Wolf Marked by Alexis Calder
4
A door slammed and I sat up, fully awake, heart pounding. A man yelled, then my mom yelled and something crashed against a wall. I scrambled out of bed and unlocked my door. Just as I stumbled into the living room, the front door to our trailer slammed shut.
My mom was standing in front of her open bedroom door in a ratty bathrobe. Her red hair was a mess and she had lipstick smeared on her mouth. The streaks of her mascara running down her face gave away the tears even if she wasn’t crying now.
“You okay?” I asked.
My mom turned away from the door and looked at me. Her eyes widened as if noticing me for the first time. We often went weeks without speaking about anything other than her cigarette stash. It was like we were roommates rather than mother and daughter. It suited me fine. She’d given up on me and herself sometime around fifth grade. I’d tried to pull her out of the funk for a while, but eventually I gave up and got a job and bought my own groceries. Shortly after the power went out for the first time, she started having male visitors over and the power went back on. I knew enough not to ask questions. She’d shut me out and she wasn’t the same mom I had before.
“Mom? Did he hurt you?”
“No, it’s fine, everything is fine. It’s a full moon tonight. You know how they get,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“How’s work?” She tied her robe closed and walked into the tiny kitchen.
“Fine.” I wasn’t sure what she was playing at. We never talked about anything anymore.
“Coffee?” She picked up a bag of grounds and held it up.
I nodded then stood there in silence watching her go through the motions of adding the filter, scooping grounds, and filling the pot with water. I knew she made herself coffee every day, but I was usually at school when she did. When I got home, I’d drink the leftovers over ice and dump the grounds.
“You’re leaving tonight, aren’t you?” she asked without looking up.
The coffee pot gurgled and sputtered as it percolated. I tore my eyes away from the appliance to look at my mom. She was a mess and it hurt a little to see her like this. I’d gotten good at blocking it out and reminding myself about how badly she treated me the last few years. But there was something about knowing it was time to say goodbye that made you view things differently. I felt sorry for her. She’d been handed this life without choice. She wasn’t the one who fucked up, but I couldn’t stay here. Not even for her. There was nothing I could do.
“I’ll leave as soon as the magic lets me out,” I said.
“Good,” she said.
“Will you be okay?” It was a question I’d wondered about a few times but always stopped myself from asking. She wouldn’t be okay and we both knew it. She’d have to start taking better care of herself and I wasn’t sure she could.
“Don’t worry about me,” she said.
“I’m not going to come back after I go.” I wasn’t sure why I told her that, but it seemed like she should know.
“I hope you never do.” She forced a smile then turned to the cupboard and pulled down two coffee mugs. She set the mugs on the counter and then pulled the coffee pot off and filled each before handing me one of the cups.
Just like her, I drank my coffee black. Probably because milk and sugar were luxuries that weren’t really necessary when you had a limited budget. It took a while for me to adjust to the bitter taste when I was younger, but now it was a staple in my life. One of the things we had in common.
“You were never meant to be in this place,” she said. “You’re too good for all of these wolves. I’m sorry I got you stuck here.”
My brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
She let out a long breath. “Your father wasn’t from around here. I left, I had a life. A good one. But after I got pregnant, I was scared and I came back. When I arrived, my dad was a mess so I stayed to help. I never planned to stay but you came early, and the magic took hold of you. If I left, you’d have been stuck here.”
“I don’t understand,” I said. “I thought you’d always been here.”
“It doesn’t matter. The fact that I returned erased any good I had from my time away.”
“You’ve never spoken about my father before,” I said.
“He’s probably long gone. He didn’t even know I was pregnant with you.”
“Was he a shifter?” I asked.
She nodded. “He never knew our secret. I was scared he’d find out you couldn’t shift and he’d disown you.”
“It couldn’t have been worse than growing up here, Ma,” I said.
“Trust me, there are things worse than Wolf Creek and the suffering we had here.” She sipped her coffee. “You’re better off without him.”
“That doesn’t make any sense. He wouldn’t have even known I couldn’t shift until I was nineteen. I’d have had a whole lifetime to feel loved and safe. How could you deprive me of that?” All the good feelings about my mom were gone now. Why would she do that to her unborn child and how had she kept this from me all these years?
“He would have known far sooner and things would have ended badly for both of us,” she said. “Promise me, you will never go looking for your father. He’d bring you nothing but pain.”
“How could I? I know nothing about him,” I said.
“Good.” She walked out of the kitchen and paused in front of her bedroom door. “Be safe out there.”
I was still standing in the kitchen with my untouched coffee when she closed the door behind her. “That’s it? No goodbye?”
It wasn’t like I expected anything touching or memorable, but I expected something other than this. What was I supposed to do with this information? Why tell me about my dad now? And how the fuck could living with a father and mother outside of this shit hole be worse than having the crap beat out of me every week?
Furious, I set the cup on the counter and stormed back into my room. It was time to go. I wasn’t sure when the magic barrier would let me pass but I wasn’t going to wait here. My guess was sometime after moonrise, I could walk right out of here but I could use any head start I could get.
