Wolf Desire: 5 Delicious Alpha Wolf Shifter Tales (17 page)

Chapter 4

Rila stood in the door of the cave waiting for the alpha’s new human female breeder. She glances at the thickset sky and a feeling of her home called on to her. The head of her alpha hung in Thane’s cave.
Was she unloyal to her alpha for succumbing to Thane?
It doesn’t matter, these things would sort themselves out. Things always changed; alphas rise and fall and territories would crash and burn. To her it doesn’t matter.
 
From her womb nothing churned, just an empty feeling of guts and flesh, incapable of extending life beyond the sorrow of her grief. She belonged to no one, and birthed no one.
 

Just last week, she had been in her first ever bus ride. The swirling images of light cascaded down the window, like distant stars made of memories soon forgotten. Towering structures on the city of men stood erect shining with torches that seemed to radiate with inner intensity, as if birthing life from their concrete womb. Her hoodie hid her face, like a mysterious traveler running from the laws that governed the universe. She let out an inner sigh. It felt like she was losing her mind to the strange environment the humans called their home. She was glad they were returning back to the forest, and back to nature.

She hadn’t told them yet, that their alphas had been captured by a berserking alpha called Thane. Her orders were simple, bring them back alive to the cave. She didn’t care about them. Why would she?

“Would you lighten up?” Mila said with her usual jubilant self.

Mila was a curvaceous woman with large mounds of flesh crowning her chest. Her thick lips reddened with lipstick, hinting at the sexual allure that had made her an alpha’s mate. Her ruddy cheeks displayed her playfulness. Her long blonde hair of locks shone brilliantly even here in the dimly lit bus. She wore a red dress and stilettoes, holding a cafe latte to perk herself up.

There was time when Mila was a model for a known fashion magazine. Always she posed with fur and the jungle setting. They said it was her natural look. It was then that her desire for werewolves grew. In one shoot concept, she was supposed to be ‘taken’ by a werewolf. She liked the idea, and soon started scouring places where werewolves frequented. Some people called her a
werewhore
, or someone who likes to roll around with werewolves. She didn’t care. They were just jealous, she told herself.

Mila playfully touched Rila’s shoulder.

“You forget your place!” Rila gave a low growl to Mila.

“And you forget yours!” exclaimed Mila. Rila belonged to Caim’s pack. However, as a breed mother she was sent to pick up the new human females for the breeding event.

“Just playing!” Mila gleefully smiled.
 
“You know when we get there, I’m going to be a werewolf princess. We’re going to be BFFs.”

“BFFs?”

“You know.. like best friends for life?”

“She meant like she would be a pack mate,” Cynthia said helpfully, ”she’s looking forward to it.”

Cynthia put her book down. Her pale skin and black hair made her look gothic. But she wasn’t. She thanked the laboratory for much of her pale skin. She almost never left the university, except for when she went to the gym to work on her love handles. Some said she was cute, but she preferred to think of herself as having inner-beauty. She reasoned that inner-beauty is an immeasurable quality that had made her instantly desirable. In reality, she was well known
hottie
of her university. But she was too timid and too much a werewolf nerd to even notice.

“Well, I wish you were my pack mate, Rila,” said Cynthia, “I’m sure Asch takes care of his members.”

In fact he does. Cynthia had found in her school’s random sampling of local werewolves that Asch scored the highest in pack satisfaction ratings. Imagine her delight when she was chosen by Asch to be imprinted -- his first pick at that! Cynthia still remembers the time that Asch asked her to be his fated-mate. She was with Mila and the other girls for the thrall event – that is – the event when human females were presented to the alphas to be chosen as werewolf mates. When the thrall came she had prepared herself for him. She prepared her body, her mind – she even ate the correct local food as to smell wonderfully for Asch.

