My Alphas: The Complete Series (6 page)

“But … I’m naked!”

Nia looked at her, nonplussed.

“That is why I helped keep you warm. Do you want to bathe now?” She spoke as though she were explaining something to a child.

Looking into her wide eyes, Cass felt her embarrassment drain away. Nia was trying to be helpful and she reminded herself werewolves didn’t have the same hang-ups people did.

She wasn’t a werewolf though so she sucked in her stomach before she got out of bed and put on her underwear and bra before pulling her soiled shirt and pants back on.

She turned around to see Nia standing there looking at her.

“What?”

“We’re going to bathe so you can get the dirt and sweat
off
you. Don’t wear those clothes.”

“I can’t go to the bath naked. People will see.”

Nia looked at her like she was speaking another language.

“I need to be covered up before and after bathing,” Cass said. Seeing the outright confusion on Nia’s face she changed course.

“Where are we going?”

“We have a hot spring near here. It is dying but it is still quite warm. Edon has given me permission to take you there.”

Cass wondered if “permission” was really “instructions”. Given how she smelt to herself she wouldn’t be surprised. To a werewolf nose it would be terrible.

“Shall we go?”

Nia held out her hand and Cass took it, getting jerked off her feet as the werewolf pulled her from the room.

Cass followed her down the winding tunnels, starting to get a sense of how they were laid out. It was a series of concentric circles and smaller tunnels connected them like spokes of a wheel. At least that’s what she thought. She wasn’t too sure she could find her way around alone.

They emerged from the tunnel into the main cavern and every wolf who was awake turned toward her, regarded her for an instant and then looked away. Except one: Rey. He was sitting up on a high shelf with two pale golden wolves lounging nearby, looking off into infinity.

Cass felt like she was at high-school. Seen, judged, dismissed as worthless. She held on to Nia’s hand all the tighter as they crossed the space. Before they exited the other door, Rey barked and two wolves stood up to follow them.

In the darkness of the tunnel, Cass felt her breathing start up and her heart slow down. She’d thought about werewolves for years, constructing elaborate fantasies but never had she considered the reality of living in a pack. An entire room full of wolves standing taller than she was with sharp teeth and keen eyes? Overwhelming didn’t quite capture the feeling.

When they emerged out into the late afternoon sun, Cass felt the touch of cool air on her skin. With the sun setting, the temperature would drop rapidly.

“Come Cass,” Nia said and shifted.

Although she’d seen it a few times now it was still an incredibly experience. In one moment a woman. In the next, a wolf. Nia knelt down and Cass climbed up on her back. The instant she was astride her, Nia took off, starting at a quick jog and then speeding up. Cass squealed at the sudden acceleration and did her best to hold on without pulling Nia’s fur too much.

They sped through the trees, Nia navigating them with ease. Cass heard noise behind them and turned to see the two werewolves Rey had sent running behind them. Although quiet in their own way, they weren’t able to keep up with Nia without breaking the odd branch.

Cass looked forward as Nia cleared a fallen tree, the buzz of excitement climbing her spine.
This
was one of the fantasies she’d had for a long time. Riding a werewolf through the forest. Of course she’d been naked, like a forest nymph and not wearing sweaty stained clothing. Still, it was an amazing experience.

The trip was over quickly though, Nia slowing down as they entered a clearing and Cass heard the sound of water. There was a scent in the air, the faint wisp of rotten eggs. In the clearing was a pool with a low rock wall built around it. Water trickled over the top, connecting to a stream.

Nia stopped and Cass dismounted.

“Ta-da!” Nia said after she shifted.

Cass saw the thin curl of steam rising from the surface of the water.

“Is it hot? Really?”

“Sorta,” Nia replied.

She walked over to the water and stepped in, sinking down into it up to her neck, completely unselfconscious. Cass looked around for the wolves who had been following them. They were nowhere to be seen but she was sure they were watching. She considered walking into the pool fully dressed (after all, her clothes did need to be washed she told herself) before telling herself she needed to get over it if-

if you were going to stay

Cass ignored that thought - although she felt she’d already made a decision she hadn’t told herself about yet - and in a burst of bravery stripped off her clothes and carried them over to the pool. She dropped them and then stepped into the water.

Nia was right. It was
sorta
hot. Compared to the cool air, it was wonderful and after not showering for three days it felt divine. Nia watched her as she sunk down to her neck.

“You have very large breasts,” she said, looking at them keenly.

“Um… yes.”

“They go well with your round butt. It would look strange to have a tiny butt and large breasts.”

Or it would be some extreme ideal
Cass thought to herself.

“Do you have trouble running with them?”

Cass could see Nia was genuinely curious and considered this might have been the first time she’d seen a real live human up close but the problem of running with boobs was nothing compared to Edon and Rey fighting over her.

“Sometimes,” she answered. “Listen - you were there today when the two Alphas started fighting. What was that?”

“We have been waiting for our Alphas to find a mate for many years now. It is very exciting, although sad one will die.”

She spoke as though it was a done deal. Cass wasn’t so sure. Her bold and ridiculous threat to come walking back into the pack territory… hadn’t been true. She was almost certain if she checked into a hotel with a hot shower and a hot meal she would’ve turned tail and left.

But now she was here and…

“They started growling at each other. They were going to fight.”

“Oh yes, that will happen soon,” Nia said, twisting water out of her hair. “One will kill the other and then take you as their mate. We hope they’re not too injured in the fight because then other packs will move in to claim us.”

