EPILOGUE 2
TOSCA
The wind howled, thrashing the topmost branches of the canopy and threatening to rip away the leaves from their slender stalks.
The ghostly sound raged high in the mountains, but down here in the lower reaches of the forest, beneath the trees, the wind barely stirred beyond the occasional draught, offshoot of a particularly strong gust from above.
There were no clouds, the moon a pale crescent in the eastern sky.
It wasn’t the usual time of month for a pack run, but Talius had called this a celebratory event, a joyous acknowledgement of the return of his mate, and a welcoming into the pack for me.
I didn’t think it was customary for packs to run to celebrate new arrivals other than when they gained an Alpha Mate, and I felt a little self-conscious about it.
But my new friends, Irian and Isca, had assured me Talius did things his own way, and that he was more than grateful to Agelius for his role in Irian’s rescue.
Rationally, I knew this run would be nothing like that.
Pack runs were supposed to be a normal part of pack life – it was just that the dominant designations in Zarbius’ pack were all sick fucks - but despite knowing this, as we gathered in the clearing where the run was to start, I was vibrating with poorly concealed nerves.
“Relax, Tosca,” Agelius’ hand ran down my back, coming to rest in the small of my back. I guess he’d picked up on my distress, despite my efforts to hide it. “I’ll be by your side the whole way. And there’s no-one here who would hurt you anyway.”
He pulled me close, wrapping me in his arms. A curious sense of ease washed over me. I stopped shaking. I frowned, trying to figure out why I had suddenly stopped worrying - then I huffed. Alpha pheromones!
“Did you do that on purpose?” I demanded, glaring up at the handsome alpha.
“Uh. What?”
“Never mind,” I thought better of it. It was making me feel better, so why fuss? “When do we start?”
I looked around at the waiting group, paying more attention to my surroundings now that I wasn’t freaking out.
There were shifters everywhere, some already shifted, others still removing their clothes.
Huh! Everyone seemed excited but relaxed, including the omegas, with animated conversations taking place all around us.
In stark contrast to my old pack, all the designations seem relaxed and happy around each other.
Omegas, betas and the few alphas all mingled freely.
“Talius is about to kick it off. Look!” Agelius nodded his head towards a large fallen tree trunk that the Pack Alpha had stepped onto.
He was a powerful-looking alpha, but from what Agelius had told me, he commanded respect by showing respect for others, and taking good care of his pack.
He was a much-loved Pack Alpha. Just one more way in which this pack was different to my last. One by one conversations faded away, until an expectant hush had fallen over the assembled crowd.
Talius’ voice rang out.
“Everyone! Welcome to the run. This is a special run exclusively for our pack – no visitors tonight. Tonight, we’re celebrating two special events.
Firstly, as you know, Irian has been returned to us unharmed for which I am extremely grateful, and due in large part to Agelius, who put his own needs on hold to ensure Irian’s safe return. ”
At this point, Talius turned his intense blue eyes on Agelius, and gave a slow, deliberate nod of his head. A quick glance at my alpha saw him blush at the acknowledgement, as he returned the gesture.
“I think you all knew that, since rumors spread pretty fast around the pack,” Talius chuckled, then continued in a more serious voice. “What you may not have known was that Isca was also under threat, as the kidnapper was Isca’s prior Alpha.”
Gasps rang out around the clearing. Clearly this was not something that Talius had been willing to disclose to the pack until the entire horrible event was over.
I was only now beginning to put together the pieces.
This was why Talius’ second mate had looked so familiar to me.
I had only ever caught one or two distant glimpses of Zarbius’ mate before he vanished from our pack, mainly because Zarbius kept him in his private dwelling, or under supervision of the betas, and he’d never been allowed to mingle freely with the rest of us omegas.
“And the second reason for tonight’s run…” Talius’ voice cut through my thoughts, “is to welcome Agelius’ new mate to the pack.”
Cheers rang out as the mood turned more jovial. A few heads turned towards us. There were smiles.
It was friendly, but I felt shy with the added attention. I’d spent most of my recent life trying to stay unnoticed and I was uncomfortable being the center of attention.
“…so let’s run!” Talius finished, immediately shifting into a magnificent dark grey wolf.
He lifted his majestic muzzle to the fragment of moon hanging in the sky, offering his respect to the Goddess and signaling the start of the run with a long howl.
Then he leapt from the trunk, and led the way into the forest, closely followed by the golden-brown and silver wolves of his mates.
The pack surged around us, as those who had already shifted hurried to follow the Alpha. The others hurried to find their canine form, eager to join the throng. A few stragglers hopped around on one leg as they struggled belatedly to pull off their pants and join the run.
Wolves flowed around where Agelius and I stood immobile. I was afraid. I couldn’t help it, but the years in Zarbius’ pack had conditioned me to avoid betas and alphas, and here they were mixing freely with others of the pack, unsupervised.
“Run with me,” Agelius spoke softly. “Together.” His eyes had a strange light in them. “We’ll run like the wolves we are… and we’ll fuck like the wolves we want to be…”
I shivered, my cock twitching with his words. How could I resist that look in his brown eyes, the chocolate swirling with flecks of gold, glinting and promising all manner of delights? How could I refuse anything he was promising?
“O-okay,” I breathed, mesmerized. I shook myself, snapping my tail and rolling my shoulders as I took my alternate form.
The combined consciousness of the pack in a run called to me, the blood thrumming in my ears, trepidation turning to anticipation and buzzing through my veins.
With barely concealed impatience, I shook myself from snout to tail again, as I waited for Agelius to register that I was ready and shift himself.