Instead of fighting each other for human mates, the thrall was designed to ensure peace among the different territories of the alphas. Inter-werewolf attacks decreased significantly from thrall events, noted Mila in her research, and it promoted the long term viability of a peaceful passage of power. Human settlers in villages also reported that werewolf attacks had been lessened, and they exclaimed of not having to give up precious daughters as sacrifice for the local alpha. The thrall event had willing females, each with their different motivations, for a chance to meet real life werewolves. Some females were turned-on by the prospect of being bred by the alpha, some just wanted to be with a werewolf, and some had a long deep fascination with werewolves.

In Cynthia’s case werewolves were her obsession. Ever since she was a little girl, she fantasized of being with a werewolf. Her obsession drove her to devour countless books, articles, magazines, and, eventually, scientific articles on wolfology. She entered the university a doe eyed undergraduate then through her sheer fascination became the top researcher of the university and subject matter expert for all things werewolf. It wasn’t hard for to leave the university life when she heard about the thrall event; she was the first one to sign-up for the event!

It was his eyes that captivated her. Of course, she’s been reading all about Asch for years now, and even had already spent time with him. The university had a small observation outpost in one of the alpha territories. The only alpha who allowed such a human outpost in his territory was Asch. His territory laid beyond the mountain, nestled between a valley and sea. In a small secret lagoon surrounded by a plant specie that masked the smell of its inhabitants, a small building outpost served as a simple research observation deck. It was here they first met. She was mapping the area and marking seasonal movements of the elk, the primary food source of the werewolves.

Asch came in to visit her one sunny afternoon. He was in human form with a body like a Greek god. He was young then and his muscles had yet to compact. His clear blue eyes radiated with compassion. The only alpha who was confident enough to have Mila conduct research on his clan. She fell in love with him that afternoon.

After the thrall event, the imprinting came next. Asch brought her to his camp nestled in the forest. He introduced her to his pack. It was there that she noticed how his pack loved him. He noticed he had her same reverence for life, a zeal for family, and connection with others. He defended all that he loved and his pack always came first. His werewolf warrior lieutenant even told her about a time he was captive by a Lycan. During this battle his face was scarred by a malevolent bite. Unfazed Asch single handedly charged the Lycan camp and freed his people.

He had loyalty. That she admired in him. She loved his compassion that shone brightly in his face. When her scent came to his nose during the thrall event, he was happy, and didn’t even bother with the other girls. He had told her they were fated-mates, that their union would be the start of something great. He had loyalty to her, and from there her loyalty to him grew.
 
He touched her tummy, glad that she would one day bear his werepups.

Chapter 5

“I need your help.”

“Why would I help you?” said Rila perched on a rock.

“I need to free Asch.”

“That’s Ludacris. Even for you,” Rila said.
 

“Why would it be Ludacris? You know I love him. And I need your help!”

“Love? Is that what you call it? I don’t know anything about love.”

Yet, she does, and Cynthia was certain of it. Female werewolves shared the same emotions as human females. They were remarkably similar, except for the fact that female werewolves were infertile. They felt compassion, love, and, interestingly enough, they yearned to be motherly to werepups.

“And besides, you have a new alpha now.”

“He’s not my alpha yet. Asch still lives. And he needs our help!”

Rila stayed perched on a rock looking out the distance.

“Too late now. Thane wants him dead. And he’ll be faced off with one of the most ruthless longest living brewed wolf”

“Brewed?”

“Don’t tell me you haven’t figure it out?”

“Figured what out?”

“Listen. What I’m going to tell you can get me killed. I don’t care much about whose alpha I serve, I just want to live.”

Rila jumped off the rock and started walking. Cynthia trailed behind her like a daughter to a mother.

“Go on..”

“Thane had been using an ancient aggression techniques that had been outlawed for many moons.”

“Which technique is that? I know many aggression techniques…”

“You don’t know about this one.” Rila said as she finds another rock to perch on.

“You saw the prison right? Did you notice how many of the cells were empty?”

Cynthia cleared her throat. Something was indeed eerily odd about having many cell with no prisoners.

