“I’m not asking you to give them a free pass. I’m saying, we could expand our pack with them. Diversify even more. The Breukelen is not like other packs. We care about those that come under our protection, even the humans in our territory. You told me that once.”
“I’m already paying the hospital bills for them.” I roll my eyes and put the now empty soft drink can back down on the desk top.
“Not enough.” I state with annoyance. “Money is not the answer here to this. They’re made of flesh and blood and they need us. They don’t know it yet, but they’re going to need us. Our pack, they’re going to need the Breukelen. You can not turn your back on the vulnerable without true reason of threat to our pack.”
“You don’t think lycans, in particular these two males, are a threat to the structure and reputation that’s been built up in the Breukelen’s name.”
“No, I don’t see how it can be.” I say tiredly looking around the walls behind him. My father pushes back from his desk. Pushing his chair back and standing up suddenly.
“And that’s why I’m pack leader and you’re not.” He said tilting his head to the side and looking at the office door.
He’s ending our discussion! I look back at the door and back at my father quickly. I’m being dismissed! His own daughter!
I sigh and walk towards the office door. Dismissal means he’s heard all he’s ever going to hear about the matter of including the lycans into our pack from me. I gave it a good go. I think he honestly tried to be open to the subject.
“You’re a great pack leader, but you’re not infallible. Anyone who thinks leaders are is naive.” The door handle turns easily in my hand.
“That’s the thing about great leaders, ultimately they are their own person and can make their own decisions and live with them. I always thought you were great because you built this pack on it’s core strengths. The biggest one, being true to itself and belief in unity. After all, isn’t that what being a werewolf is about? Unifying all that is human, and working with all that is werewolf, to make the individual the best they can be and to use the best in them for the pack.”
I turn to face my father as I open the door. A phrase appears in my head and I look at him, holding his look. “Een Draght Mackt Maght.” I say at him.
It’s the borough of Brooklyn’s motto. It means in unity there is strength. Maybe it should say and in ignorance there is bliss.
“They were attacked. It doesn’t make them bad and it doesn’t make me wrong. It’s just how people perceive us because they’re ignorant and stupid. That isn’t you. In the end you make your own way to where you want to be in this life, how you want to remember it.”
I turn and walk out not waiting for a response, not expecting one. What’s been done can’t be undone right? Years, generations of werewolf culture and thoughts drilled into an Alpha werewolf. What the hell did I honestly think I was going to achieve here? I’m lucky he so much as humoured me by having an audience with me.
By the time I reach my bedroom, my legs are shaking and it hits me just how defiant I was in there. Taking on not just any Alpha werewolf, but my pack leader, as the pack leader, not my father. My knees buckle and I reach for it to steady myself. I can’t believe he didn’t tell me off.
12
The next day, I find myself at the hospital and in the room of one of the males I’m fighting for to be included in our pack.
He’s asleep in a hospital bed that looks too small to contain his large figure. The sheets strapping him in, look inadequate.
He’s face has bruises on it, barely any swelling. His body is already healing from the benefits of lycanthropy in his system.
Aksel had told me he’d been watching the change in the guys appearance each day he was rostered on.
Said he looked vastly different now to how he did when he was initially brought in. The urge to lean down close to his face and inhale his scent was making me hesitate between getting closer to the bed and doing that just.
Or sitting down and observing him as he slept. I opt to sit down. I don’t know why I wanted to inhale his scent. To clarify maybe if he really was a lycan. To just see if I could. Can’t say for sure.
Both males were registered as John Doe’s. John Doe number one was the one I was looking at. I put my head in my hand and rested it on my knee, looking at him.
The poor guy he is being stripped of every ounce of his identity. What till he wakes and feels like he has no dignity or anything else.
The hospital doesn’t know who he is, and he doesn’t know he is likely a lycan now. Or what that means.
Talk about shit happening outside your control. Being attacked by a werewolf, had to be the ultimate in that scenario.
“Ben, no, Ben.” The sound of his voice in the otherwise utterly quiet room startles me.
I watch his head thrash from side to side as he mumbles something else before saying that name again. I start to stand, wondering if I should try and wake him up.
It seems like he’s having a bad dream, when he sighs lightly and I see his eyes flutter open slowly.
Brown eyes that focus on me. He blinks a few times and still those eyes, hold me. Staring at me. Trying to figure out who the hell I am, no doubt.
They wander around the room as far as he can see without turning his head. Checking out his surroundings before landing back on me silently.
