An Inconvenient Mission
Ares
SEVERAL MONTHS LATER…
Being Alpha is fucking boring, and what do you know? No one tells you that part.
They talk about power, respect, loyalty, legacy, and all that poetic shit people use when they want to make responsibility sound less like unpaid labour.
They don’t mention the meetings. Or the reports.
Or the complaints about patrol schedules, training rota changes, border issues, damaged equipment, and stupid arguments between grown adults who apparently need their Alpha to decide who has the right to use a particular stretch of woodland to grow fucking vegetables. Like who the fuck cares?
Me, apparently.
I am the Alpha who has to solve the stupidest shit known to man.
Months have passed, and not one person has decided to try to challenge me yet.
I’m starting to take that personally. Not because I want to lose the title, but because beating someone into submission would at least break up the paperwork.
But I think going up against Poseidon’s favoured isn’t as appealing as I hoped it sounded.
Today, I’m standing outside one of the briefing rooms at Midnight Academy because Leo ordered me to wait here.
Because this must be so fucking important. Has he forgotten I have to attend the Academy and run a pack?
However, when the King tells you to be somewhere, it is usually because something has either gone wrong or is about to, and unfortunately, I’m not stupid enough to pretend that doesn’t matter.
Still pisses me off, though.
I lean against the wall, arms crossed, as I watch students move through the corridor, some in small groups and others alone, each with a destination in mind. Then there’s me; I don’t even fucking know what I’m doing after this meeting.
I’m still enrolled here, but like Sienna, I don’t live here anymore. With a pack to run, and luckily or unluckily, depending on how you look at it, Sienna and I live close, so we go back and forth together. I hate it; she seems to enjoy it.
There’s a bunch of us – Carter, Renji, Heaven, Alessandra, Sienna and me – who often miss so much of the training here, and the Academy keeps pretending we’re not basically dropouts with divine trauma and a talent for surviving things that should have killed us.
Jayce doesn’t attend anymore. He has enough going on with being the Deimos King, the Blood Moon Pack Alpha, Sienna, and now Stephen Corvin Westwood, who is apparently the new centre of the universe.
The pup is only a month old and already has the entire family acting like he personally hung the moon in the sky.
Jayce looks like he hasn’t slept properly since the day Stephen was born, but every time someone mentions his son, he gets that smug, soft look on his face that makes me want to throw something at him.
He’s settled, though.
Alpha.
Mate.
Father.
All the shit he was clearly meant to be, even when he was too much of an idiot to accept half of it.
Good for him.
Annoying, but good.
I look at the time; Leo’s late…
Fucking prick.
I’m still considering leaving just to be difficult when light footsteps approach from the left. I don’t bother looking at first, assuming it’s another student passing by, but then the scent reaches me.
Fresh rain, sea breeze and something faintly sweet beneath it, polished and expensive, like someone bottled arrogance and added flowers.
My eyes snap up, recognising the scent before I even see her.
Charlotte Arden walks towards the briefing room like she has been summoned to a social event rather than whatever disaster Leo is dragging me into.
Her blonde hair falls in styled waves over her shoulders, glossy and ridiculous as always, and her grey eyes flick over me once before she takes a seat in a chair opposite where I am standing.
Crossing one leg over the other, she looks down at her phone, ignoring me entirely.
For a moment, neither of us says anything. Then I decide I don’t have the patience for this shit. Like, the fuck is she doing here, anyway?
“Why are you here, Arden?”
She doesn’t look up. “Good morning to you, too, Westwood.”
“What are you doing here?” I push again.
Now she looks up, raising an eyebrow. It still doesn’t stand a chance against the height of her hair.
“Do you always interrogate people for sitting?”
“Only when they sit near me.”
“How territorial,” she replies, sounding bored or exhausted, maybe both.
“I’m an alpha. It comes with the job.”
“And here I assumed it was just a personality defect.”
My eyes narrow, but she simply returns her attention to her phone.
The water in the glass dispenser beside the door ripples. She pauses, and I feel the push back.
Barely. Not enough for most people to notice, but obvious to me.
My power shifts beneath my skin, irritated by the quiet brush of hers. Water answering water. Not strong enough to be a threat, but present enough to get under my skin and remind me she isn’t weak.
Fucking perfect.
“Why are you here, Arden?” I ask again. “I just want to know if Leo called you, too. I thought it was just me.”
Charlotte sighs, as if I’m the inconvenience. “Mind your own business,” she says.
“Arden.”
She finally lowers her phone, her grey eyes meeting mine properly this time. “Westwood.”
“You always this difficult?”
“No,” she says smoothly. “Sometimes, I’m worse.”
I believe that.
Before I can reply, I hear quiet, measured footsteps. Leo’s scent reaches me, and I turn as he comes into view, dressed in black, expression cold, a cigarette in his hand.
His gaze moves from me to Charlotte, then back again.
“Both of you are here. Good. Let’s step inside.” He leads the way into the large briefing room.
I push off the wall. “Both?”
Charlotte stands, slipping her phone into her pocket. “Try to keep up, Westwood,” she says haughtily.
I resist the urge to flatten her over-volumised hair and follow her into the room, shutting the door behind me.
Once both Arden and I sit down, Leo taps the centre of the table, and a three-dimensional map flickers to life above it, built from thin lines of blue-white light. I recognise the layout instantly. I have a knack for remembering layouts after seeing them once. This one… is family.
I scan the layout as Leo zooms in on a ruined pack territory. A pack abandoned long ago. The Desert Storm Pack.
He drags two fingers through the projection, and the map rotates silently.
“This is an abandoned pack…” Charlotte says.
