Half Wolf (Alpha Underground Book 1) (6 page)

“Ginger?”

“Definitely out,” the red-head responded, her eyes sparkling with passion. “We don’t need him and we don’t want him.”

“What she said,” her brother quickly chimed in.

My gaze turned to Glen at last and he tilted his head to one side in consideration. I could see my beta doing the same math I’d engaged in a few moments earlier. If he voted pro-Hunter, then the tie-breaking choice would be up to me. And I somehow didn’t want to be the one to say that the uber-alpha had to go.

And yet...the uber-alpha had to go. He was too strong for our young pack to handle and we had too little understanding of his purpose in following us around to trust him at our backs. In short, Hunter was a danger to our clan, so we couldn’t welcome him into the fold.

Nodding his understanding of my dilemma, Glen sealed Hunter’s fate. “Tentatively, probationarily...I say no. Hunter is out.”

I expected the uber-alpha to be annoyed. What I didn’t expect was the flood of invective that came surging out of his mouth, some of the words so intensely imaginative that Cinnamon felt moved to cover up Lia’s sensitive ears. Ginger, on the other hand, was clearly taking mental notes, and I had to admit the female trouble twin had a point. Hunter’s language was almost poetic in its pure, unadulterated filth.

“Dude, tone it down,” Glen growled. “We don’t want the campsite host to come back over here and check on us.”
Not while you’re standing outside our tent buck naked
, he didn’t have to add. We all knew that our attempt at appearing human was in serious jeopardy if the uber-alpha didn’t get himself under control. So this time around, I didn’t naysay my pack mate as Ginger pushed open the tent fly and stepped out into the morning air.

Then the trouble twin began to swear as well, which is when I fumbled for the sheathed sword I’d stuck down inside my sleeping bag and hightailed it out the door as well. The sight that met my eyes pulled a few choice words from my lips to join the invective soup before I started barking orders.

“Cinnamon, Ginger, you’re together. Glen and I will team up with Lia. Do what you have to do, but I want one of these invaders captured alive. We have to figure out what’s going on.” Finally, as an afterthought: “And please try not to wake up the cookie lady.”

At last, I returned the entirety of my attention to the outpack werewolves who were stalking out of the mist in lupine form. There were at least half a dozen large, menacing animals present, and the faint banana aroma that drifted off their bodies suggested some or all of the invaders had been present in the bar that Ginger led us to the night before. Our enemies had been beaten once and now didn’t seem inclined to hash out our differences with words. Instead, the shifters arrayed against us were out for blood.

Clothes flew off in record time, and soon I was flanked by five friendly werewolves, evening the odds somewhat. “Where’s Quill?” I asked, and in response Hunter jerked his chin toward the bathhouse barely visible between the trees. The uber-alpha didn’t bother to shift and elaborate, but I guessed the cowboy shifter had gone to take a shower while the rest of us were voting on his future.

Here’s hoping our newest member won’t be blindsided by a battlefield when he comes strolling back into camp,
I thought. But I couldn’t really find it in myself to regret Quill’s absence. When it came right down to it, pack size wasn’t everything. Instead, if given the choice, I’d always go for fewer werewolves who I could really trust at my back rather than for larger numbers of loose cannons.

At the thought, my hand drifted down to settle upon Hunter’s head, although whether I was considering him a trusted companion or a loose cannon was up for debate. Immediately, the huge wolf craned his neck to gaze back up in my direction before returning his attention to the outpack shifters who were drawing ever closer to our small clan.

Despite my reservations, I had to admit that our newest companion’s presence made me feel stronger. Sure, Hunter epitomized unpredictability. But he also might turn out to be our secret weapon. Soon, the attackers would be close enough to be growled into submission without waking the campground host...assuming the uber-alpha felt like saving all of our skins rather than just his own, that was.

At the thought, I couldn’t prevent my fingers from tightening around one fuzzy ear in a silent plea for help. I didn’t really expect Hunter to understand what I was asking, nor did I expect him to obey even if he did understand. But, to my surprise, the uber-alpha accepted my subtle direction with alacrity.