I sweep my hair off my shoulder and straighten up. Standing up, I walk over to the bed slowly. I don’t want to frighten him. The focus in his eyes is sharper now and those beautiful brown eyes, with long eyelashes, sweep up my face and back down over my body. Taking me in.
One of us has to break the silence. Surely.
“You’re in a hospital, you were attacked. Do you remember that?” I ask and instantly regret saying that to him.
Why does those have to be the first words out of my mouth at him? He stares at me still. Saying nothing. Not that I can blame him. Who’d want to answer that question. It’s like adding another vulnerability to the long list of shit he doesn’t want to happen to him. I wonder if he knows the other guy, in the room next to his.
“I don’t want to alarm you. But you were muttering the name Ben.” His eyes widened as I speak “Is that the other guy’s name?”
He starts to shake his head and pull at the tight hospital sheets encasing him in the bed. Like he’s trying to escape and get out of…oh.
“You shouldn’t try and get up, you’re in no condition to..” But he’d already ripped the sheet back from his chest.
A hospital gown on this guy is doing him no justice what so ever. I can tell he’s a strapping guy. Maybe an athlete of some sort. Maybe a quarterback. He’s struggling with the sheets when he says “Where’s my brother?”
A gruff voice, almost hoarse in volume. But my hearing now, after having shape shifted is exceptional. People should not whisper near me.
“You should rest have some water.” I say spotting water jug on the nearby table and reach for it. I’m pouring a class of water when his hand shoots out, ever so fast and grabs my wrist.
His touch is warm, hot even, like he’s still got the fever, only he doesn’t look feverish anymore. Lycanthropy would probably amp up his average body temperature, bit like being a werewolf,
We operate a few degrees hotter than normal I think. But that’s not what tells me he’s a lycan, as if I didn’t already know. It’s the strength in his grip, as he holds my wrist. I’m stronger than most humans.
This guy feels like he could throw me the length of the entire room, with just a deft flick of that wrist letting me go.
I try not to panic. I don’t want to get thrown across the room. I don’t want to freak this guy out anymore than my presence already might have.
I will myself to look soft and unimpressive at him. I didn’t want to come across as ready to fight him should he flick that wrist and snap mine if he doesn’t throw me. Instead he pulls on it, moving me closer to him still as his nostrils flare.
&nb
sp; His fingers move so he can grip my wrist but expose the soft flesh on the inside at the same time. He runs his nose over the soft skin of my wrist.
Definitely a lycan, he’s scenting me. I let him. That’s practically instinctual in werewolves. We get someone’s scent and it locks into her memory and we can recall it, whenever we need to recognize them.
To identify them easily. His eyes dart back over me. He’s probably not sure what to make of what he just did.
Or maybe it’s me. The lycan part of him recognizing the scent of another wolf, but not one of his own.
“Uh, you’re brother Ben, he’s fine. He’s alive. He’s…”
“Not Ben, Hooper.” He gasps loosening his grip on my wrist before letting me go entirely.
He falls back against the pillows in his bed. He seems exhausted from our little exchange. “I’m Ben. Benicio.”
A smile plays across my lips. He isn’t without everything. Now he has a name. “Ben.” I repeat offering the glass of water to him.
My wrist is throbbing, burning from the grip he had on it. But I ignore that, because now I know his name and he has one. They will probably be a bruise later from it I suspect. I don’t bruise easily, but the burning sensation around my skin is a good indicator that there will be a bruise.
“Booker. Everyone calls me Booker.” He mutters sighing and looking at the water in my hand.
“It’s been a long week. When you were brought in neither of you had any identification on you, police figured…” Booker snatches the glass out of my hand quickly, without spilling it and sculled the contents of the small glass effortlessly.
“We’ve been in here a week? Where? Where’s Hopper?” He dropped the glass to his bed covers, not worrying about it.
And starts trying to sit upright again, this time, manoeuvring to the side of the bed I was on. “God, my mother. I have to tell her where we are, that we’re…”
“Whoa, big guy, Hooper’s next door. He’s still sleeping. He won’t be awake now but he’s doing just fine.” I step back when I realize how broad shouldered Booker is.
If I thought he looked big in the confines of the bed, he looks absolutely behemoth next to me, now that he’s trying to stand up. He has to be at least six foot.
He gets to his feet and pushes off the hospital bed. I don’t know how I’m going to stop him, or even if I have a right to.