Moments later, he led me out of the clearing, only a few stragglers left to follow us.
At first he kept an easy pace, but when he saw I was easily keeping up with him, he cranked up the speed and we dashed past the slower members of the pack - the families with pups, the younger members or the very old wolves, until eventually we were racing flat out, noses extended, tails streaming straight out behind us.
On either side of us, wolves raced between the trees, weaving their way between the sturdy trunks, over fallen branches, around clumps of thick underbrush, leaping over old decaying logs or rocky mounds.
We wound our way around the mountain, heading steadily upwards, a sea of brown, grey, black and white in constant motion over the forest floor.
The sensations were acute… the cool air rushing across my nostrils, up my snout, stinging my eyes; the tingling of the fine olfactory hairs as the air flowed over my sensitive ears; the dampness of the earth on my pads and the sharp sting of a twig digging into the soft spaces between; the shadows racing past or left behind, combined with the sense of community, of pack… it was intoxicating.
As time drew on, my world narrowed down to the pounding of my heart against my ribcage, the singing of my lifeblood in my ears, the steady drumming of my paws over the forest floor…
and the scent of my mate beside me, his hot breaths fanning my face, his alpha scent, raw and wild, stirring something in me that was also wild and new. It was an exhilaration I’d never known.
Above, stars speckled the night sky, a larger one – probably a planet – lingering low above the canopy. As we ventured higher up the mountain, the trees grew sparser, the stars more visible, the wind gusted down more strongly.
Muzzles stretched into the abrupt gusts, delicate hairs around snouts reveling in the tingle of cool mountain air over sensitive fiber.
The air was fresh and alive with the scent of eucalyptus and damp earth.
The long stalks of untouched summer grass glowed faintly silver in the eerie light, crushed under our paws as we passed.
We had neared the top of the mountain, when up ahead, I saw Talius leap onto a rocky outcrop, his wolf silhouetted against the silvery leaves of the trees behind him.
Stretching his head to the sky, he unleashed a powerful howl that resounded and reverberated around the mountainous spaces.
Two smaller shapes leapt onto the rock beside him and the three howled together, a song of love and endurance and mate and joy.
They sang to the skies, to the night, and to any creature that cared to listen.
Then, before the last echoes of their song had rolled away, the two smaller wolves leapt down and darted away.
Talius lifted his proud head to the moon and gave one more cry before following his mates.
The three wolves disappeared into the bush to fulfill the call of the wild and do the things than only mates do.
Agelius turned to me. His eyes seemed to say what his wolf could not. Follow me! And he took off.
We raced further up the mountain together, but instead of stopping and heading back at the top, as the others did, we continued on, going further, until we found ourselves overlooking the valley beyond.
For a moment, we paused there: one large black wolf with a smaller, pale grey one at his shoulder. Tongues lolling, ribcages heaving, hot, heavy breaths blowing puffs of condensation into the frigid air as we caught our breath. This was our valley, a tapestry in shades of midnight green.
We picked our way along a rocky stretch where the slope fell away dramatically, then began climbing the next mountain.
When I noticed Agelius had fallen behind, I slowed and turned to search for him, but he was right behind me. A possessive gleam of intent lit his eyes, and I shivered. A trickle of slick slid out of me, scenting the air and dampening the fur of my back legs.
Agelius’ ears pricked up, his inhale harsh as he caught the scent. His nostrils flared, the red mucosae visible.
He seemed to grow larger in front of my eyes, puffing out his chest, standing taller, hair on end.
A blast of alpha musk and pheromones hit me.
My pulse, which had slowed, quickened. My eyes were drawn to the rod of glistening red flesh protruding from his sheath.
My tunnel quivered. I swallowed the saliva that flooded my mouth and nervously licked at my lips.
My eyes flickered up to his. There was nothing threatening there, only hot desire.
He remained still, eyes fixated on me, just watching and waiting, but he made no move, And I knew he wouldn’t.
At the first sign of me refusing – if I sat down, walked away, shifted back, anything like that – he would turn away.
But if I ran… he would hunt me until he caught me and he'd fuck me senseless…
I ran.
And I ran fast. Chest heaving with the exertion, cold air rasping through my windpipe, I ran… I wasn’t giving up anything without a chase, so…
SPLAT!
I landed belly-first on the ground, my heated skin seeking the coolness of the earth. A heavy weight had landed between my shoulders, pressing me into the dirt. A hard rod of flesh jabbed around my anus, probing for entry.
There was nothing sweet or tender about our fucking.
We were wolves, and he claimed me in the way of wolves – full of carnal lust and the primeval urgency to mate.
And I was a wolf, his to claim in the way of the wild.
It was what I wanted from him. I wanted his shaft buried deep in my tunnel, thrusting and releasing his seed, and my body released the slick to urge him on.
At the third attempt, he stabbed into me on a sea of slick, and the heat of his swollen member thrust wildly and unrestrained as I lay crouched on the forest floor, whining for more and lifting my hindquarters to give him better access.
Pushing back onto him as he bucked and thrust, until I was seeing stars and howling wildly and his triumphant howl joined with mine, as I felt the warm jets of seed release and his knot form inside me, binding us together.
Panting heavily, we would be intimately tied together for the next half hour or so, and my heart felt so large, I thought it might truly burst.
Agelius was the man of my wildest dreams, the wolf of my heart.
What had guided him to me, in my hour of need, I didn’t know. Was it the Goddess? Fate? Random chance? I’d probably never know. But there was one thing I did know.
The knot would go down within the hour, but I was sure our hearts would be bound forever.
THE END