I could almost hear the human words in his lupine bark as the booming sound rolled out across the campsite in near-visible waves. And the command
should
have frozen every enemy in his tracks. Even though the uber-alpha’s attention had been pointed in the opposite direction, in fact, Cinnamon and Lia cringed away from the noise, their feet growing a little unsteady beneath them.

But the outpack males just kept advancing, parting the fog with their bodies as they drew ever closer on silent feet. Now I could see that each boasted a collar around his neck, a characteristic that struck me as distinctly odd under the circumstances. Equally odd, but more understandable, were the splashes of neon color nearly hidden by the folds of each lupine ear.

“They’re wearing ear plugs,” I said softly for Hunter’s benefit. That explained why the uber-alpha hadn’t been able to use his strong compulsion auditorily—the other shifters had arrived prepared for such an attack. But perhaps our not-so-secret weapon could still stare down each enemy individually if he could force the wolves to meet his eyes.

Hunter glanced up at me, and it was almost as if he read my mind. Nodding once, the uber-alpha set off toward the lead shifter, dancing around the latter as the enemy strove to keep his head averted. And rather than helping their compatriot, the other wolves parted to surge around the strange battle of wills and continue with their own advance.

Hunter’s ploy would likely work, I suspected, but it would take time to hit all six enemy werewolves one by one. The rest of us needed to pull our weight and defend ourselves in the meantime. So I unsheathed my sword and jerked my head to motion Cinnamon and Ginger away from the tent. In response, the duo slunk off to the side in preparation for flanking our attackers while Glen and Lia drew in closer to me.

Then the campsite descended into such savagery that I could no longer keep track of what each member of my pack was doing. There were wolves everywhere, the enemies’ strange silence making their curled lips and sharp teeth appear even more ominous. Two sprang toward Lia from either side in a pincer maneuver and Glen and I worked as a team to drive them back, he with his fangs and I with my sword.

After what felt like hours but was probably less than five minutes, pain threw me off my stride as one of the enemy shifters latched onto my leg, breaking through my jeans to pierce the skin below. I raised my sword, unsure where to cut in order to harm but not kill the beast. But before I could decide, Lia had slammed into the enemy’s shoulder and knocked him aside while Glen took the beast the rest of the way to the ground.

In the ensuing lull, my slender young savior looked up at me with such question in her young eyes that I couldn’t quite make myself take her to task for diving into the skirmish. It went against all my instincts to allow a sixteen-year-old to fight for her life. But Lia’s wolf wasn’t quite as submissive as my own, and she’d just proven herself to be both able and willing to defend not only herself but me as well. So who was I to say a halfie had no place in combat?

“Thanks,” I said instead of voicing the dueling emotions that swirled through my mind in the battle’s split-second pause. And I could have sworn the girl’s shoulders broadened ever so slightly at the praise.

Then, to my dismay, she darted away to flank Hunter, who had frozen one wolf and was now playing a game of cat and mouse with another. The halfie watched the action for several long seconds, then repeated her previous bulldozer maneuver, this time throwing the enemy onto his side just long enough to prevent him from evading the uber-alpha’s medusa-like gaze.

Two wolves down, six to go.
Because my leg-biter had evaded Glen’s grip, and I saw now that my initial head count had been off as well. A quick survey of the campsite turned up eight enemy shifters, which meant their lessened numbers still matched our own.

And the enemy was already regrouping. Our remaining attackers split into two parties, one zeroing in on Lia and the other on me. They’d unerringly set their sights on the two halfies within our clan, which probably meant there was a dominant werewolf present who was able to pick out the specifics of our lupine souls beneath our skins. That same alpha would also be able to bark all of us except Hunter into submission, which was a danger to keep in mind since our side hadn’t thought to don earplugs.

Can’t deal with that now
, I reminded myself.
We’ll just cross that bridge when we come to it.

“Glen, go with Lia,”
I commanded instead of worrying about the issue. I didn’t want the girl to be left dangling in the wind during her first altercation, especially not when she appeared to be a person of interest to our enemy.

Sure, Lia was fighting alongside Hunter. But the uber-alpha didn’t seem to understand pack dynamics in the same way the rest of us did.
I never have seen the point of a pack
, he’d said the night before, words that later haunted me as I tried to fall asleep in the dark tent surrounded by my own clan members. If Hunter didn’t believe in a pack, what
did
he believe in?

