ALPHA PRIME MAGAZINE JUNE 15th, 202X ALPHA SYLVESTER (SLY) STERLING is the CEO of STERLING INCORPORATED and the current ALPHA of the SILVER CRESCENT PACK. INTERVIEWER: Tell me, Alpha Sylvester, how does it feel running the biggest pack on the West Coast without a permanent Luna? ALPHA SLY: Please, call me Sly. And It feels liberating, Joe. INTERVIEWER: But don't you miss the constant companionship that having a true Luna brings. ALPHA SLY: Not at all. INTERVIEWER: You've been using Rental Lunas since the break up of your marriage to ALPHA LUNA Alexis Greystone 6 years ago? ALPHA SLY: That is correct. INTERVIEWER: You two were once seen as the power couple on the West Coast. She was the daughter of the previous alpha, correct? Everyone thought you'd be together forever. ... ALPHA SLY: Except for her... INTERVIEWER: Do you care to explain...?
[Apple]I don’t remember much of the rest of the day. Beta Rudy carried me out of the office and brought me back to the apartment. I vaguely remember Hazel helping me into some borrowed pajamas right before she handed me a large cup of cocoa and tucked me underneath a large comforter on a small but cozy bed. The next morning I was almost my old self again.There’s a note on the nightstand. “Rudy called. He says you can take a day off of work.”Thank Goddess.Looking over at my phone, I check the date and time and a calendar message reminds me I need to sign up for classes. I haven’t paid yet, and I can’t sign up for classes until I pay. And even though I haven’t quit yet, I have no plans of going back to collect my check. Ugh! “What am I going to do?” I ask Hazel as I eat some leftover pizza from the night before. “I need the money, but there is no way I can go back to that place. It was terrible.” “Alpha Sly feels very protective of you. Alphas are possessive by nature, but the
Against my better judgment, I take his hand. It is warm and soft and as he guides me. I feel a rush of tingles that move along my fingertips into my arm and settle into my heart. His natural scent, like warm nights under the stars, soothes my nerves even as I tremble anxiously. He gives me a small close-lip smile. "Shall we go?"I nod, my throat dry, my heart beating rapidly against the cage of my chest. Following him back to his car I look up to see Hazel watching the street diligently. She waves and I decide to forgive her for being the type of person to push me out the door for a coffee date with a dangerously handsome beast. Sylvester opens the passenger side, and I buckle my seatbelt with shaking hands, still not convinced that this is a good idea. My body reacts strongly to him, a bit too strongly as I cross my legs, an uncomfortable heat building in my core. We drive in silence and I watch the neighborhoods change into densely populated urban spaces and then slowly melt away
[Apple] I don’t feel safe again until I’m on the other side of the apartment door and both locks are latched. Looking out the window, I can see that the wolf isn’t anywhere nearby. But I also don’t know where he is and that terrifies me too. There is something about this Sylvester Sterling that sets all of my nerves on edge. I can't tell if I'm attracted to him or afraid of him--another reason for me to hesitate. My life is complicated enough. “Hey stranger,” Hazel smiles from the couch as she crosses her legs and bounces happily, “How did it go?”She is almost aglow with joy as she looks at me, her sunny smile shining and her eyes crinkling. “Not as bad as I expected,” I throw the envelope and it lands with a loud clunk on the table just as my phone starts to ring. Startled, I reach into my pocket and almost drop my phone with fumbling fingers. Looking at the number I see it’s the college. They're probably calling me just to demand I pay my tuition or lose my spot. I don't reall
[Apple]“Your apartment?” I shake my head, confused. “But then where does Hazel live?”“Here with me of course,” he laughs. “Where else would she live?”I feel like I’m at the butt of some terrible joke. Did Hazel set me up to be embarrassed by her boyfriend? Did she lie to me and tell me this is her place with roommates?“The question is,” he finds his keys and holds them up, “Is why you are here. A strange girl in my apartment. Alone.” He tilts his head to the side. “I mean I guess I could just hold you here until you tell me the truth,” he smirks. The young man reaches around me and shuts the door and for a brief moment, our faces are only a couple of inches apart. The smell of crushed leaves and fresh rain wraps around me like a cloak just before he steps back. With his hands on his hips, he looks me up and down. “Are you really Hazel’s friend, or are you here for another reason?”“I have no idea what you are implying,” I stand straighter, finding a bit of courage. “And I don’t
[Apple] Within minutes of meeting the two beautiful young women who run the establishment, I had a part-time gig working the night shift at a catering company along with Hazel, who also works with them on major gigs. We have a big job tonight, and I’m promised that the tips are excellent. When they heard I had waitressing experience, they decided to assign me to work as an assistant bartender. “Oh, you are so lucky!” Hazel squeed with envy. “Bartenders get the biggest tips!” While the pay isn’t as good as Rental Luna, it will help me pay the bills and save a bit to eventually pay Alpha Sterling back for his generosity. With a new spring in my step, I feel hope for the first time in a long time. Hazel is like the sister I always wish I had. I’ve only known her for a couple of days, but I can already feel myself bonding to her as our friendship grows deeper. Until meeting her, I didn’t realize you could learn to care for someone so quickly. “So this is the biology department,”