Quickly, I made myself a peanut butter sandwich and grabbed a bunch of snacks to get me through the next couple of days in case Wolf Creek was a longer walk from civilization than I knew.
That was another shitty thing about this place. I had no idea where we were geographically. I knew we were in the United States and that we got mild winters with some snow and hot summers, but other than that, I was clueless. I could be days away from a hotel or I could walk right into a bustling metropolis. No matter how many adults I asked, nobody would tell me the details.
I was done with the secrets. Done with the magic. I was going to find my way out of here and start living my normal, boring, human life.
When I stepped out of my door, I was greeted by three familiar faces. Tyler, and his two best goons, Julian and Kyle, were waiting right out front of my trailer.
“How am I supposed to avoid you when you show up at my house?” I demanded. “I’m not in the mood for any of your games, Tyler.”
“I had a feeling you might do something like this. You're going to run,” Tyler said.
“I told you I was going to run. That was always my plan. You knew that. You're the one who told me to do it.” I glared at Tyler, totally confused and super pissed about the way he was behaving. What was going through his head? He told me to get out of here. And he told me to avoid him. Yet, he shows up at my house first thing in the morning on the day of the First Moon Ceremony. Every interaction I had with Tyler was getting more confusing by the second.
“My dad says everyone has to be at the ceremony or it’ll displease the gods. I'm here to make sure you attend.” Tyler, to his credit, looked like he would rather be anywhere else but standing here playing errand boy for his dad. I wished the same could be said about his friends, but their grins and tense body language told me they were hoping I wasn't going to go down without a fight.
I had two choices. Try to fight all three of them and lose badly, or agree to go along with it. There was a possibility I could still run if they didn’t stick around to babysit me.
“Fine.” I took a step back, giving some distance between the three of them.
“I'm supposed to bring you tonight. You're the only one that might ruin it.” Tyler moved closer to me, his expression serious.
“After a week of warning me to stay away from you, you want to spend more time with me? What is it, Tyler?” I probably should have kept my mouth shut but in my defense, I was already out of this place in my head.
“What is she talking about, Ty?” Julian asked.
“Keeping me away from your friends, too. What the fuck is going on, Tyler? Is this really about your dad?”
“Don’t push me, Lola.” Tyler growled.
“Tyler, teach her some manners,” Julian said. He inched closer to me and I could practically feel his wolf pacing. The thought startled me. I couldn’t communicate with the pack the way the others could. I’d heard we could sense wolves, feel emotions, connect in ways humans couldn’t. But that was never an option for me.
I shook my head, trying to send the confusing thought away. It had to be in my imagination.
“If she’s unconscious, she can’t participate. My dad was clear that she has to be there. All the new wolves do,” Tyler said.
“She’s not a wolf. She’s not even a human. She’s an abomination and she shouldn’t even have been left alive,” Julian said.
I’d heard the words my whole life but they stung more today for some reason. I was so close to getting out of here and this was exactly why. Usually, I could use the hatred thrown my way as fuel, but today there was already so much unwanted nostalgia.
“I told you, she’s still connected to the pack,” Tyler said. “My dad said she can’t be killed before the ceremony, or it could threaten the pack.”
My brow furrowed in confusion. We’d had tragedy in our pack before. A few years ago, a few kids from school had drown in the swimming hole. They were seniors and I was a freshman. Of course I knew them, but we weren’t friends. Not that the age difference was the cause of that but that’s not the point. The point is, they died within months of their first moon ceremony and nothing bad had happened. I remembered the older folks talking about how tragic it was that they were almost to their first shift. Most people seemed to think they’d have survived if they had bonded with their wolf.
Tyler was lying. They’ve never needed all the wolves before. Besides, there were only two of us who were shifting this month. Aside from me, only one other classmate had a May birthday and turned nineteen right before tonight’s full moon. And I knew for a fact, she would not care if I wasn’t there. She’d likely prefer the spotlight.
Something was going on and I needed to get out of here before it went down. “Alright. I’ll hang out here and meet you at the barn at dusk. Work for you?”
“Sure.” Tyler walked over to the shabby porch swing in the dirt next to a dozen abandoned pots and containers that used to hold flowers before my mom snapped. He sat down. “We’ll wait.”
“You’re kidding me, right?” Then I realized I could sneak out the back door if he was camped out here. “You know what, not my problem. I’m going to take a nap. You assholes knock yourselves out.”
I walked back into the trailer and glanced toward my mom’s room. Her door was still closed and there was no sign that she was aware that I’d been outside talking to anyone. I rolled my eyes. What had I expected? Her brief moment of lucidity this morning was the deepest conversation we’d had in years.
Making sure my bag was secure behind my back, I walked for the back door, taking care to open it slowly. The hinges creaked and I winced at the sound. I didn’t get a foot out the door when I realized Julian was standing outside staring at me.
“Unless you’re coming out here to offer to blow me, I’m not letting you leave this place,” he snarled.