Glen, on the other hand, was ultra-protective of every member of our little clan...me included. He struggled against my compulsion for a moment, clearly unwilling to leave me alone with only a sword to defend against the three strong wolves stalking ever closer. But eventually my second followed my gaze with his own and conceded the point. Just before the enemies blocked the last possible escape route, he sprinted off to the side to join up with our pack’s youngest member.

That’s the point of a pack, Hunter
, I wanted to say.
From each according to his ability. To each according to his need. In other words, we have each other’s backs.

It wasn’t an issue the uber-alpha and I could hash out right then, though. Not when three outpack males were currently lunging toward my feet with murder on their minds. I flicked my sword back and forth through the air, cutting a long gash in one wolf’s shoulder and nearly skewering another before I pulled the blow. I hadn’t forgotten our need to take at least one of these shifters alive for questioning, nor did I want to add another notch on my belt and more nightmares to my already interrupted sleep.

And, apparently, our enemies felt the same way. Because the trio of shifters facing me could have easily surged forward en masse and ripped out my throat. But they seemed willing to play a game of attrition instead, waiting me out until I conceded defeat.

It won’t take long
, I admitted. Already my arms were growing tired from the weight of my weapon, and the first fumbled thrust would give these wolves the upper hand.

Then Cinnamon and Ginger materialized out of the fog. The trouble twins’ lupine fur was tinged with red, the coloration not as strong as their vibrant hair in human form but equally eye-catching. And I couldn’t help smiling as I took in their grinning faces. Ginger’s teeth were bloody, but she was clearly having a blast. And Cinnamon was always glad to protect his sister’s back. As an added bonus, neither looked ready to fall over from exhaustion the way I was either.

As soon as she came within range, in fact, the female wolf bounded up against the hindquarters of the smallest enemy, a younger specimen who was lagging slightly behind his compatriots. Ignoring the other two attackers, the trouble twins continued to focus on the loner, Ginger grabbing him by the ruff and shaking while Cinnamon went in for what could have been a killing blow to his jugular. Instantly, the enemy stilled, rolling over to show his belly in a juvenile show of submission.

He’s just a kid
, I realized. But I didn’t have time to pay closer attention to the twins’ efforts because the battle raging right in front of my eyes had yet to slow. The two older wolves were unconcerned by the loss of their youngest member, and they now had their parries down to a science. One lunged forward quickly followed by the other, the repeated motions pushing me back step by step until I nearly tripped over the stake holding up one corner of our tent.

I was being drawn away from the larger battlefield, but there was nothing I could do to prevent the herding action. Not while I remained unwilling to outright slaughter my enemies and not while the smooth operators dodged most of my blows anyway. In a two-against-one altercation, it seemed inevitable that I would eventually be ground down beneath their mechanical attacks until I was forced to mimic the enemy youngster’s show of submission.

And then a huge, brindled wolf leapt out of the fog with a smaller animal at his heels.
Hunter and Lia
. The latter rubbed her cheek against the former’s shoulder in a display of pack solidarity and Hunter spared one quick swipe of his tongue across Lia’s left eye before getting down to business.

I caught my breath in surprise as Lia darted in alone. The teenager drew the attention of one of the males then danced away on light feet, leaving the enemy torn between turning back around to face me and lunging at the younger half-blood. And Hunter took advantage of the moment of hesitation, sliding in front of the outpack male and freezing him with a single glance.

Now my only remaining attacker turned to face the larger threat, leaving me unencumbered for the first time since the skirmish had begun. I spared a quick glance across the larger battlefield, realizing that the sounds of fighting had ceased everywhere except in my immediate vicinity. Ginger and Cinnamon were standing over a cowering, now-human teenager while Glen guarded six frozen shifters scattered across the campsite. The enemy was entirely present and accounted for.

Except for one last shifter who had been intent upon taking me down only seconds earlier. But even as I turned back around to face him, Lia was leaping astride the stranger’s back, drawing his eyes unconsciously to those of Hunter, who had positioned himself just behind his opponent’s left shoulder.