[Sylvester][EARLIER TODAY]My eyes stalk her as she enters her apartment. The street smells of piss and shit, angry witches, and tired humans. It is a vile pit of a neighborhood near the waterfront in an area ripe for redevelopment. "We need to drag her back to the packhouse," Rufus insists. "This place isn't good enough for our Luna." "She isn't our Luna," I remind him. "Even if she chooses to sign the contract." "She is too our Luna," he snaps back, "Even if you refuse to recognize it. She is ours," he growls. "Mine." Rufus refuses to listen to reason. It doesn't matter how many times I say that she's too young, too weak, and far too human, he is insistent that I am wrong. But I can't have a human mate. No matter how good she smells.I take one last look at her apartment window, her gaze pulling my attention upwards. She is frowning, her brow furrowed.Sighing, I turn towards the harbor and begin my slow march back to the office. She'll come around, I'm certain. The offer I'm
[Apple] The only warning we receive is the flash of his glowing blue eyes. Faster than I’ve ever seen any man run, Sylvester Sterling crosses the distance from the shadows to our apartment stoop as a gracefully dynamic force, grabbing Hawthorne by the collar and slamming him into the wall near the door. “She is MINE!” he growls, his eyes glowing brightly enough to cast my friend’s face in harsh relief, deepening the shadows and highlighting the fear in Thorne’s eyes. “Alpha, stop!” I shout but it’s no use. Whoever is in charge, it isn’t Sylvester Sterling, even if he is dressed like him. “He’s my friend.”“He is an interloper,” his fangs elongate as he tilts his head to the side. “An invader. An enemy. You are MY Luna. MINE. He may not touch what is mine.”"Sylvester, look at me." The wolf turns his head towards me and his eyes slowly begin to dim. "Please listen. We are just friends. This isn't what you think it is..."“MINE.” The word is spoken with so much force that I can alm
[Sylvester]As she takes his hand and they walk up the stairs together, my stomach sinks and my heart feels like it has stopped. As I move towards the car, my leaden legs resist moving away from the place where I held her in my arms, the smell of our mixed scents calming me, relaxing something deep within. “We need to go get her,” Rufus insists. “She needs us.” “Maybe she doesn’t need us” I push back, “Maybe we are the ones who need her.”My phone rings. It’s the council. I don’t want to answer it, but I know that if I don’t they’ll make trouble for me one way or the other. Their message for me is brief, curt, and on the nose. They have a solution to all my problems. I just need to present myself IMMEDIATELY to receive their justice. Well damn. Calling Rudy, I asked him to pick me up and to bring the file he prepared earlier today. "We need to convince them that Apple is our best option," I explain.Rudy sends a car and the ride is silent as I make my way back to Sterling Inc. I'm
[Hawthorne]I was three drinks in when my great-grandmother swept into the tavern, her sudden appearance quieting every laugh and sob with the sheer power of her presence. Even the music seemed to disappear as the door closed behind her and she made a direct path to the bar where I sat surrounded by other lovesick witches mourning their losses over cheap beer. “Come with me child,” the old witch commanded in a voice barely above a whisper, as she leaned in. “If you want to help her, you’ll come. You aren’t doing either one of you any good moping around here.” She barely masks her disappointment as she looks me up and down. I've seen that look on her face before, every time that I disappoint her. Now is no different except for the rushed intensity of her movements. Her glare has the power to incinerate stone, so I moved quickly before there was nothing left to me than ash.The powerful Coven Mistress doesn't wait for me to catch up as she sweeps from the room, her cape billowing behi
[Apple]As I stand there watching my two closest friends hold one another, the ferocity of their embrace startles me. It isn't anything more than a tight hug, but the way their bodies mold to one another, his nose burying itself in her hair, feels more intimate than a simple kiss might have. My homecoming with Sly might not be much different if he came to me hurt as Rudy is now. I've known them both for a little while now, but neither have been known to show more than a passing respect and kindness towards one another. Now as I stand there, stunned, I realize there is so much about their everyday lives I know nothing about. Eventually, they pull apart, but before I can ask either one of them a question, Hazel yells and smacks Rudy hard across the face while carefully avoiding a large gash running downward from his eye."I thought you died in that courtroom," Hazel's hands seem to shake as she wraps them around her chest. She mumbles something else that I don't quite catch and Rudy s
[Apple]Despair is deeper than sadness--it is the feeling of no longer having hope. As I sob on the cold, hard ground, my body seizes with loss. What will I do without Sylvester? Is this little spark of life all that remains of my mate and our love? Will I end up like my mother, alone with a child, still in love with my mate but unable to be with him, mourning him for the rest of my life until I die of depression?Rudy falls to his knees beside me, shielding me with his body and grounding me in comfort as my body struggles to adapt to this new information. Sly is gone, missing. But that doesn’t mean he’s dead. I sent my wolf along the connection between my mate and me, and she came back with the report that the link is still there, but he is blocked somehow. “I can still hear Rufus, but it’s like he’s far away,” Astrea reports, disappointed but emboldened. Nobody is going to keep her from her mate. Her certainty that we’ll be reunited brightens my despair with the smallest flutte
