Leaving the pack

I didn’t know where to go or who to call for help, I literally had no one left in this territory or in the world. My mother had been cruelly taken from me by my own father and now I was all alone. Even if my father was alive at this moment, I knew that he would have never taken care of me the way my mother would, he would have probably kept good on his promise and killed me right after he killed my mother.

I was now deep in the forest and just didn’t know which direction to go, my mother was literally the only family I had. I knew for a fact that no other pack would be willing to take me in once they knew that I had killed my father who also happened to be the alpha. I had to find a way to try and make it on my own and the first thing I had to do was to suppress my wolf. I couldn’t do that on my own and so I had to enlist the help of my friend who was an oracle. She surely was going to know a way that I could use to suppress my wolf so that I could roam around without being detected and maybe I could even fit into the vampire community without my true identity being known.

I didn’t know much about vampires, the only thing I knew was that my mother was from the Southern clan. I knew that she had been banished after she was mated to my father and because her father was one of the Great elders they just couldn’t tolerate that she had chosen to accept a wolf as her mate. I actually respected my mum for taking a stand against being bullied into giving up what she wanted simply because of what her father thought and for who her father was,  but I just felt like my father had never been worth it and my mother was too in love and probably naive to even realize that. However, I still felt like my mother was treated better by her own kind than she had ever been treated by wolves and that was enough to convince me that even I was better off living with vampires than wolves.

I waited until the sunset before I made my way to the witch territory, I knew that I was still being hunted for by my father’s pack trackers and I knew that if I didn’t get a move on soon they would catch me by following my scent. However, now that I was in the witch territory  I knew that they wouldn’t dare to enter in search of me out of fear of starting a war between the two territories. It was never a good idea for a pack to start a war without an alpha let alone a war with witches that had had their eye on this pack for the longest of time. I was well aware that my father’s death didn’t mean that the pack had suddenly become weak, it only meant that there was a window period where there would be complete chaos in the pack, and anyone who wanted to attack the pack could use that to their advantage. However, I also knew that my father’s death was going to be a well-hidden secret until another alpha was appointed for the pack

As soon as it was dark, I made my way towards the Iyana’s hut and hoping that none of the witches had seen or picked up my scent yet. It wasn’t that they were not used to me being here but rather it was just that they refused to accept my friendship with Iyana. However, they didn’t have a choice but to accept it because she was the only great witch that they had and they needed her. She once told me that she had told them that if they really valued her they would accept my friendship with her because she valued my friendship and she kind of felt indebted to me. Despite all this, I still didn’t feel comfortable being around the witches because thanks to my wolve’s sharp ears, I could always hear them whisper horrible things about me amongst themselves.

When I finally reached Iyana’s hut, I knocked on the door as quickly as I could hoping that she would answer the door before anyone else noticed that I was there and thankfully she did.

“Amber… what a pleasant surprise,” she said as she opened the door but I stormed into her hut and she shut the door behind me

“You look like you just saw a gh…” I interrupted her before she even finished her sentence, this was no time for me to make small talk. I was panicking and I was scared out of my mind.

”I just killed my father..” I said and she just stared at me in shock

“You just did what?” she asked me as if she hadn’t quite heard or understood what I had just said to her

“He killed my mother and was about to kill me too, I had to defend myself,” I said even though that was a half-truth, it was a half-truth because I killed my father in an attempt to save my mother’s life, an attempt that had failed dismally.

“Okay I understand now, you are here because the trackers are pursuing you?” she asked and I nodded

“But you know I can't keep you here” she pointed out and I nodded, even if she could keep me here I wasn’t sure if I would be able to stay in a territory that was overflowing with witches.

“That’s not why I am here,” I said “I need you to help me suppress my wolf because as long as that side of me is dominant I will always live my life on the run and looking over my shoulder. I need you to help me awaken my vampire side and I can embed myself in my mother’s former territory” I said and she raised her eyebrows in shock

“Correct me if I am wrong but are you saying you want me to help you kill your wolf?” she asked me

“Can you really kill it?” I asked her with raised eyebrows and with a little hope in my voice, I was really hoping that she would say that she could do it.

