Running With Wolves

I couldn’t hide in the seclusion of that hospital room forever.

That was what I was doing after all, I was hiding not resting. Something in me was stirring anyway and it wouldn’t let me rest if I tried. It was an anxious sort of feeling but you couldn’t figure out exactly why you were feeling anxious in the first place. It didn’t make a lot of sense but so few things seemed to these days.

I dressed in a fresh pair of jeans and a simple plain t-shirt before I dared to venture out of my four-walled seclusion.

There was yelling down the hall and at first I thought it was an emergency; doctors and nurses yelling at one another. However as I ventured farther down the long white hall my heart dropped as I recognized each voice.

”You really think you can keep us from her?!” Jasmine.

”We just want to see how she is, we don’t mean any harm.” Mia.

”Listen Prick, that is my sister in there and it is going to take a lot more than you’re Alpha’s fucking word to stop me.” Did I even have to say?

”Yeah it’s going to take a lot more than a traitors word.” Rune.

I ran then and turned sharply into the nearest waiting room, grabbing the doorframe to stop myself from slamming right into someone.

The waiting room wasn’t meant to contain so many bodies, especially of the confrontational variety. I saw Jasmine, Conan, Mia, and Rune instantly but it was then that I saw Lukas with his arms around Jasmine, pinning her arms to her side restraining her and Knoll, Knoll of all people, the only one standing between what was mine and Eastern. Boarder guards were blocking the doorway out, successfully trapping them in the room.

Protect, Protect, Protect.

“What the fuck are you doing Knoll?” One of the men demanded. “Do you know what you’re father will say about this?”

“You are out of your goddamn mind if you think you can just wander around this hospital. You must have bumped your head if you think you can just walk right in and walk right back out.”
Another voiced, his words directed toward Jasmine and my brother.

Protect, Protect, Pack, Protect

So much danger in such a small room had my Were pacing back and forth in the cage that held her. I could feel her bristling, hear her snarls in my ears.

Protect, Protect, Pack, Pack, Pack

“Actually,” my voice was eerily calm and cool. At the sound of my voice Jasmine stopped struggling against Lukas and the others heads instantly snapped in my direction. Even the Eastern guards turned their attention toward me. “That is exactly what we will do.”

I moved forward and a few of the guards parted for me like the red sea but some defiantly stood in my way, towering over me and staring me down as though to intimidate me.
Lukas abandoned Jasmine and moved toward me, pushing the guards out of the way roughly who turned as though to strike him. But when Lukas stood protectively beside me, the look of us both, the children of Alphas and all that that implied, was enough to stop them. We moved through the room until I was beside Knoll, facing the guards who threatened us.
Lukas stood to my right and Knoll stood just beside him, little Rune with her deadly gaze flanked him.

Protect, Pack, Pack, Pack, Protect, Pack.

To my left Conan came to stand easily and protectively, Mia daringly taking her place beside him, which left Jasmine to flank her. At the moment Jasmine didn’t appear to mind the position but later might be a different story.

Pack, Pack, Pack.

The Eastern guards paled as they suddenly looked at us reproachfully and I knew why.

Lukas to my right, Conan to my left, and the others who flanked behind them;
These were their positions,
These were their ranks

and this was my pack.

Electricity zapped through the air and left the airs on my arms standing. Suddenly I could sense them all clearly. Not just Jasmine and Lukas but Knoll, my brother, and Rune.

It was then that Erik pushed his way through the guards.

“I don’t care what orders Viktor gave you. This is still my hospital!” he barked furiously. Viktor had promised him as much and Erik would be damned if Viktor’s rein took over his hospital as well as everything else in town.

He froze however when his eyes fell to me and then to each one of those I swore on my life to protect and he paled worst than the guards. He looked scared, he looked like he’d seen a ghost—he looked sick.

“What—What have you done?” He whispered.

“Just let us go home.”

And then another Canis appeared. His sharp features made him look as severe and unkind as he knew how to be. He was handsome but his features made him appear more predatory than human. He resembled the rest of his family but there was something in him that set him apart from the others.

“What the hell is going on here.” He barked, his eyes alive with lividness. The guards stood straighter, Jasmine and Conan’s muscles tensed and ready to spring, Knoll looked warily, while Lukas remained perfectly indifferent to the new arrival. Erik looked torn between farther wariness and exasperation.

His cold stony eyes fell to me and a dark glee flickered behind those orbs. He looked at me like a cat might a mouse.
“Sage Wolfe? I’m surprised to see you here.” His eyes moved to Lukas. “I’ll deal with you later.” His eyes fell to each who stood beside me. “Well, well, well, someone’s been a bad little bitch.”

“Let us through.” I demanded gritting my teeth. I could feel them around me, drawing closer so that each of their elbows were touching, strengthening their connectedness, their closeness with one another. It was a subtle Were move that assured us that we were all in this together, that we all had each other, and that we were an unbreakable unit.

He laughed in amusement. “Let you through? Is that really what you believe I’ll do?” His face changed then, contorted in a dark rage. “Who the fuck are you to tell me what to do?!”