My upper lip curled in disgust at the thought of doing anything remotely intimate with him. Julian was attractive, sure. He had long brown hair, warm brown skin, and deep amber eyes. He was the kind of male most of the girls in school would do just about anything to get even one night with. Especially after he shifted. He was marked as a protector, one of the highest ranking wolves in a pack. The crescent shaped tattoo had appeared on his shoulder the night of his first shift. He’d be in Tyler’s inner circle when Tyler took over as alpha; he might even be his beta one day. Julian had shown everyone who walked by the mark after his shift, eager to impress even lowly nobodies like me.
He’d only calmed down after the next full moon, the one where Tyler had his first shift. Julian was first, then Tyler. Everyone expected Tyler to get the mark of the alpha. He never said if he did or didn’t, but he didn’t go around showing off anything after his ceremony and Julian stopped showing off his mark.
It was something I’d poked Tyler about at first, even though it cost me a few beatings. It had been worth it to find out the truth. Tyler, next in line to be alpha, hadn’t been chosen by the gods. If he had, he’d have shown everyone his moon and star tattoo. It was a mark that would appear when an alpha was chosen. Not all alphas got one, but that mark outranked an alpha without one.
That meant, one day, another shifter could get the mark and rise to take Tyler’s place as leader of the pack. A marked alpha didn’t even need to fight to the death; they would just take their place and demote the previous alpha.
In my lifetime, I’d never seen that mark. I was fairly certain Tyler’s dad didn’t have it either. I used to wish someone would challenge him so Tyler’s status would drop, but I gave up on that long ago. It wasn’t my problem. By the time someone did challenge him, I’d be long gone.
“What’s it going to be?” Julian said, moving closer to the door. “How wide can you open your mouth?”
“You’re disgusting,” I said.
“Why else would Tyler ask you to stick around if you’re not putting out?” Julian asked.
“I’m not fucking Tyler.” I wasn’t fucking anyone. Like there was anyone in this pack I was willing to get into bed with. Sure, I had desires just like everyone else, but they were mellow compared to shifter libidos. I’d walked in on classmates in the library more than once. While I might get myself off on occasion, I could wait until I was home and my door was locked.
At least that was one good thing about this curse. I couldn’t imagine having sex with any of the assholes around here. We didn’t have the concern of STDs like humans did, but I wasn’t about to risk pregnancy.
“There are other things a woman can do besides fucking,” Julian said. “I’m sure you learned a lot of tricks from your mom. My dad says she’s like a wolf in the sack, even if she can’t shift.”
Heat filled my chest and I balled my hands into fists. “Don’t talk about my mother, you piece of shit.”
“I can talk about your mother all I want. In fact, maybe I’ll take a turn of my own. I was hoping you’d join the family business and I could finally wipe that smug grin off your face with my cock, but you mom would work, I suppose.”
“Go home and fuck your own mother,” I snapped. “At least my mom is honest about what she does. Your mom is the one hiding in alley ways and sneaking around. We all know she keeps the alpha’s bed warm while your father is alone.”
Julian charged so fast I didn’t have time to slam the thin door in his face. His six-two, muscular frame was on top of me, knocking me to the ground. My arms were pinned to the floor, his knee on my gut. I squirmed, trying to angle myself better so I could kick him in the groin, but I couldn’t budge from his grip.
“Let me go,” I hissed through gritted teeth.
“Not without something for you to remember me by.” He switched his grip so one of his large hands was holding both of mine, freeing his other hand. He traced a finger down my cheek to my jaw before his hand closed around my neck. “You mutter so much as a single sound and I will snap your tiny, human neck.”
“Julian, get off her. Now.” Tyler’s voice had all the command of an alpha. Even I couldn’t help but look up at him.
Julian’s hand left my neck and released my wrists. He jumped to his feet, turning to face Tyler.
I sat up. “This is what you had planned? Let your friends throw me around one last time?”
Tyler didn’t look at me, his gaze was locked on Julian. “I told you not to hurt her. I told you we needed her in one piece.”
“I wasn’t going to hurt her,” he said. “I was just having a bit of fun.”
“You touch her again and I will break all of your fingers,” Tyler said.
“So you’re the only one who gets to hurt me, huh, Tyler?” I don’t know why I said it, but it was like something had snapped. I was on my feet now and Tyler still wasn’t looking at me. “You bastard, answer me.”
He looked over at me and I could see the anger in his eyes. He was furious. The look was enough to send a little shudder of fear through me. There was a warning there that I hadn’t seen before.
I recoiled and took a step back. “Leave me alone. Both of you.”
Tyler grunted. “Out, Julian.” He pushed his friend toward the door before turning back to look at me. “You stay here and you don’t leave. I will take you to the ceremony and then you won’t be my problem anymore.”
Julian and Tyler walked out the door, slamming it behind them. As soon as they were gone, I took a breath, letting my guard down a little. My whole body was shaking and I was near tears. This was never going to end. As long as I was here, I was a target. I was going to end up just like my mom or worse. I had to get out of here but I needed to do it on my terms. I had no idea what game Tyler was playing, but I wasn’t sure how much more I could push him.
I had no choice. I’d wait here and go to the stupid ceremony and when everyone else shifted and ran in the woods, I’d run the other way.