The guy is probably confused and disorientated and now he’s trying to trip the IV drip out of his hand. Rather unsuccessfully and he’s getting frustrated.
I take another step back. The one thing I remember being told rather repeatedly about lycans is they’re have temper issues, like they rage, easily. To easily.
He ignores the IV drip and takes one step forward off the bed and collapses. Crumpling in on himself, like his body is atrophied, crashing the drip and holder to the floor with him.
I could hit the call button for an orderly to come in and help get him back in the bed. Or I could call out to my own personal body guard, who today will be played by my brother Aksel, that I managed to convince to wait outside Booker’s room, instead of follow me in.
One werewolf at a time is enough to deal with. Aksel charges in, through the door at the sound of the crash.
“It’s fine. I got him.” I state shooing him away. Aksel stands there, glaring at me, as if debating wether to actually pay attention to my command for him to leave. God damn, Alpha’s. They will do as they fucking please.
“He was trying to get out of bed, please, I got this. Really.” Aksel backs out of the room slowly.
“Call out if you need help.” He states.
But I think I need to test my werewolf strength. Before my shape shift, I thought it was pretty good. But things are better, ability wise, now that I’ve gone through the shape shift phase in my life.
I rush over as his eyes flutter shut again. He’s through the worst of the lycanthropy, but he needs to adjust to it in his system. Not that he knows that yet. My heart blows up at this thought. It’s not fair.
Booker’s eyes open again and fight to stay fluttering open as I reach for him. I wonder if he sensed the pick up in my heart beat.
Some werewolves can do that. Hear the difference in heart beats when they’re close to one another.
Or even the softest of breathing. He’s pushing his upper body off the floor. I get down and close to him, slipping my arm and shoulder under his armpit.
“Come on,” I grunt doing a squat and pushing upwards with my entire body. “Back to bed for you.” I lift him upwards and get him to a standing position on his feet. “Come on, help me out a little, I mutter pushing him towards the bed as he tries to stay awake and conscious of what’s going on. No matter, once I’ve got the bulk of his body on the bed, lifting his legs back up on it and straightening him up is easy enough.
I look at him stretched out on the bed and pull the side barriers up quickly, so he doesn’t accidently roll out. I get the pillows under his head again and drag the sheets, looser now, back over him so he’s covered up.
Maybe he’ll wake up and think it was all a dream. Which is probably for the best.
“And my work here is done.”
13
I open my father’s office door and walk straight in. Without invitation. A closed door usually means do not disturb or that he’s in a meeting.
As I walk in I see two other werewolves, associates of his there. He’s in a meeting.
“Bg, I’m in a meeting.”
“I don’t care. You need to hear me out on Booker and Hooper. Did you know that’s the two guy’s names? The two guys who have been fighting for their life in hospital for the past week. Hmm? ” I put my hands on my hips, looking directly at my father.
“No I didn’t know that, I was under the impression they couldn’t be identified.” His eyes go to my purple wrist. Yep, bruised in the matter of an hour. “What is wrong with your wrist?”
“Booker the lycan, grabbed it.”
“Are you..”
“I’m fine. See?” I say waving my wrist around at him. “I’m a little bruised, a soft tissue injury that will go away of it’s own accord or even when I shape shift next. No biggie. See?” I say continuing to waving my wrist about. “I’m still fine, I’m still alive and I’m still standing. See? I’m still the same as I was before I went to the hospital. I’m still me.”
“Bg, I’m trying to conduct a business meeting here, you’ll need to take this up with me later.”
“No. You’re going to do more than listen to me.” I state walking closer to my father’s desk. Both his associates rise from their seats automatically.
Ready to protect their Alpha from his ranting, angry daughter. This makes me feel good. That at fifteen, as damaged as I am, I could instil the idea of threat in two more powerful, older werewolves than me.
Werewolves who should know better. My father waves them off casually and they sit back down in their seats.
“You’re going to hear me on this matter.”
“Bg,” My father tries.
“They could be the same as they were before this, you don’t know what type of men they were. They can still be themselves, even as lycans. We can help them be that, instead of whatever the average stereotype lycan I’m told about all the time is. We’re Breukelen, we’re better than ignoring them. We can deal with them. We can help them, they can be who they are still, just like I am, just like you are, even though we’re werewolf’s.”
“Bg I’ve,” He sighs heavily, I know his patience is about to go out the window. But this is important. I need to get through to him.
“You just got to say yes, give them a chance. They haven’t done anything to us, to warrant us not giving them a chance.”
Perception Page 5