Just fur and frost and silence.
I kick snow over the fire, reducing it to steam.
The pack is rousing as the scouts return with fresh meat before our journey.
“Morning, Alpha.” Tala yawns behind me. She stretches, her dark braid slipping over her shoulder, umber skin glistening in the morning light.
“Morning.” I return my glare to the horizon. We still have half a day before we’ll arrive at the castle and the air feels wrong. Too still. Too quiet. We’ll have to hustle to make it.
“You’re brooding again,” she says, stepping beside me.
“Just focused.”
“You always say that.” Tala rolls her brown eyes.
Since her mother remated and left the pack, I’ve taken her under my wing. She’s become a little sister to me, and with that closeness comes the ability to read my every emotion. A weakness an Alpha shouldn’t display.
“No more than usual. Just trying to arrive on time.”
“Oh, in a rush to find a mate, are we?” She nudges my shoulder.
“The Alpha, find a mate?” Olcan scoffs, wavy dark hair and wide frame sauntering toward us with Koa, his younger brother, on his heels.
Although born a year later, Koa could be his twin.
Steele follows closely behind the brothers, like his namesake, his hair, eyes, and aura are stormy steel gray.
The silver-eyed Bane follows a few steps behind, his black hair tied back, making his eyes stand out against his tan skin.
Koa, Steele, and Bane are a few of the younger wolves who just became eligible for the Mating Trials this year.
For some reason, they’ve attached themselves to Olcan, who’s attending his second season.
Olcan continues, “Not likely.”
Koa and Steele snicker. Even the ever-quiet Bane smirks.
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Olcan,” I deadpan. Olcan is another one whose parents have left the pack. He hasn’t taken it as well as Tala.
“I’m starting to think you like to compete with us younger guys. I’ve taken two mates since; again, how many times have you attended?”
“And you couldn’t keep either, so maybe you shouldn’t be giving advice,” Tala interjects.
“Let’s face facts, he’s the only Alpha without a mate,” Olcan shoots back. “Doesn’t that mean something?”
I take a slow breath, “I’m not willing to mate out of desperation like some people.”
“Oh right, you’re waiting for a fairy tale,” he scoffs. “You preach of gods, but it looks like you’re not worthy of their blessing.”
Because I won’t settle for anything less than fated. Maybe it is a fairy tale.
“You want a mate or a ghost?” Olcan grins, “Either way, your line ends with you.”
Tala bristles beside me, claws unsheathing, “Say that again.”
Olcan smirks. “Didn’t mean to offend. Just figured we should know whether we need a new Alpha before the snow melts.”
That lands like a blow to my stomach. The Alpha I challenged was dead after a long winter. His crimson blood melting the snow beneath his body. Scar just happened to be Olcan’s grand-kin.
The younger wolves look to me, not with fear. With doubt. And that’s worse.
I step closer to him, shoulders square. My voice low as I state, “Be careful what you wish for; the last person who threatened me was turned to ash.”
I step forward again, looking from Olcan and Koa, then Steele to Bane. It’s Bane who drags Olcan away.
“It’s only a matter of time, Thorn. Count your days,” Olcan yells over Bane’s shoulder.
I sigh, kicking my foot in the snow. I’ll have to shift soon before I get frostbite.
Tala approaches my side. “I haven’t heard this talk; it’s just Olcan, don’t worry about it.”
“It’s only a matter of time, Tala. I’m the only Alpha without a mate.”
“How can they think you’re not worthy? Did they not see you win Alpha from Scar?”
“I chose not to take a mate; I preach these trials and journey annually and it doesn’t even work for me.”
“How does that make you unworthy, maybe you’re just a hopeless romantic?”
I shoot her an incredulous look. First, I look unworthy, and now I look hopeless. Gods help me. “I don’t know which is worse.”
Our pace is brutal. Snow crunches beneath our paws as we weave between bare trees, the forest a blur of white and fur. The wind cuts sharp and the weight on my back isn’t just my pack, it’s every doubt, every lingering stare, every wolf questioning whether I’m Alpha material.
Even my own pack trails farther back than they should. They’re not running with me. They are watching me, counting on me to fail.
Tala keeps pace at my flank, quiet now.
But before we left, she’d confronted me again, “You could have ripped his throat out. No one would have stopped you.”
“I know.”
“So what’s stopping you?”
“I’m not like him, I don’t want to rule with fear, I want respect.”
She fell silent, but I felt her question hanging in the air. Then who are you?
The truth is, I don’t know anymore.
I was forged in a fight I didn’t start, crowned in blood I didn’t want to spill. I didn’t become Alpha to dominate. I did it to survive.
It seems that’s all I’ve been doing ever since.
Up ahead, a scuffle breaks out. Two of the younger wolves, freshly turned eighteen this year, Bren and Corv, snap and tumble through the grass, snarling and jowls snapping at each other.
Olcan stands nearby, not intervening. Of course.
I shift mid-stride, my bones stretching until I land in human form. “Enough!” My voice cracks like thunder.
The fight halts. Blood splatters the muddy grass.
I grab Corv by the scruff and yank him upright. He bares his teeth, but when he sees my face, he immediately drops his gaze, shifting back to human form. I drop him in the mud.
“Bren shoved me,” he mutters. “Said he’d be a better mate than me.”
“This isn’t for you to decide. That’s for the gods to sort.” I growl, looking both of them in the eye. “You want to prove something, do it with the trials, not by tearing each other apart.”
Corv nods, Bren mutters an apology. Muddy and nude on the ground makes them look ever their age.
They have no idea what they are in for. What being a real mate means.
Feeding a mate or a family throughout a long winter, hunting in freezing conditions, and gathering furs.
It’s brutal to have another wolf be reliant on you.
I step back and shift again, fur bristling, and heart pounding. We’re close, grass sprouts up all around us. Over this mountain, the Ancient Castle sits in the next valley.
After ten years, the journey to the castle is a trek I’ve memorized. The wolves pound up the mountain crest toward the valley.
The sun is just high enough to be seen over the edge of the mountain, casting it into a pretty golden hue. The wind shifts. On that breeze carries a hint of jasmine. I close my eyes, relishing the scent.
My mate could very well be in the castle right now.
Hopefully, this is my year.