[Apple] I should have known he’d be the one who would find me first. Of all the wolves in Crescent City, he has always been the one looking out for me. From the very beginning our bond has been strong. He really is the very best Beta a pack could have. “Luna,” Rudy gasps, doing his best to bow while holding his side as he leans against a wall. “Thank Goddess I found you!” Stepping out of the shaddows of the alleyway, the first thing I notice is that Crescent City has changed. Since stepping through the portal to arrive in my great-grandmother's shop, I've spent all my time back here underground in Haven. Haven, if anything seems even more bustling than normal, full to the brim with witches wanting to keep their families safe with the disaster happening live on TV. But here on the surface, everything is unnaturally quiet and still. The shop fronts are abandoned, stuck in a state of unchanging, forever trapped in sales from last month. The streetlights are blinking red and a few
[Apple] No. I can't breathe. There is no way that anyone in that room is going to survive. I'm going to be a widow before I have a chance to be a wife. The wolves holding whips jump to the front of the line at first, swinging like mad until one by one they begin to fall, and the remaining defenders, afraid for their own lives, turn tail and run in the opposite direction. But the cowards soon discover that all of the exits are barred, the bodies of the living dead, wandering, mindless rogues poisoned by some drug, push at every door and window. The courtroom is like a box of cookies, and the rogues already have their hands inside. It's only a matter of time before they are all consumed by those wolves' insatiable hunger. "This is April McKaine coming live to you from the courthouse," the frazzled reporter whispers into a camera whose cameraman has either fled or fallen. The camera is tilted to the side as she hides under a bench, her fine white suit blemished with dirt and bl
[Sylvester]The sting of Chancy's whip burns more than just my body--it sets fire to my mind, searing my soul as I fall into memories from an almost forgotten moment of my childhood. [18 years ago]We were a small collective, just twenty wolves. No alpha and no lands, so we couldn't be called a pack. We were all rejects, wolves that didn't fit anywhere else, so we were forced to wander from pack to pack, begging for whatever charity they might have. For lack of a better term, we were rogues. My mother tried her hardest to make the best of things but I could see it wearing her down. My father had been her fated mate, as unfortunate as that was for her because he was an alpha and could afford to reject her. She, on the other hand, couldn't handle the separation, and while she kept up a brave face for me, after three years away from our pack, a place I can't even remember, she had withered, her omega body unable to handle the strain of a broken connection. So like many of the other ro
[Apple] Every day I watch my mate dragged into that courtroom and placed on that podium, center stage in a ridiculous farse of a fair trial. Sylvester never stood a chance of defending himself. His fate was sealed before he stepped foot in that room. Despite Sly Sterling being a werewolf, all of Haven is watching the proceedings with bated breath, and while there have been some comments about how the wolf "deserves whatever foul future he receives," there are more voices saying "His mate is one of us and he stood by her." When I walk around town, people recognize my face from the proceedings and bow in reverence. The girl who is a witch and dared to love the Alpha King--Granddaughter of the Coven Mistress and a Thorpe! Such a prestigious background with such powerful allies. In a way, he's become a bit of a hometown hero. One of Crescent City's own defending the rights of all of us, not just wolfkind. "It's time," Thorne, turns on the television. The screen focuses on a
[Alexis]I've been trying to keep him safe, and still, he chooses her. That weak, sniveling, useless girl. She doesn't know how to be a Luna, she hardly knows how to take care of herself. What is the use of having so much power at your disposal if you cannot use it as it is intended?I can't let my uncle see the rest of this footage. "Erase it," I tell my old delta, "Wipe the record clean. Nobody should see this...ever. Do you understand?""Yes Luna," he bows, still loyal after all these years away. "As you command."I have given Uncle Chancy an edited version of the tape from the clinic where the botched procedure created the opportunity we needed to finally topple Sylvester. The footage shows Apple strapped to the table. It shows her idiot human boyfriend demanding that she be cut without anesthesia. Fool. If he had just been more patient, and let things happen as they should, she wouldn't have awakened. The light that shone from her immediately grew so bright that it blinded the
[Sylvester]The first day of the trial was long and ardorus. I am exhausted mind, body, and soul. Several alphas came forward, each with their own evidence against me. The first, of course, was Clancy, who presented the case, standing up in court declaring he had proof of my guilt, that I've broken my bond as Alpha. His testimony was followed by the head of Rental Luna and the Alpha from Arc de Lune. All saying the same thing. "Alpha Sterling forced us to lie. His Luna isn't a real wolf." My status as Alpha is tenuous at this point, awaiting the end of the trial. Although nobody in the courtroom doubts the conclusion--I will soon be a rogue again. The march back to my cell was solemn. The room that they placed me in was in the basement of the city center, where all the criminals were housed as they awaited trial. Due to my status, the guards shoved me into the corner cell, one that looked more like a room and less like bars and bricks. "For privacy, " the guard explains, "Due to yo