His Were was unstable than even my own. Where I had restraint however, he did not. There was a rabid madness to his Were fueled by his human madness and the insanity his Were form imposed. If there was one formidable opponent in the room right now against my Were it was his.

I could feel my Were lunge at the proverbial cage that held her.

“Back off.” Lukas snarled. He was no longer standing slightly behind me but just in front of me. My Alpha blood was strong enough to command the others but Lukas was my Soulmate, we were equals, I couldn’t command him and I didn’t want to. It was Lukas’s choice to choose me, choose danger, over his family.

“What are you going to do little brother?” He wondered in amusement.

An animalistic growl slid through Lukas’s mouth, his lips curling up over his teeth.

I could sense his Were, how eerily still it was and it seemed only I recognized how dangerous that was.

“Is that an invitation to find out?” Lukas challenged.

Kerrick was many things, a blood thirsty mad man being only one of his charming traits but Lukas had the ability to be as equally cruel. The difference was that Lukas didn’t act on it, but just because he did not act upon it did not mean that Lukas was not equally as deadly as his oldest brother.

“Make your pup back down.” My muscles were tensed, my voice hard and unwavering.

I wasn’t afraid of Kerrick, I wasn’t afraid of any of them but that didn’t mean I wanted to do this in the confined space of the waiting room of a hospital. My gaze was on Erik. Erik could stop Kerrick, Erik could stop all of this. Viktor wasn’t here yet which left Erik, as Beta and second in command, in charge. Even Kerrick wasn’t out of the realm of being controlled by his reserved uncle.

I thought back to the conversation I had just had with Erik, how different things had been only a few minutes before and now Erik was as good as my enemy.

“You think you can take me?” Kerrick questioned in amusement, a cruel smile on his lips.

“He isn’t the only one here who would like to try.” It was Knoll’s hard and unamused tone that spoke up then. I didn’t want the Canis brothers to fight and in spite of the fact that I could command Knoll to back down if I really wanted to I wouldn’t do that.
Not for this instance.
The Canis brothers had bad blood and unfinished business that no Alpha should get between. One day the brothers would unleash their teeth and cruelty upon one another, it was as unstoppable as an unmanned train. But that did not mean that I wish it to be this day.

“My stupid, stupid brothers. Why do you bother with this? Father will string you up by your tails for this, but your friends playing make believe will not meet such a kind fate. Do you really believe father will allow this?”

I stepped forward until Lukas and I were side by side, the rest of them several feet behind us; protected by the two of us. “Do you really believe any of us give a flying fuck what your father thinks?” I snarled. “Tell your father he can kiss my ass.”

“You fuck—“

“Watching yourself.” Lukas growled in warning. I wasn’t looking at him but I knew there was nothing but pure protective Were in his eyes. It paced just under the surface of his skin, snapping and snarling furiously and looking for a weak point in Lukas’s hold over it. I knew his Were didn’t care whether or not Kerrick was family.
His Were wanted blood.
Kerrick was a threat and Lukas’s Were would rip his throat out.

“Or what?”

“Or it will be a declaration of war you hot headed spoiled fuck.” I informed. “This isn’t a game of House. This is my Pack,” A thrill went down my own spine at my words. “If you make any attempt to harm any of them, even your brothers, it will be considered a declaration of war against us all.”

Erik paled. “All of Western?”

“No, this pack is my own, but I wouldn’t be so sure Western would not aid us.”

“If you aren’t Western you aren’t anyone.” Kerrick sneered.

“Do you really want to find out, Kerrick? How real my pack is? Do you know what drives them? I don’t command them, I don’t force them to do my bidding like your father. They are my friends, my family, and our loyalty to one another is unyielding.”

The guards were no longer the cocky bullies they had been only moments ago, they now appeared wary; Erik just looked sick.

“You may want to hurt me Kerrick. Punish me, or Lukas and Knoll, for our disobedience but you see my pack has restraint and they don’t wish to harm you here.” I suppose the statement wasn’t entirely true. The Canis brothers on either side of me were proof to that. Yet I knew even they did not find this closed space ideal for a fight. “But I daresay that if you were to go after any one of us none of them would have much qualms about living in a world you didn’t exist in, if you know what I mean.”

“Let them through Kerrick.” Erik stated calmly finally speaking up. He wasn’t looking at any of his nephews though, he was looking at me and he was looking at me as though he didn’t even recognize me.

“No,”

“Kerrick step aside.” Erik’s voice rose to a sharp bark that was every bit as commanding as his brother’s. His eyes flashed to the eldest Canis brother and he glared at him.

Kerrick’s jaw locked, his eyes filling with fury but he had no choice than to step aside. They parted like the red sea allowing us to pass.

None of us looked back as we made our way out of the waiting room and down the hall. Nurses and doctors were all lining the edges of the halls, watching us with wide eyes; they knew, everyone knew now.

“When Viktor asks,” Erik called from down the hall and we turned to him in synchrony. “What pack dare trespass into Eastern, provoke his eldest son and disrespecting his Beta, what do I say?”

I hesitated for only a moment, the name slipping effortlessly off my lips, “Tell him Falcon Ridge Pack. Tell him to stay out of my way. Tell him their Alpha has a bone or two to pick with him.”