“Unfortunately I can’t do that, and the spell that I can perform for you will only be effective if you are away from wolves but will be broken once you meet your mate and that is if he is a wolf,” she said and I felt like she had just poured water on the fire of my dreams

”I don’t even want a mate at this rate” I whined and she laughed

“Unfortunately I don’t think that is all up to you, but I will do what I can to help you,” she said “but because I don’t want to be responsible for you not meeting your mate I will only be able to help you with a spell that can be broken, I won’t do any permanent changes to your destiny,” she said

“I mean not that I can” she added but I knew she was lying, there was very little that Iyana couldn’t do

“Thank you for your help,” I said teary-eyed, I may have been feeling like I had nobody left on my side but Iyana was more than enough because at this point we shared the same hatred for wolves.

“Don't mention it” she said signaling me to come and join her in the circle that was drawn in the middle of her room.

She started whispering some incantations but eventually, she started getting louder, and the circle that we were sitting in started glowing. She suddenly went silent and for a little while it was just silence between us and I was tempted to ask her if I was supposed to be feeling anything at this point but I decided not to because I didn’t want to break her focus. I desperately wanted this to work out for me because I had already been through a lot with wolves and I was just ready for change.

With no warning or a chance to react I found myself in excruciating pain, it started as a familiar pain but eventually it got worse and worse and soon it was ten times worse than what it had felt like when it first began. The pain I was feeling was almost the same as the pain that I first felt when I turned into my wolf form but it was just so much more painful than I remembered my first time to be.

“Okay, it's done,” Iyana said as she got up and continued with whatever it was she had been doing before I came here

“Just like that?” I asked “I mean did it work? I don’t feel any different and I did feel like I was turning when you were doing your thing” I added and she laughed

“Of course it worked, I have never done a spell that doesn’t work,” she said confidently

“Okay then, now I have another problem that I need you to help me solve,” I said

“What is the problem now?” she asked me with a sigh

“How do I get to the Southern territory?” I asked her with pleading eyes, I really needed her to take me there and I knew I had already asked too much of her but she was the only one that I could count on and the only one that I could trust.

“Just so you know, they don’t call it the southern territory but the southern clan and if you want to fit in you are going to have to learn the way they speak” she said “I will drive you there” she said and I breathed a sigh of relief. Even though witches were living as they did in ancient times one thing they did keep up with was the convenience of cars.

“I know I just keep forgetting” I said as I got up and followed her to her car, if there was one thing that Iyana knew very well it was how cruel wolves could be when wronged and that was because she had experienced that cruelty first hand. And the worst part was that it was at the hands of my father which was how I met her.

Iyana and I met when my father tried to take over their lands and tried to kick them out, we met because I was advocating for them and even though I had gotten in a lot of trouble for simply standing with a witch and supposedly against my own kind, Iyana had noticed me and our friendship was formed. She had become a close confidant of mine and because she was a little older than me I also relied on getting advice from her a lot of the time.

We got into her car and she started the two-hour-long drive to the southern clan, along the way Iyana tried to get me to loosen up because she could see that I was very worried about what could have possibly been waiting for me. I knew, in fact, I expected it to be hard for the vampires to accept me as one of their own. I had grown up witnessing how rogue wolves were treated whenever they visited our pack and most times they ended up being killed or imprisoned only to be released into slavery. I prayed that this wouldn’t happen to me, and I hoped no one in the southern clan would recognize that I was my mother’s daughter because that would surely spell trouble for me.

“Well I will leave you here and I am sure you can walk the rest of the way. Vampires don’t really have problems with witches but I don’t want to push my boundaries” she said making a sad face

”I am really going to miss you and our chats, but I hope you stay safe and don’t get into any trouble if you do…just say my name three times and I will be with you,” she said with a wink and then we hugged.

I got out of the car and watched Iyana as she drove away, she was the last part of my past life that I had to say goodbye to and it was very painful to think I wouldn’t be seeing her for a while.