“To claim you?”

“It is common for both Alphas to die. Or another Alpha will come and kill the weakened one.”

Cass looked away from Nia and down into the water. Her reflection was rippling in the fading light and the expression on her face matched her internal feeling: holy crap.

“But don’t you, like… defend them or something?”

Nia swam around behind her and started rubbing her hands on Cass’ back, getting rid of the collected grime. Cass tensed at her touch and then relaxed.

“An Alpha does not need defending. We defend our pack if attacked but if they challenge the Alpha, he must defend himself.”

Cass stared off into the shadows of the forest, forgetting to wash herself as Nia rubbed her hands down her back.

What had started her on this path had been a mad idea. There had been no grand moment, no crushing relationship breakup (although Cass had plenty of them for inspiration if she needed). There had been a slow accretion of events, a building of pressure that turned up degree by degree until one day she’d known she had to walk into the wild to find one or both of the werewolves who’d rescued her ten years ago. It was that or… non-existence. She might still look alive but inside she’d be dead. A nothing. So she’d given up her lease, sold her possessions and returned to where she’d first met them. What she imagined would happen next ranged from thanking them to… well, scenarios she’d only entertained in the dark of her room, under the covers.

But this… this was insanity. She’d found them, or they had found her, after only three days and they’d moved straight to killing one another so they could mate with her? And if that happened there was a good chance another Alpha werewolf could attack and try to kill whichever one survived?

“Edon said I could leave if I wanted to,” Cass said quietly.

“Oh yes, he is very reasonable. But Rey would not permit that. He’d kill you rather than let you go. They’re both under the thrall.”

Nia’s voice was light and unconcerned, as though she were discussing a shopping list rather than death and pack warfare.

Cass moved away from her, feeling very uneasy. She swam to the bank and pulled her dirty clothes into the water. She focused on scrubbing them in the warm water but it did nothing to ease her mind.

As Cass scrubbed, Nia explained the thrall. In all the werewolf books Cass had read, they’d very specifically said it wasn’t like human love but still it was easy to romanticize it. The way Nia told it, the thrall was more like a curse and that term was used interchangeably. It was dangerous and intense at the best of times. But when a werewolf was around his fertile mate, it could be downright lethal. Nia told her about Alphas who killed half their pack in the madness that came over them, just for doing the slightest thing that he perceived as a threat to his mate.

“And if the mate dies or leaves, the Alpha must often be killed by his pack because he will go insane. Which is hard because, you know, they’re Alpha for a reason.”

Nia looked at the alarm on Cass’ face.

“The Alphas are very strong and difficult to kill,” she added by way of explanation.

The sun was disappearing behind the mountains and although only her shoulders were out of the water, Cass shivered as the temperature dropped. The shadows between the trees darkened and it was easy to imagine some hungry beast in there, watching her. Given Rey had sent two werewolves after them, there
were
two beasts somewhere nearby.

“Can we go back now?” Cass asked, moving out of the pool. She stepped out, feeling the cold leech the heat from her body and squeezed the water out of her clothes. Half a second later she realized she had nothing to dry herself with and nothing to wear apart from the wet clothes.

Nia stepped out of the pool and ran her hands over her body, pushing the water off her and Cass was very glad for the dim light. Any girl standing next to Nia would look like a porker. Cass knew she wasn’t a… porker, so to speak… but she also knew there were a few too many treats and too few jogs in her past.

“Do you have a towel or something?” she asked, flattening out her clothes on the rocks so they would hopefully dry the next day.

“Oh yes! We have a towel! Get on!” Nia shifted and knelt down.

Cass looked around. The night was rapidly falling and she was naked and getting cold.

“Exactly how I imagined it,” she muttered to herself as she climbed astride Nia. They took off through the forest, back to the den, Cass holding on for dear life and thinking she must be the most jiggly nymph to ever ride through the night.

*

Edon led the hunting pack out into their territory, his mind leaping like a crazed rabbit.

He’d been called away from sleeping with Cass, much to his annoyance, by the return of three scouts.

The first two, Elen and Ravo, small female twins, had bad news: they’d spotted two werewolves from the Turo pack killing a human man ten miles from the den. That they would dare come so deep into Arctos territory was shocking in itself. Knowing they did it to plant another dead human was a whole different type of worse.

That type of worse came with the news the third scout, Kita delivered. Although raised by a pack, Kita learned human ways easily and was one of their most valuable spies. She spent weeks at a time living in the human towns, tracking those who would seek to track werewolves.

Growing up amongst the humans, Edon understood their insatiable need to collect information. They measured raindrops and counted chickens and followed the tides. To most werewolves it was part of the lunacy of humans but Edon understood it as the source of their power. They measured and
learned
and from learning,
changed
.

The news a group named Werewolf Safe World was pushing for dramatic restrictions on werewolves wasn’t new or shocking. But they were also pushing for
culling
, a weasel-word that meant murder. But not all werewolves, no - just the ones in Edon’s territory. They were using the dead humans found in Arctos territory as ammunition for their cause. Edon suspected they were connected to World Without Werewolves - an outright hate group with nothing short of genocide as their main agenda.

It all tied together too neatly to be coincidence. Edon had long suspected the Turo pack was behind the deaths and tonight they were delivered proof and the consequence of that in one tense meeting.

Although what his scouts told him was deadly serious, Edon had found his mind slipping back to Cass. He could still feel the softness of her body as she curled against him and when she’d stripped off completely, he’d almost lost his mind.