The Ripple Effect

Unknown P.O.V.
Tears streamed down my face, and I hated myself for how easily I went back to crying like some helpless baby! Last time my brothers made me cry, I had sworn it would be the last, and yet here I was being a slow, dumb girl again. But I just couldn't make the tears stop!

I knew the patrol wolves were running after us, but why? They were growling and snapping like we were criminals. But Papa was Alpha, so why would they chase us? They were supposed to protect us, not hurt us!

"Mama, what's happening!" I sobbed, clutching her hand tightly as she kept pulling me.

I could hardly keep up with her when both of my legs worked, so keeping up now—with my lame leg throbbing in protest—was really hard.

A sudden ache formed in my heart as Salek's image filled the darkness that surrounded me when I slammed my eyes shut. This was his fault! He wanted to be first-born so badly that he had all but pushed me out of that tree and broke my leg. And Papa's disappointed look when he saw me... Papa had been starting to brag about me, like he always bragged about Salek and Qale and Rashal and Zalor.

But Papa didn't brag about my hunting skills or about how easily I had caught up in my agility courses...

I think Papa hates me.

And it was all Salek's fault! I had stood up for myself for once in my life and broke his nose, so he broke my leg and gave me this horrible limp! He ruined everything! I just wished he had never been born...

I only realised that I had stopped running when something tugged my arm so harshly that it almost popped out of the socket. Mama was shouting at me as she pulled harder until my feet started moving once more.

"Baby, we have to—No!"

The ground disappeared from beneath me, and I wriggled helplessly as I was pulled into the air by my wrist. I demanded to be released, but...

My Papa was staring down at me, and he wore that smile that my horrible little brother Salek always wore. But unlike Salek's smirk, this was a smile that scared me more than any of my brothers' empty taunts and threats.

"Papa?" I whispered, my body freezing.

"Not anymore," he breathed in my face, and then he threw me aside.

I tried to get up, but the wind was knocked out of me when men started kicking me. I slammed my eyes shut and tried to curl into a ball, but it didn't help! I heard Mama screaming, begging them to stop. I even felt her hand brush my arm, and I cried out to her that every part of me hurt. But then she got quiet.

I told myself that I had to be brave, for Mama, so I dared to open my eyes.

And her empty, wide blue eyes stared back at me.

"Mama!" I screamed, pushing my way past the men and throwing my body over hers, begging her to wake up.

But she wouldn't answer me. I kept screaming for help for Mama even as the men dragged me away from her. And I reverted back to crying like some baby, crying like a useless little girl as my Papa grabbed my arm and jerked me toward the edge of the territory.

"You're useless to me," he hissed in my face, and then he broke my nose like I broke Salek's so many days ago. "If I see you here again, I will kill you."

Then he threw me out.

That was how I became an orphan.