“Thane keeps the prisoner’s there and,” said Rila as she glances behind them to make sure nobody was listening, “tortures them.”

Cynthia leaned forward, resting a hand on the rock that Rila stood on.

“It’s not just torture that he does, there is also an element of magic that he uses. It’s called brewing. He keeps them in the cells and ‘rods’ them. Don’t you see?” said Rila unsteadily.

Cynthia’s interest peaked. She’s never heard of rods used as a torturing device. In fact, werewolves were known to prefer swift kills of their enemies as opposed to slow death of torture.
 

“When a werewolf is in a cage, he is apart from his nature. He will naturally draw back. But with rods, which is just stabbing with a metal rod. The anger is continuous. Poking flesh time and time again builds a primal rage. Do you understand what primal is?”

Cynthia nods her head.

Mila continues, “Thane would ‘rod’ all of a captured pack in front of each other. Don’t you see how maddening that would be for a werewolf? To see his tortured…”

Cynthia listened intently, puzzling the facts of what she had seen, what her research had told her, and the cold words of Rila’s pronouncements. Werewolves treated their clan mates as blood relatives. To see them tortured in front of each other, coupled with unrelenting pain would indeed cause unfathomable psychological harm.

“Eventually this torture process would turn the werewolf into an animal. When they are in this state they could no longer be controlled. He would either unleash them in a new territory to decimate the local clan or…” It was as if her words made Rila unsteady as she jumped off another rock. “He would use them in wolf fights for his pleasure”

The understanding sent shivers down Cynthia’s body. She knew the exact physiology that rodding would do to werewolves. It was torture plain and simple. Sooner or later the animal part would come loose through the rage to consume them completely. From the little she knew about this technique, she remembered that the practice was completely banned in the world of the werewolf. Wolf fights, a banned practice, are one on one wolf fights that ended with at least one dead – with rodding this was a guarantee.

“There aren’t many werewolves left if you haven’t noticed. Thane doesn’t care about building an army, he just wants to see everything destroyed.”

Cynthia remembers the empty cells and wondered how many clans had been used to destroy one another.

“Then we have to do everything to stop him! And we start with freeing Asch!” Mila exclaimed. “Listen. What do you think will happen? Do you think Thane would stop at just Asch? He would run out of werewolves and would soon devour his own.”

“Yes, it was plausible. He’s an animal, so why wouldn’t he?” said Rila.

Suddenly Mila had a flash of inspiration and understood how to rescue her alpha from his predicament. She knew that wolves all followed rules. Rules of the pack. If you don’t follow rules, then you’re no better than an animal.

“As a female of this clan and breed mother you also have the responsibility to prevent this from happening!!” Cynthia started.

“But I’m just a female here” said Rila as her eyes darted to the horizon, “I won’t be able to birth any werepups.”

Aha! Cynthia had read about this in the wolf psychology books. She realized that Rila had the condition of ‘lone wolf syndrome’ that is that she has questions of her femininity, stemming from her inability to breed.

“Rila! You are a mother of the pack! You may not birth any of your own werepups, but you are still the mother of all the werewolves.”

“Mother of the pack?” asked Rila as she climbed on another rock.

“Yes, don’t you see? You have the responsibility to be a mother of the pack. All the other packs are gone, so you will now be responsible as a mother of all werewolves!”

“Do you want someone like Thane to be the alpha of a new litter of werepups? Do you think swaying in to the ruthlessness of what he’s done is the future of the werewolves? No. You do not. What you want to be is the protector of my werepups, birthed through my union, solidified with love and respect. I love Asch. And I want you to be the one to help me raise our new clan.”

She meant all those words. Cynthia had already analytically formulated a plan in her head. She was certain appealing to Rila’s desire to be motherly would yield results.

“So what would it be? Help me free Asch!”

“I can’t. I’m sorry.” Rila said as she jumped from another rock.