“Na, really?” I say, earning a frown from both of them.
“It is. The old Desert Storm Pack up north,” Leo says, frowning coldly as he stares at it.
“There’s not much left, but even with other packs claiming the outer areas and moving around it, the main pack area has remained untouched.
There’s a lot of dark history tied to this place… Some don’t like going near it.”
“And we’re going there?” Charlotte asks in her perfect royal accent.
Leo nods. “Yeah. Beneath it, somewhere along the river that runs through that pack, there’s a crack in the veil where monsters have been getting through.”
Charlotte steps closer to the table. “Underwater?”
“That’s what we think.”
Of course it is.
Leo’s gaze shifts to me. “The land sits over old storm drains and underground waterways. Some are on record, most aren’t.
Whatever has opened down there is either inside the water or woven through it.
I sent a team, and it’s confirmed that it is in the water.
So, I want the two of you to go, use the sewer tunnels, and locate it.
It’s been a struggle to find the crack, even with an extensive team, and there’s no witch capable enough to send. So… You two are the next best thing.”
“That’s insulting,” I remark.
Although sending us into the sewers is even more insulting. But if Arden isn’t going to complain, I’m not going to either.
“Understood,” Charlotte says with crisp determination. “Will we have a team or is it just the two of us?”
“You’re a Solaris wolf who controls two elements; he’s, believe it or not, favoured by Poseidon. I think the two of you are sufficient. Everything will be sent to your Schattensichts. Prepare to leave tonight. Funds have been transferred for food and a place to stay. Report in every day, same time.
Leo turns back to the map. “Sienna will close it once we know exactly where it is, but until we have those answers, we can’t send her.
“I could do it alone; I don’t need her,” I point out.
“We don’t know what other threats are out there. You’re not going alone.” Leo’s voice is absolute, and I frown, my wolf snarling in my head at his command.
“He’s right,” Charlotte says.
I simply glare at her, and Leo frowns. “Save it for the tunnels.”
I look back down at the map, at the old Desert Storm Pack, at the image of the drains and forgotten tunnels beneath a pack that should have stayed dead. A pack I never thought I’d visit, but here we are.
A crack in the veil, no clear location, paired with Charlotte Arden because the universe has a shit sense of humour. How the fuck did Leo think we made sense?
“The Blood Moon is in a few days…” Charlotte says. Leo looks at her. Ah yeah, the Ardens are hosting this year.
“I hope you’ll be back by then. Do you want to refuse?” he asks, and I scoff.
So, she gets a choice? So she doesn’t miss a ball? Ok, I avoid them anyway, but it’s still unfair.
“No. That won’t be necessary; this is important,” she says, then turns to me. “I’ll meet you at the exit at six o’clock?”
I give a curt nod before leaving the room, before Leo fucking wastes more time.
Six o’clock comes too fast.
Or maybe I’m just still pissed off that I’m going at all.
By the time I reach the Academy’s side exit, the sky has already begun to darken. The clouds are stretched thin and grey above the grounds as if the weather can’t decide whether it wants to rain or not. British weather, what else can I expect?
I spot the car before I see her.
A dark grey car is parked beneath the trees, old enough not to turn heads, clean enough not to look abandoned, and dull enough that no one will remember it five minutes after it passes them. Just a normal car.
Boring as fuck.
Which is probably the point.
I pull open the driver’s door just as Charlotte appears from the path leading out of the Academy.
Her blonde hair is pulled back from her face, still styled with enough care that it looks deliberate rather than practical, and she’s wearing a dark grey coat which is buttoned neatly over dark jeans and boots that actually look suitable for walking over ruined land.
I’m almost disappointed. I was half hoping she’d show up in heels so I’d have something to complain about.
Her grey eyes flick over the car. “Discreet.”
“Yeah, shit car.”
“Not what I meant,” she says, opening the passenger side door.
“So, I’ll take that as I’m driving?” I ask, not that I would have let her drive.
She pauses. “Oh, I’m sorry. Do you want to be the passenger princess? I can drive.”
“Get in,” I growl, glaring at her across the roof of the car.
I kind of walked into that one.
I slide into the driver’s seat, shut the door behind me and start the engine. Charlotte fastens her seatbelt before immediately opening the files Leo sent through to her Schattensicht and transferring them to her tablet.
For a while, neither of us says anything, and that suits me.
Once we are through the wards and protections of the Academy grounds, I sense the magic on the car, protection spells and probably something to stop the Indomitable from attacking.
Charlotte swipes two fingers through the projection, shifting one map over another. “Leo sent archive records, Council files, and modern land scans. None of them completely match.”
“They won’t. That land’s been abandoned for years,” I reply, keeping my eyes on the road.
The Desert Storm Pack was left alone because people didn’t want to go near it. Because too much blood had soaked into those grounds. Because its name was attached to things most families preferred not to discuss in front of their children.
And lucky for me, I have the honour of having a monster for a great-grandfather.
Charlotte is quiet for a moment before she speaks again. “Are you all right with going there?” Her voice is neutral, her grey eyes composed when I glance her way.
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“You know why.” She gives me an infuriating look.
I take a bend in the road, and it’s already getting dark.
“My great-grandfather’s dead,” I say eventually. “Whatever he did on that land doesn’t bother me.”
“That isn’t what I asked,” she replies calmly.
“You always this determined to irritate people?”
“No, you just seem to get annoyed with everything extremely quickly,” she replies with a deadpan expression.
I frown. I hate that she’s actually right.
She simply holds my gaze for a few moments, then returns to her tablet.
This sure is going to be one long fucking mission.